[FREE 2019 GUIDE] 9 Ways You Can Instantly Increase Online Sales on Your Website Today

The first time I built a website, I had no idea what I was doing.
In fact, I was around 14 years old, and I knew little more than it just needed a few pages, like a brochure, with some basic information and contact details. I also didn't know code, at all.
Strangely enough, that project fell through.
Despite this, I still knew I wanted to figure out websites, how they work, and how to help people grow their businesses. So I kept at it.
Over the next few years I picked up the experience I needed to figure out exactly the tactics, psychology and skills the best implement in their digital marketing.
Enough about me.
Let's talk about your business, your website, and how to get the very most out of it, so that's it's not just another 'digital brochure' (there's a lot of those already).
Are you ready to learn how to increase your sales and leads on your website, instantly and easily?
Grow your business with these tried-and-tested techniques and tweaks that help create more business for you online
First things first, get the right mindset
This is something that every good digital marketer understands:
Don't spend your time and effort trying to get your potential customers to understand your business.
Spend the time making sure you understand them.
Sounds obvious, and maybe a bit strange. I know.
What I mean is, the crux to all marketing is relating to your customers.
It's showing them that you know what they want, the problems they have, the pains they face, and how your product or service is the solution they need.
You need to show them why they value and want what you already offer.
They should instantly understand 'what's in it for them', and why they should believe that you're the answer they're looking for.
Put simply, some examples:
I don't need 'plumbing services'. I need someone to fix my leaking tap or cold shower.
I don't need '20 years of car repair and maitenance', I need my buckled wheel changed.
I don't need 'Architectural drawings using the latest techniques'. I just need help drawing my new home extension.
This perspective may seem obviously important, but it's the key that we should always refer back to, to check if we're meeting the needs of our audiences.
Okay, let's get going.
Customer Benefits Are Clearly Noted - Preferably in Bullet Points
What's in it for me?
That's what your website visitors are thinking.
Their (our) attention spans are so short these days, you need to immediately get their attention with exactly the benefits they're looking for.
Some generic examples of the benefits might be:
- Quick service
- Easy process
- Affordable pricing
- Fast delivery
- Money-back guarantee
- Next-day delivery
- Free shipping
- Tailored service
But, you do want to be specific to the problem where possible.
So, if you were a plumber, it'd be:
Get Your Leak Fixed in 1 Hour or Less
New Shower Units Installed Quick, Easy and for Affordable Prices
We Fix Most Blocked Drains in Less Than 30 Minutes
From Leaks to Blockages to New Installations: Affordable, Friendly and Easy
The idea with most of these is that they all address common problems that are specific to the audience. Try to use the examples above with your own business, play around with them, and let me know how you get on with them!
Your Headline is Value-Focused and Engaging
Are customers doing this when they land on your page (at least inside their minds)?
Much like your clearly-displayed benefits, you need to immediately grab attention with what the visitor values.
Quickly and efficiently communicate the value of whatever you offer, so that visitors 'get it' right away, otherwise they might lose interest and continue scrolling through social media, or worse, through a list of your competitors.
It might be cost-focused, such as:
Your Ideal Garden is Closer. Grab 30% Off Your Next Garden Tool Purchase
Limited Offer: Your Case of Handpicked Wines 10% Off and Free Shipping
Save Up to X on Your New Car - Get the Best Offers from Dealers
It could also be more benefit-focused, for example:
Get Clear, Soft Skin in 3 Days with ABC Cream
Knock 10+ Seconds Off Your Mile With Our Running Training Program
54 Recipes for a Healthier but Tasty Diet: Reach Your Transformation Goals
Now, I know, these examples are all made up, and some maybe a little far-fetched, but the point here is to consider why people should care, and tell them this right away.
If you don't, you risk losing them entirely, if not just for now.
Your Page Contains 'Social' Proof and Accreditations
Most of us have heard of companies faking reviews on popular websites. This does happen, and we should be aware of it.
However, if you have authentic reviews, oftentimes most people can spot they're genuine.
So, flaunt them! If you're offering the best burger in your town and that one guy writes a rave review, share it with the world.
A lot of people decide to make purchases or work with other businesses primarily due to trust-related factors, such as referrals.
Having consistently good reviews online, that people can verify on their own too (not just cherry-picking the best ones for your website), is a huge bonus.
So if you can integrate them into your page you should do it. If you don't have many (or any), ask satisfied customers to leave an honest review.
Likewise, if you have industry or other relevant accreditations, add the badges or logos to your site.
In the UK, many tradespeople are required to have certain credentials, and can get more to show their expertise. Potential customers are looking for these all the time, to make sure whoever they bring on meets standards.
If you're not meeting standards, then that's definitely something to work on before this!
Where Do I Sign Up?!
If your offer, headline, benefits and social proof factors are all nicely put together, your target market should want to take some action.
Whether it's leaving their contact details for a follow up, or clicking through to a checkout, you should make that process so easy they can't resist.
Too often, people have tiny little text links, or buttons that don't stand out, or buttons with dull and generic text.
So many call to actions are so hidden, people can't find them if they want to sign up!
Don't be that person.
Make your button big (within reason), make sure it stands out (e.g has a contrasting colour to its background), and make sure the text is actionable or personable.
So instead of 'Submit' or 'Send Message' or 'Visit Checkout', try 'Claim Your 20% Discount' or 'Learn More About Your Workout Guide' or 'I Want Cheap Wine', respectively.
Even if they may seem a little 'in your face' or lame, even this simple differentiation between you and the 99999+ other sites out there makes the whole process so much more engaging for visitors.
There's nothing worse than a bored visitor to your offer page.
Your Landing Page Messaging Has Continuity
Did your whole deal and feeling change when they arrived on your website?
This comes up time and time again.
Whether people are finding you through Google or Facebook, or even from Flyers or Print Advertising, your landing page headline and benefits need to tie in very closely to wherever they came from that made them land here.
The offer, the benefits, even the product or service all need to match.
You'd be surprised how many companies create a great looking advertising campaign, only for visitors to end up on the website that is half-broken on mobile and the page is a generic page such as your 'Services' page or your eCommerce shop product index.
If you're advertising the latest technologies of your hairdryers that dry hair in two seconds, make sure visitors land on a page that showcases that, and primarily that.
Sure, let people have a look around other pages if they choose, but the focus should be there.
On the reverse, make sure you advertising campaign makes sense for the people you are reaching.
So many times I've seen an interesting advert online, only to click it and find out 'This offer is not available in your country/region/town'.
That's just annoying for the visitor, plus a waste of your advertising budget (much like men seeing TV ads for feminine products and vice versa - entirely wasted advertising spend).
Get the Tech Right!
If you're not technologically-minded, that's fine, but there's still a lot you can do to avoid technological errors on your website.
Key things are oversized images. Don't upload raw camera photos at huge sizes. Most images don't need to be bigger than 1500 pixels squared these days on the web.
If they must be so big, try an image compressor such as tinypng.com
Do a search for Google PageSpeed and plug your page in to see other suggestions on how to optimise your website. If using WordPress, there are plugins you can use to decrease load times.
So that's speed, what else?
Mobile!
Mobile is key today - making up at least 50% of most web traffic.
So if your site loads with tiny text, or is super-slow on mobile networks, you must work on this. Every commonly-used template-built website these days is mobile-ready. If not, there's a ton of great resources out there to help you get moving.
We're all guilty of it, if we can't scroll, swipe and zoom as we normally do on our mobile apps as we can on your website, we've quit and gone to the next thing.
Security must meet modern standards.
Don't let your security be like this guy
Primarily, SSL Certificates. These keep websites with any kind of forms where customer data is stored, plus other elements, nice and secure.
Many website hosts now offer these for free or at affordable prices, so get one installed; otherwise you get the dreaded 'Unsecured' badge on your site, which doesn't make you look trustworthy.
Unfortunately, you may not even need one, but it's another important standard to adhere to in the current internet landscape.

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SEO in Motion – Raising the ranking of an Animator in London, Robert Grieves
Creative Local Search Engine Optimisation - Case Study
When an agency or business are looking to have a new creative piece produced, they look for the best suppliers to shortlist.
Outside of recommendations, the go-to is of course Google.
For this reason, it's crucial that animator Robert Grieves appears in the right searches.
Read on for more information on how I helped this happen.
The brief:
Robert Grieves is an award-winning animator, having produced animated projects for brands includings Adidas, the BBC, ITV, British Red Cross, Samsung, RMT, the Natural History Museum, PBS and the 2012 London Olympics ceremony.
We had recently completed a brand new website for Robert, showcasing his excellent work in a more visual way.
Robert wanted to expand his reach by making sure he appeared in key search terms in London and the UK.
What I did:
After researching which keywords we wanted to rank for in Google and analysing the competitors, We focussed on the term ‘animator london’ as it had large amounts of traffic and other known competitors were ranking well there.
I reworked the page’s SEO elements, including headings, alt tags and meta tags, in order to include that search term or close synonyms.
We also made sure any mention of Robert Grieves in press articles and on social media linked back to the website where possible.
We also did have the added benefit that his domain was over 10 years old, which to Google shows his authority and helps rank the page once optimised.
Over the course of the next few months, we shot from somewhere in the depths of 9th page obscurity ranking, all the way to the first page.
See Robert’s email here:
“Just to say:
- Open Google
- Search "animator london”
- Results = first page!
VERY good work Jon. You can be proud.
Now let’s build on this!”
After that, we continued monitoring the site, and slowly we rose to the top spot.
Number one on Google for a competitive city such as London was a great result we were proud of.
Some time passed, and though Robert and I were both happy and he got a few enquiries from the site, we revisited it and decided to change tact.
I explained that maybe a ‘longer-tail’ keyword/phrase would be better.
The general rule for these is that people who are more serious about hiring or buying tend to be more descriptive and specific with their search queries.
We settled on a new focus of ‘freelance animator london’, and a little while after we had reworked the SEO content, we reached the top 5 on the first page again.
Some time on, Robert has recently moved to Sydney for a little while with his family, and our next challenge is hitting these kind of results down under! Stay tuned for a future update.
The Results!

Took the website from around #100 to the #1 spot for broad term ‘London Animator’

Top 5 spot for more specific and relevant term ‘Freelance Animator London’

Significant increase in site traffic from Google
Curious about whether SEO can help your business?
Why not send me a quick note for a no-obligation chat on how I could help you and your business?
Top of the list! SEO for Architectural Solutions Practice Green Cu3ed
Local Search Engine Optimisation Case Study
Local SEO can be very important for a wide range of businesses offering services or retail sales to a geographic area.
Read on for details on how I helped move a company right up the ranks to get the results they need.

The brief:
Green Cubed is an architectural solutions practice with a focus on sustainable methodologies of building with many years of experience.
Founded by industry expert and specialist Jeff Radwell, Green Cubed operates in both the commercial and residential space.
Jeff approached me to discuss his ranking on Google.
He had made some initial efforts to help with ranking, but as his existing site was built on a limited platform, there was little else that could be done to improve results.
The website was very low down on search results, past the 8th page (or around 70th) for key terms.
After rebuilding the website with a more suitable, optimised foundation, we were able to look at ways of better ranking the site on Google for key terms.
What I did:
As a locally-focussed business, we looked at search volume data for related terms to planning permission, building regulations and architectural drawings.
We eliminated unsuitable terms from our targets, and looked more specifically at ‘long-tail’, descriptive keyword phrases.
We also analysed the competition, which is quite significant in this space.
We decided to focus on two key phrases for people further down the buying cycle on planning permissions and building regulations, with a focus on the local area.
I built two specific pages for each keyword phrase target, optimising content within the page and in meta tags and titles.
We also looked at building backlinks - Jeff helped to register Green Cubed with any relevant business directories within the area or the industry.
After a little while of monitoring and re-indexing on Google’s part, we gradually climbed the ranks to 1st position for one term, and the first page for the other.
In a relatively short time period, we managed to make a huge change to the ranking of this business on the world’s go-to information source, Google.
The SEO landscape is changing regularly, and we are currently working on some further plans for Green Cu3ed, so watch out for an update in the near future.
The Results!

Took the Green Cubed website from around #90 to the #1 spot for specific term related to ‘Planning Permissions’.

Ranked with a top 5 spot for another relevant term around ‘Building Regulations’.
What did they say?
"We had an initial brief where Jon carefully listened to my needs.
He was also happy for us to work together, in rebuilding my Architectural web-space and work on the dark art of SEO.
He was patient with my numerous minor tweaks and in developing the brief as the project grew.
Jon worked speedily and efficiently throughout, always available and I would not hesitate in recommending Jon to fellow professionals. 5 star service."
- Jeff Radwell, Director at Green Cu3ed Architectural Solutions
Curious about whether SEO can help your business?
Why not send me a quick note for a no-obligation chat on how I could help you and your business?
7 Fresh Marketing Ideas To Get New Osteopathy Clients

Regularly bringing in new clients is vital to your business success.
If you’re like most osteopaths, it’s likely that a bulk of your clients come to you from word of mouth.
Word of mouth referrals are fine when they happen frequently enough, and are the type of repeat clients you want, but they don’t come in regularly and you can’t rely on them all the time.
Would you like more clients that suit you best?
You might think that there’s not much you can do to ensure you consistently get new and ideal clients.
That’s not true.
There are people out there looking for your services every day, and you’re the one that can help them in return for their business.
So how do you get those new clients to ring the phone or send you an email?
Glad you asked!
Why should Osteopaths use digital marketing?
If you’re an Osteopath, the market can be competitive, with often numerous practices operating in a city or town, and covering a wider radius.
Because of this, you need to make sure you are doing some marketing activity so you make it onto the shortlists of your potential clients.
In the past, local businesses such as Osteopaths would advertise in local magazines, newspapers and maybe have leaflets posted through people’s doors.
These approaches can be expensive while not providing much return on the investment of your time (which is always valuable) and money. You also can’t find out exactly what you get back from what you spend.
Today, with everybody having smartphones and access to Google, everybody’s first point of call is hitting the search button and checking out the top results. They may also ask friends, consult social media, and check local online business directories.
This means you need to be appearing in those places people are looking!
Plus, even better, whether you invest nothing other than time, or you invest in some digital advertising, you will know exactly how much you’re getting back from your investment, meaning you can make smart decisions about where you best spend your efforts.
I’ve helped other businesses like yours fix up and increase their digital presence and generate new clients, customers or sales. I know that it isn’t simple to market your business, especially when it’s not your skill set or specialty.
Drawing on my experience, I’ve put together a fresh list of new ideas that you can use to bring in new business and stand out from the crowd.
Digital Marketing Strategies for your Osteopath Business
Get your notepad out, a cup of your favourite brew, and read on for your new marketing ideas for 2019 and beyond.
Osteopath Marketing Idea #1: Build a great website
If you haven’t got a website, you’ve got to start here.
This is your online home. It needs to work on desktop computers, phones, tablets, and everything in between.
Making sure you have a website ensures you are at least visible online, and allows potential clients to trust that you’re legitimate and professional.
Layout is important, and this is done best when it adapts to each screen size. A competent developer knows exactly how to do this, and it’s common practice.
You don’t want to try and fit very long lines of text on a phone screen, as it’ll be too small to read. You’d be surprised how often this is the case with local business websites, osteopaths included!
You also need to be sure that all of your details are correct and up to date. Don’t lose new business leads to old addresses or typos, that’s waste that nobody wants.
Osteopath Marketing Idea #2: Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
SEO is the practice of making sure your website is ticking lots of boxes for search websites, primarily Google, so that they can show you in the top results of user’s searches where you are relevant.
You should always make sure you at least have basic Search Engine Optimisations (SEO) in place.
This can be as simple as making sure your page titles are descriptive of the page’s contents, and any images are described with ‘alt tags’ in the code.
For example, you may choose to create a page such as your About page with a title of ‘ABC Osteopaths – Osteopaths in Cambridge’, and explain the other areas you cover in your text on the page. This will help search engines like Google know that you are relevant to people searching for ‘Osteopaths in Cambridge’ or whatever your town location is.
SEO is its own practice, and there are more advanced elements that a professional would be able to help you with, but at least ensuring you have the basics in place is a great start.
There are plenty of beginner’s guides to SEO out there, such as Moz’s one found here.
Osteopath Marketing Idea #3: Paid Digital Advertising (PPC)
As I touched on earlier, advertising online can be more targeted and bring about measurable results, so you can be sure exactly what you’re getting back for your money. That may come in the form of new business leads, engagement, page likes/follows, website visits or whatever your end goal may be.
The key difference in cost structure between putting an ad in a local newspaper or publication and running them online, is that you are (usually) only charged when somebody actually clicks on your adverts – that’s why it’s often referred to as Pay Per Click advertising.
The two most popular digital advertising options for small businesses are Facebook Ads and Google Ads.
Facebook allow you to advertise to potential customers in a very targeted, detailed way, based on various specifications such as age, gender, location, interests and much more.
For example, if running adverts to local residents for your Osteopathy business, you may choose to target people living in your town +3 miles, between the ages of 35 – 60, with an interest in health and fitness related things such as a gym company or Holland & Barrett.
The great thing about Facebook is both it’s hyper-targeted platform and the engaging content types you can use – so your ads can be in the form of just text and an image, or can include videos, carousel ads (which can show multiple projects or products), plus other types like Canvas ads which provide a rich content experience.
This makes for more engaging content that users will be more likely to interact with.
Google offer a different option which can also be useful.
First and foremost, the Search Adverts allow you to put together a simple text-based advert which show on search pages of your choosing, for example you may choose to advertise on the search term I used earlier ‘Osteopaths in Cambridge’.
Some search terms will have more competition from other advertisers, and as there are a limited number of spots, a bidding system is in place. This means you decide how much you are willing to pay per click on your advert, and Google will show your advert, as long as you are in the top X number of highest bidders.
Google also have other options, for example you can advertise on YouTube between or at the start of videos related to your target audience.
You can also advertise through display adverts which show on other websites, but as these can also be less of a good match with the host website’s content, they can be seen as irritating unless done well.
Osteopaths Marketing Idea #4: Get on the Local Directories and Websites
Although as an Osteopath you may be willing to travel for site visits and to meet clients, you may often prefer to have clients come to you, so being visible on local directories is a great place to start.
Many local towns, cities and counties or regions will have their own business directory pages. Sometimes these may be local newspapers, or independent organisations centered around the area itself. Check out your local sites, and most of them will have a way to contact the manager of the page to add your practice’s details.
There are also the bigger players, such as Yell.com, Yelp, LinkedIn, Facebook Pages and Google Business Listings. Make sure you sign up to their basic plans at least, so you appear on their pages too. This also builds trust for your practice, which is very valuable when you’re looking to bring on new clients.
Making sure you’re on these directories is also really helpful for SEO purposes. So make sure you do it as soon as you have time!
Running a business takes hard work, and there are always problems to solve for your projects. If you don’t feel you have the time to work on your website or marketing, you could ask me for more information on how I can help you get these things done. Get in touch by clicking here for a free website health report, or proposal for your business, just mention it in an email or in the form.
Osteopath Marketing Idea #5: Social Media
With Facebook having billions of users, this is a key example of the power of social media, and how you can be sure that at least some of your potential customers are using social media. Sounds obvious, but sometimes people write it off altogether and miss out on its offering.
Social media is about community and content, first and foremost. Using it regularly to interact with your audience, your local community and so forth, builds recognition and that all-important trust. This can be through your practice’s business page, or your personal account if you’re comfortable about that.
Creating content and sharing on social media is also a great way to interact with your potential clients. Sharing short and snappy videos, tips and tricks, client stories (with permission) and other interesting content are all good ideas for getting the most engagement from people, which you can later nurture into relationships and clients.
You can run competitions or special offers to encourage maximum sharing and interest from the community. Sometimes these are best done through local groups, so search for your town, city or county name on Facebook under the groups section and see if you can start engaging with people there.
You don’t need to use every single social media platform for your Osteopathy business.
Being a discipline like osteopathy, I would recommend sticking to two platforms such as Instagram (great for images and short videos) and Facebook (Better for communities and video/longer text posts), and use these two platforms regularly – at least once a month.
This is much better than trying to manage 5 different social media platforms and failing to update any of them.
The above is just an overview with some simple tips, there are a lot of resources out there for you to learn more, or you can get in touch with me and I’ll happily answer your questions.
Osteopath Marketing Idea #6: Get Your Ratings Up
If you’ve ever bought something online, and there’s a good chance you have, you’ve probably checked out the reviews before deciding to purchase.
Reviews build trust and confidence that this product or service will solve the problems of the individual. We all know how important those 5 Star reviews can be.
When you’ve helped a client to an acceptable stage, make sure you ask them to leave a review online for your business on sites such as Google Business and Yell.
This will help your potential customers who are doing research on Osteopaths to choose between you and another Osteopath, and that’s why it’s important to get some on there.
If you think your clients are unlikely to leave you a review out of the goodness of their hearts, you can create an incentive for them to leave an unbiased review (buying good reviews is bad news), by offering them a discounted session, bottle of wine or a voucher in exchange as a little gift. Also make sure you make it easy for them by sending them the exact link where they should leave a review!
If you could use some help managing your online presence, or following up with clients asking for reviews, get in touch to see how I can help!
Osteopath Marketing Idea #7: Create a Referral Scheme
Use your past clients to bring new ones!
A good referral scheme can be a brilliant way of bringing in new business. Make sure you design it so both parties get something from it.
For example, you can offer a set amount discount in % or £ for the new customer who’s been referred, and a gift of a value such as a voucher OR discount off a future appointment for the past client who referred the new business to you.
This creates an incentive for everybody to share your business with each other, and is a win-win situation for you and everybody else.
Many companies use this to great effect, and there’s no reason why you can’t use this to bring more of the work in that you actually want.
7 Fresh Marketing Ideas To Get New Architecture Clients

Regularly bringing in new clients is vital to your practice's success.
If there are no emails or phone calls coming in, there's no guarantee of work that keeps your business healthy.
If you're like most architects, it's likely that a bulk of your clients come to you from word of mouth.
Word of mouth referrals are fine when they happen frequently enough, and are the project you actually want, but they don't come in regularly and you can't rely on them all the time.
Would you like more projects that suit you best?
Maybe you want more new builds projects? Maybe you prefer smaller residential extension works that are quick and relatively straightforward?
You might think that there's not much you can do to ensure you consistently get the jobs you want, and more of them.
That's not true.
There are people out there looking for your services every day, and you're the one that can help them in return for their business.
So how do you get those clients to ring the phone or send you an email?
Glad you asked!
Why should Architects use digital marketing?
If you're an Architect, the market can be competitive, with often numerous practices operating in a city or town, and covering a wider radius.
Because of this, you need to make sure you are doing some marketing activity so you make it onto the shortlists of your potential clients.
In the past, local businesses such as Architects would advertise in local magazines, newspapers and maybe have leaflets posted through people's doors.
These approaches can be expensive while not providing much return on the investment of your time (which is always valuable) and money.
You also can't find out exactly what you get back from what you spend.
Today, with everybody having smartphones and access to Google, everybody's first point of call is hitting the search button and checking out the top results.
They may also ask friends, consult social media, and check local online business directories.
This means you need to be appearing in those places people are looking!
Plus, even better, whether you invest nothing other than time, or you invest in some digital advertising, you will know exactly how much you're getting back from your investment, meaning you can make smart decisions about where you best spend your efforts.
I've helped many businesses, including architects, fix up and increase their digital presence and generate new clients, customers or sales.
I know that it isn't simple to market your business, especially when it's not your skill set or specialty.
Drawing on my experience, I've put together a fresh list of new ideas that you can use to bring in new business and stand out from the crowd.
Digital Marketing Strategies for your Architecture Practice
Get your notepad out, a cup of your favourite brew, and read on for your new marketing ideas for 2019 and beyond.
Architect Marketing Idea #1: Build a great website
If you haven't got a website, you've got to start here.
This is your online home. It needs to work on desktop computers, phones, tablets, and everything in between.
Making sure you have a website ensures you are at least visible online, and allows potential clients to trust that you're legitimate and professional.
Layout is important, and this is done best when it adapts to each screen size.
A competent developer knows exactly how to do this, and it's common practice.
You don't want to try and fit very long lines of text on a phone screen, as it'll be too small to read.
You'd be surprised how often this is the case with local business websites, architects included!
You also need to be sure that all of your details are correct and up to date.
Don't lose new business leads to old addresses or typos, that's waste that nobody wants.
Architect Marketing Idea #2: Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
SEO is the practice of making sure your website is ticking lots of boxes for search websites, primarily Google, so that they can show you in the top results of user's searches where you are relevant.
You should always make sure you at least have basic Search Engine Optimisations (SEO) in place.
This can be as simple as making sure your page titles are descriptive of the page's contents, and any images are described with 'alt tags' in the code.
For example, you may choose to create a page such as your About page with a title of 'ABC Architects - Architect in Cambridge', and explain the other areas you cover in your text on the page.
This will help search engines like Google know that you are relevant to people searching for 'Architects in Cambridge' or whatever your town location is.
SEO is its own practice, and there are more advanced elements that a professional would be able to help you with, but at least ensuring you have the basics in place is a great start.
There are plenty of beginner's guides to SEO out there, such as Moz's one found here.
Architect Marketing Idea #3: Paid Digital Advertising (PPC)
As I touched on earlier, advertising online can be more targeted and bring about measurable results, so you can be sure exactly what you're getting back for your money.
That may come in the form of new business leads, engagement, page likes/follows, website visits or whatever your end goal may be.
The key difference in cost structure between putting an ad in a local newspaper or publication and running them online, is that you are (usually) only charged when somebody actually clicks on your adverts - that's why it's often referred to as Pay Per Click advertising.
The two most popular digital advertising options for small businesses are Facebook Ads and Google Ads.
Facebook allow you to advertise to potential customers in a very targeted, detailed way, based on various specifications such as age, gender, location, interests and much more.
For example, if running adverts to local residents for your Architecture Practice, you may choose to target people living in your town +3 miles, between the ages of 35 - 60, with an interest in home improvement related things such as Grand Designs.
The great thing about Facebook is both it's hyper-targeted platform and the engaging content types you can use - so your ads can be in the form of just text and an image, or can include videos, carousel ads (which can show multiple projects or products), plus other types like Canvas ads which provide a rich content experience.
This makes for more engaging content that users will be more likely to interact with.
Google offer a different option which can also be useful.
First and foremost, the Search Adverts allow you to put together a simple text-based advert which show on search pages of your choosing, for example you may choose to advertise on the search term I used earlier 'Architects in Cambridge'.
Some search terms will have more competition from other advertisers, and as there are a limited number of spots, a bidding system is in place.
This means you decide how much you are willing to pay per click on your advert, and Google will show your advert, as long as you are in the top X number of highest bidders.
Google also have other options, for example you can advertise on YouTube between or at the start of videos related to your target audience.
You can also advertise through display adverts which show on other websites, but as these can also be less of a good match with the host website's content, they can be seen as irritating unless done well.
Architect Marketing Idea #4: Get on the Local Directories and Websites
Although as an Architect you may be willing to travel for site visits and to meet clients, you may often prefer to have projects that aren't so far away, so being visible on local directories is a great place to start.
Many local towns, cities and counties or regions will have their own business directory pages.
Sometimes these may be local newspapers, or independent organisations centered around the area itself.
Check out your local sites, and most of them will have a way to contact the manager of the page to add your practice's details.
There are also the bigger players, such as Yell.com, Yelp, LinkedIn, Facebook Pages and Google Business Listings.
Make sure you sign up to their basic plans at least, so you appear on their pages too.
This also builds trust for your practice, which is very valuable when you're looking to bring on new clients.
Making sure you're on these directories is also really helpful for SEO purposes.
Make sure you do it as soon as you have time!
Running a practice takes hard work, and there are always problems to solve for your projects.
If you don't feel you have the time to work on your website or marketing, you could ask me for more information on how I can help you get these things done.
Architect Marketing Idea #5: Social Media
With Facebook having billions of users, this is a key example of the power of social media, and how you can be sure that at least some of your potential customers are using social media.
Sounds obvious, but sometimes people write it off altogether and miss out on its offering.
Social media is about community and content, first and foremost.
Using it regularly to interact with your audience, your local community and so forth, builds recognition and that all-important trust.
This can be through your practice's business page, or your personal account if you're comfortable about that.
Creating content and sharing on social media is also a great way to interact with your potential clients.
Sharing short and snappy videos, tips and tricks, latest projects and other interesting content are all good ideas for getting the most engagement from people, which you can later nurture into relationships and projects.
You can run competitions or special offers to encourage maximum sharing and interest from the community.
Sometimes these are best done through local groups, so search for your town, city or county name on Facebook under the groups section and see if you can start engaging with people there.
You don't need to use every single social media platform for your architecture business.
Being a discipline like architecture which lends itself so well to imagery, I would recommend sticking to two platforms such as Instagram (great for sharing photos of latest projects, for example) and Facebook (Better for communities and video/longer text posts), and use these two platforms regularly - at least once a month.
This is much better than trying to manage 5 different social media platforms and failing to update any of them.
The above is just an overview with some simple tips, there are a lot of resources out there for you to learn more, or you can get in touch with me and I'll happily answer your questions.
Architect Marketing Idea #6: Get Your Ratings Up
As an architect, you must not only be able to do the work, you must also manage clients and their projects from start to finish and provide a great service whilst doing so.
If you've ever bought something online, and there's a good chance you have, you've probably checked out the reviews before deciding to purchase.
Reviews build trust and confidence that this product or service will solve the problems of the individual.
We all know how important those 5 Star reviews can be.
When you've completed a project for a client, make sure you ask them to leave a review online for your business on sites such as Google Business and Yell.
This will help your potential customers who are doing research on Architects to choose between you and another company, and that's why it's important to get some on there.
If you think your clients are unlikely to leave you a review out of the goodness of their hearts, you can create an incentive for them to leave an unbiased review (buying good reviews is bad news), by offering them a bottle of wine or a voucher in exchange as a little gift.
Also make sure you make it easy for them by sending them the exact link where they should leave a review!
If you could use some help managing your online presence, or following up with clients asking for reviews, get in touch to see how I can help!
Architect Marketing Idea #7: Create a Referral Scheme
Use your past clients to bring new ones!
A good referral scheme can be a brilliant way of bringing in new business. Make sure you design it so both parties get something from it.
For example, you can offer a set amount discount in % or £ for the new customer who's been referred, and a gift of a value such as a voucher OR discount off a future project for the past client who referred the new business to you.
This creates an incentive for everybody to share your business with each other, and is a win-win situation for you and everybody else.
Many companies use this to great effect, and there's no reason why you can't use this for your practice to bring more of the work in that you actually want.

Find out how much more revenue you can generate online
Use my handy checklist and worksheet to find out what you could earn from your website, and how to make it work better for you.
5 Common Mistakes Local Business Websites Have & How to Fix Them

So you’re a local business owner, you’re working hard, and you’ve got yourself a website.
But is it really bringing in much new work for you, or is it just sitting there because you ‘should’ have a website?
Here are 5 common mistakes I see with these types of websites, and the solutions to fix them!
Your Website Doesn’t Optimise for Mobile or Tablet Displays
You might have heard the term ‘responsive’ or even ‘adaptive’ websites.
All this means is that the websites changes how it looks across different devices to make sure everybody can browse your pages with ease.
Some business sites don’t have any optimisation for mobiles, so the text and images are tiny and the pages are hard to navigate. This will turn away potential customers because getting around your site is a pain.
Some people have the basic responsive features down, but are missing out on things like images or embedded video, which are still getting cut off by the mobile screen size.
In 2018, over 50% of global website traffic was on a mobile device. This number can be even higher depending on your industry or users, so there’s no excuse to not be ready for those iPhone browsers!
A common solution to this is something like Bootstrap which uses percentages (%) instead of pixels (px) to tell a page how to display on different devices.
Your Website is Old and Unattractive or Unprofessional
How ugly is your site to your visitors?
Sometimes this one and the lack of mobile responsive design go hand-in-hand.
Many people have rightly got their website together, but this might have been 10 years ago, and the online world has changed a lot since then.
Others just have low quality or small images that hurt your business more than help it if potential customers think it looks unprofessional.
Some people have even put white text on very light backgrounds which makes it hard to read. How is a customer going to learn about you if they can’t read your text?
Design doesn’t have to be expensive, but it IS important to make sure you have the basics and stay up-to-date with the latest improvements.
Your Website is Very Slow, Especially on Phones
Is this what happens when people are waiting for your page to load?
Some websites can have a lot of extra ‘stuff’, baggage that isn’t needed which means it takes AGES for somebody to load your pages.
Usual offenders are big image files, extra unneeded plugins or functionality.
Removing or reducing the size of these files and/or code can dramatically change how fast your pages load.
Be aware that mobile networks can have slower speeds, so really big pages will take a long time to load when people are browsing on the move.
Google have a great little tool to figure out if you page is slow or not, which you can use by clicking here.
You Know People are Viewing Your Website, But Not Turning Into Customers
Have you lost your potential customers before they got in touch?
A lot of people just threw up a website with a bit about the business you run and some contact details, without thinking about how your website will get you more work, especially the work you actually want.
This might work for some people, but often you do need to think about marketing and build it into your site design to make your website work for you.
Simple things like a small form where people can put their number if they’re interested so you can call them back at a good time often work well.
Other options are special offers or clear buttons that have a ‘Call to Action’ such as ‘Get 20% Off Your First Appointment, Click Here’ can all dramatically improve performance.
You need to hold people’s hand a bit once they get to your website, and show them around and how to get in touch or learn more. Make it so easy that they won’t think twice about doing it.
I Made My Website BUT We Don’t Show Up on Google Searches for Our Services
This could be you and your business partner climbing the Google ranks
Yep, that’s pretty frustrating. You probably spent ages in the evenings or on weekends around your work trying to get a website together, and it’s invisible to Google.
There are common errors that people often miss, things that need adding or removing to get Google to show your page on search results.
You can tell Google lots of detail about your website, and optimise it for certain phrases or words that people around your area are searching like ‘Yoga Class in Kingston’ or ‘Osteopath in Teddington’.
You’d be surprised with how dramatic a few tweaks can be. Within a few weeks, I helped a business who wasn’t even ON the search results to #1 for their target search, even above some friends who are also competition which was great bragging rights for them.
Some confusion is out there about SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). There are no secret tricks or magic bullets like there used to be in the earlier days of Google. These days, it’s all about best practice, but it does require some programming knowledge to get the details right (unless, if you have WordPress, try Yoast).
Is your business website in need of a bit of work?
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