Creative | Print | Digital
The Budding Gardeners website was set up by Harrod Horticultural to encourage children to grow their own fruit and vegetables.
The website includes handy hints and tips on how to grow fruit and veg effectively and each month there is a different mission to teach children how to protect their plants, what types of fruit and veg they should be growing and keeping their garden clean and tidy.
Smith Bros based in Lowestoft, Suffolk have been supplying Timber products around East Norfolk and East Suffolk for over 50 years. Their product catalogue ranges from flooring and decking to mouldings and hardwood. They also have a shop in Oulton Broad that stocks everything for a decorator/handyman.
A re-design and development of the existing website keeping to the traditional blue and white Smith Bros corporate colours. A Content Management System (CMS) was also integrated so that they could easily update their wide range of products.
They stock 100s of products, so our website designers had to come up with a way of displaying their extensive range in a way that was also easy for customers to navigate their way through the website.
All the main product sections where placed in the main navigation bar at the top, when the section was clicked on to the customer would then be taken to a page listing all products within that section. Each product has it’s own page with the product image, dimensions and PDF file.
A CMS was implemented so that they can add/edit and delete products as well as uploading images, PDFs and any other file attachments.
ACT are criminal defence specialists with offices based in both Norwich and Thetford. They specialise in notary, prison law, motoring law and benefit fraud services and can also assist you in applying for legal aid.
The new website was built with a Content Management System (CMS) to allow for content to be changed easily.
For over 23 years Circleline has developed strong links with the Co-operative movement. Our unique understanding of ‘The co-operative’- undoubtedly the UK’s most ethical retailer and biggest supporter of local communities – has enabled us to build a strong portfolio of work within the retail market sector.
We have been fortunate to work for some of the biggest and most successful retail co-operative societies throughout Essex, East Anglia and the Midlands. This has encompassed all aspects of creative development from branding, advertising and brochure production to direct mail, email marketing and website development.
Our very latest project for the Society was to completely re-design and build a new dynamic ‘Showcase’ website. Our first move however, was to change the domain name from its original ’21century.coop’ to ‘heartofengland.coop’ which more accurately reflects the Society’s brand identity and its trading area.
The site was constructed as a Content Managed System (CMS) incorporating plenty of interactive features and each trading division having its own individual section. It’s early days, but the site has already seen a dramatic increase in ‘visits’ with browsers spending considerably longer than average on each visit. Very shortly we will also be launching a brand new ‘Members only’ area, designed to further encourage an increase in membership by offering a range of exclusive benefits.
Best Wishes are a family run business created in 2012, they supply gifts and accessories for Weddings, Christenings and Baby Showers, as well as offering a hire service and an event decoration service. Their products are available to buy or hire online and through their printed catalogue.
Their products range from favour boxes, bridesmaid gifts, place cards and tiaras to christening gowns and baby gifts.
The Best Wishes E.commerce website was built for customers to purchase and hire products from the Best Wishes range. The E.commerce website was built responsively so that customers could view the website comfortably across devices such as a laptop, PC, Smartphone and tablet. The easy to use adminstrative side of the website allows the client to manage orders, invoices and emails and also to edit products/content and stock numbers.
EPOC handcrafted Beds are a division of the Mansion House Bedding Company. They make hand crafted mattresses and divan beds to the highest quality and their clients include leading designers and hoteliers.
A Content Management System (CMS) was added to the new website so that EPOC could manage/change content on the website easily.
A slide show is now the prominent feature on the website to really show off their exclusive range of beds they now have to offer, from the Diamond 60 bed to the new Crystal bed.
The headboard brochure is now available as a PDF for customers to download and the news section can now be edited/managed by the client so that any new news can be added to the website as it happens.
There is also a ‘zoom feature’ that we added to the images so that customers can see the quality and detail of each bed and mattress.
Harrod UK are the UK’s leading manufacturer of sports ground equipment and netting. They currently employ 125 staff with a fleet of 5 specialist vehicles and are based in the small seaside town of Lowestoft.
Founded in 1954, Harrod UK have supplied sports equipment for the 1999 and 2011 Rugby World Cup, XVII Commonwealth Games and 2012 London Olympics.
New World Music are based in Bungay near Norwich, they distribute the world’s finest new age and relaxation music to over 85 countries around the world.
The E.commerce website we designed and built for the client needed to offer customers both traditional physical C.D products and digital downloads, an ever important web based business.
The new website also provides insights to the artists behind the music with an artists section including a discography of each artist and it also offers an online Jukebox for customers to listen to the latest music.
Not only does New World Music offer C.Ds and digital downloads they also have a range of DVDs, gifts and books that you can purchase online.
As New World have an extensive catalogue the new website design needed to include an easy navigation menu so all products are listed in one place, this was achieved by presenting these products in a mega-menu.
The new E.Commerce website allows the client to be able to add special offers and promotions to any products for any length of time without having any technical knowledge, all this is done via the content management system of the website.
The client can also keep track off all orders placed, print invoices and generate reports all from the E.Commerce CMS system. The E.commerce system that we built in Drupal is very versatile, payments can be made via Sagepay and Paypal and additional modules can be added at anytime such as a newsfeed and a blog.
Willow Builders based in Ditchingham, Norfolk have over 20 years experience in the construction industry.
Willow’s building projects range from Contemporary Homes and Barn Conversions to Listed Buildings and Commercial Developments and as well as working on projects within the Norfolk region, they have also undertaken projects in London and Cambridge.
Each project is built to the highest standard and they provide the upmost attention to detail from project costing to construction methodology.
The website has been developed using a Content Management System (CMS) to allow the client to add any future projects to the website. Content such as text and images can be easily changed via the CMS and a gallery feature has also been included so multiple images can be added to each project.
The Willow Builders logo was altered slightly to reflect the new modernised website and the website has been built using Responsive Design so it can be viewed across all devices such as iPads, Smartphones, Laptops and PCs.
You can find Twyfords in the heart of Beccles, a family run café with a friendly and relaxed atmosphere. Twyfords source their food locally and it is freshly prepared, you will be spoilt for choice with the range of food and drinks they have to offer.
A brand new website for Twyfords Café. The client’s requirements for the website design are; to be very traditional to reflect the old market town of Beccles with a quirky edge to attract customers to the Café.
We needed to create something that was different, so we came up with the idea of a special moving background with featured birds and an image of the front of the cafe. We wanted the website to be very visual so we added a slideshow at the top of the page with images of the café and of the food.
There are various menu choices on offer at Twyfords so as well has having the menus as pages we also added PDFs so customers could download these. The website was built with a Content Management System (CMS) function so the client could make regular changes to the menus and gallery page and update the news section and events calendar.
Established in 1988 Willow Builders is an award winning Construction Company based just to the south of Norwich in the village of Ditchingham.
We created an identity that reflects the precision and attention to detail carried out in their work.
Applied across printed and online media.
Barbara Robb Family Mediation – working to reduce the emotional and financial costs of separation and divorce.
Applied across printed and online media.
The Locksley school (part of SSSfN) is a exceptional transition environment in the heart of Norwich. The dedicated team of staff work with children and young people from the ages of 5 – 16
with emotional, social and behavioural issues. They also work with young people out of school for reasons of illness or ongoing medical problems.
Our brief was to create a brand new identity to reflect the school’s formation and ethos.
Our solution developed the idea of an oak tree to portray strength and stability using children’s handprints to symbolise developement and growth.
The Short Stay School (SSSfN) is an extraordinary and diverse school which caters for young people throughout the county of Norfolk. Our brief was to create a brand new identity to reflect the school’s formation and ethos.
Benjamin Britten High School is a specialist technology college and community comprehensive situated in Lowestoft, Suffolk. Named after one of the town’s most famous sons, the original logo (created in 1979) was themed on one of his works ‘Noah’s Flood’.
The client asked us to create a vibrant new identity to reflect the school’s ‘fresh way of thinking’. A modern and distinctive identity was created that re-invented the original concept with a modern twist.
For the third consecutive year we have been commissioned to produce the Benjamin Britten School prospectus. This year we’ve introduced a young and vibrant look utilising striking house colours and graphics. We have also created a set of display panels continuing the theme and designed to add extra impact at parent’s open evenings and we also designed and created business cards for the teaching staff.
Harrod UK are based in Lowestoft, Suffolk and are the UK’s leading manufacturer of sports equipment and nets. Official supplier to Wembley Stadium, England Hockey and England Netball and also the London 2012 Olympics.
Roomes Furniture and Interiors – trading since 1888 – is probably the largest family-run, specialist home furnishing store in Essex. During our long and successful working relationship with Roomes of Upminster we have completed a major build of their website www.roomes.co.uk, numerous direct mail campaigns, catalogues, newsletters, press and magazine advertising and point of sale displays.
Best Wishes is a small family run business located in Lowestoft, Suffolk. Specialising in beautiful accessories and decorations for weddings and special occasions. Best Wishes also offers a hire service for table decorations, cake stands and accessories.
The the brand identity we created for Best Wishes is used across many promotional materials such as the Best Wishes website, leaflets, roller banners and adverts.
The logo design is simple and elegant. The silver represent satin with the purple giving a quality and luxury feel.
You can find Twyfords in the heart of Beccles, a family run café with a friendly and relaxed atmosphere. Twyfords source their food locally and it is freshly prepared, you will be spoilt for choice with the range of food and drinks they have to offer.
Our work includes branding, design for print and online communications.
Chelmsford Star Co-operative Society has pledged to source and bring together the excellence of Essex food and beverage producers. This important initiative is to be promoted under the ‘Only Way is Local; Support your Essex Producer’ marque.
The society deems that “local” means goods that have been cultivated or produced in Essex where possible, using locally sourced ingredients.
Marketing & PR Manager Vanessa Howard said;
“There is a huge raft of fantastic food and drink products being made in our county and as an Essex organisation; we felt it was time we shouted about them in a more meaningful way.”
“Our commitment to supporting Essex producers, means we can also contribute to the growth and stimulation of local commence making a positive impact on business growth, employment and prosperity”
“Furthermore, our members and customers can be confident that when they buy local produce they are supporting the Essex economy and the people who live here”
EPOC Bedding was established in the East End of London by Joseph James Cope in 1949. The business was founded with one main priority, to build the finest hand made beds possible.
Designed by RHS Chelsea Flower Show gold medal winner Tom Hoblyn for Harrod Horticultural MD Stephanie Harrod back in 2005. Stephanie’s Kitchen Garden was set up primarily to trial various methods of growing fruit and vegetables and to share the knowledge gained with our customers.
Inspired by the concept of growing produce from ‘plot to plate’, we created a brand identity that has been applied across packaging and direct mail catalogues.
The way in which businesses reach their customers is changing. Are you prepared for the digital era of Smartphones and tablets? How do you currently market your business? Through print, web, social media or both?
More and more business owners are seeing the potential in having their website work across all devices including tablets and smartphones. The number of Smartphone users has increased from 21.6 million in 2011 to 30.9 million in 2013 and m.commerce or mobile shopping has risen 55% compared to a year ago.
Research has shown that Smartphone owners are increasingly using their phones to shop and browse for products on their phone, with 31% of users now say that quick browsing should be an essential feature of mobile websites. Smartphone owners who said that they expected to browse and purchase more on their phones in the next 12 months doubled from 20% to 46%, this highlights the importance for retailers to continue to develop and invest in mobile marketing.
It is important for retailers to engage with customers anyway that they can and give them every possible way to buy and interact with their brand.
All our websites now are built using Responsive Design, this means that the website design adjusts to the size of the screen of the device you are looking at. Responsive design is becoming hugely popular now with business owners because they know that most of their customers are viewing their website on a Smartphone.
If you would like to find out more about M.Commerce and Responsive Design, please call us on 01502 712800
Every business needs a marketing plan and this should also include a Social Media strategy. You will need to think about what you want to achieve from your Social Media Marketing, list your targets and aim for these. You should start your Social Media Marketing plan by doing a SWOT Analysis.
Strengths – what are your businesses strengths? What are you good at? What can you offer your customers that your competitors cannot? Do you have cost advantages over your competitors? Where are your customers most likely to interact with you?
Weaknesses – what does your business need to work on? What do your competitors do that is better – Blogging, Facebook, Twitter?
Opportunities – work on your weaknesses and turn them into strengths, are there any other Social Media channels that you can utilise to gain customer interaction such as Pinterest and Google+?
Threats – are there any obstacles that could potentially get in your way to stop you from turning your weaknesses into strengths? such as time, costs or resources?
The next step is your objectives and what you would like to achieve from your Social Media Marketing plan.
Give your followers something they cannot get anywhere else and offer tips and advice on your industry. Give away prizes exclusively to your Facebook Fans. Ask questions and engage with your audience, people like to offer their thoughts. The more comments that you get, the more you will succeed at News Feed Optimisation and so will reach a wider audience.
Interact with your fans and keep a conversation going, this will draw attention to content seen in the News Feed. You may not see positive feedback all of the time, but people like to see how you deal with negative comments.
Incorporate a variety of posts from links, videos and images. Most users aren’t interested in reading lengthy posts, instead they like to look at visual content and they are a good way at getting fans excited about new products.
Link back to your website, blog, youtube and Twitter, this is good for SEO and it will remind fans of what products and services you have to offer.
Be explicit in your posts, tell people what you want them to do with a calls to action. Explain to users what you want them to do, for example, “like” this post if….. or “comment” on this post if……
Find out who your audience is, are they B2B or B2C? And what social media channels they are participating in.
What do you want to accomplish? Increase in sales? More likes? More traffic to your website?
Is all your profile complete? Make sure you include your website address, logo and contact details and a bit about what you do. Are all your social profiles on business stationery? People will need to know that you have a Facebook and Twitter presence so make sure you put these on your business cards, leaflets and email signature etc.
If you would like help with your social media, please have a look at the Social Media packages that we offer.
E.commerce websites are sites that consumers can purchase products or services online via a payment system, usually through payment gateways such as PayPal or Sagepay.
There are different types of E.commerce software packages that are available, more notably Drupalcommerce, Magentocommerce and X-Cart. The type of software that will be used for your E.commerce website will depend on individual requirements and what the web designer/developer would recommend. Some E.commerce websites will need to be very specific, the supplier may have many different products that have different attributes such as size, colour and price. The supplier may also want to add offers to their products such as 2 for 1 or buy 4 and get the 5th free, the E.commerce package that is used will need to be flexible and cater for these types of attributes.
The standard features of an E.commerce website are as follows:
Manage categories and products
Unique URLs, title tags and Metatags for each product
Set shipping costs and weights
Manage stock levels
Manage, generate and print invoices
Add products to multiple categories
Set and manage offers
Add/edit content eg. text, images and PDFs
We have compiled a list of a few things that we know would make a good E.commerce website, these points will help bring new and returning customers to your site.
Quality Images – good quality images means more sales, the photographs need to reflect the quality of your product. Hire a professional photographer to take photos of your product. Add additional images for one product if this will show-off the product more and make sure your website has a zoom feature allowing for customers to zoom in on the product.
Stick to the same theme – make sure you choose a theme for your website and make sure that you stick to this as this will allow for easy navigation throughout your website. Make sure that your product sections are easy to navigate through.
Social Bookmarking – customers may want to share your products with their friends via Facebook, Twitter or Google+. Include Social Bookmarking so they can do just that, this will increase your brand awareness and help with SEO.
Call to action buttons – encourage your customers to buy products, call for more details or contact us using call to action’s buttons, add these throughout your site to encourage people to interact.
Promotional Area – people are more often than not drawn to a promotional area of a website, most promotional areas are demonstrated as a slide show or as a block on the website, which will remain fixed no matter what page of the website you are on. Encourage people to buy products that are on sale or ones that are in a special deal, i.e 2 for 1.
Use SEO – SEO is so important for all websites not just E.commerce ones. Make sure that each page has targeted keywords, but avoid keyword stuffing and make sure all images are optimised with title tags.
Try different approaches – if a particular product or service isn’t getting the response you had hoped, perhaps try advertising in a different area of the website.
Use Google Analytics – Google Analytics will be able to prove how many visitors you have to your website, what pages they are visiting, how long they are on your website for and much more. You can then take this information and improve on pages where you are not receiving many visitors.
We have the capabilities to design, build and maintain an E.commerce site that will work for your business. The most recent E.commerce sites that we have built are Best Wishes Special Occasions Ltd in Lowestoft and New World Music in Bungay and have so far been a success story.
Talk to us today if you are thinking of selling online, call us on 01502 712800.
In light of the recent revelation of the new Yahoo logo, it got us thinking… What makes a good logo?
It seems that everyone has their own opinion on the new logo, ‘if it’s not broke don’t fix it’ is what seems to be on everyone’s mind, but even if the publicity has not been great it’s still got people talking and with Social Media playing a huge part of people’s lives it’s hard to get away from.
In their ’30 days of change’ campaign, we saw a new Yahoo logo being revealed for 29 days until their permanent logo was revealed on the 30th day.
The new logo has changed dramatically since their very first one in 1994. The logo is slicker, cleaner and uses slimmer letters. The font used is optima and the colour, Pantone Violet C.
You can see the video of the new Yahoo logo creation and the 30 days of change campaign here
We have come up with a checklist of what we think makes a good logo.
Stick with these and you can’t go wrong!
If you think your logo is need of that something a bit special and could do with a refresh or if you are a new business and need a new logo, then please do not hesitate to give us a call on 01502 712800 or email justine@circlelinedesign.co.uk
Pinterest was launched in 2010 and can be regarded as a virtual pinboard for your favourite images. Boards are created to pin your favourite images onto with the most popular boards being baking, wedding ideas, ideas for your home and fashion. You can pin an image to your board from another website or repin somebody else’s pin, or alternatively you can upload your own images as pins.
Pinterest is growing at a very fast rate and by January 2012 it already had 11,716 unique users and 10.4 million users by early 2012. Pinterest has become the fastest growing Social Media network with 80% of users being female and 30% of users are aged 25-34.
The main topic of interests on Pinterest in the UK are:
The best times to post on Pinterest during the day is 2pm – 4pm and in the evening 8pm – 1am.
Just like Facebook and Twitter, Pinterest can also be used for business and can become an integral part of your Social Media strategy. Build up a network of followers by pinning and creating interesting pins and boards. Plan your strategy and keep your account active, find out who your audience is, what they like and what they want to see.
Your followers will be interested in you as a business and the people behind the business too. Pin images of your product, your workplace, employees, blogs and videos. It is important that your images are of good quality, the maximum width of your image should be 600px and the thumbnail width should be 190px.
Google loves Pinterest, so make sure you use keywords in your description relating to that particular pin. Think about what keywords your audience will search with and use Hashtags (#) too as this will make your pin easier to find. Drive traffic from your pins to your website or blog wherever possible.
Create many boards that relate to your business. For instance, if you are a furniture retailer you could create boards on Dining Room furniture, Living Room furniture, carpets, and sofas. You could also think outside the box a bit and create boards on How to remove stains from furniture, kid’s bedroom decor or even famous people’s homes. Set your boards/pins to align with popular topics, i.e. this seasons colour, and popular furniture brands.
Follow other boards associated with your business as this may give you some inspiration. Engage with users by commenting on their pins, liking their pins and repinning their pins.
It’s good to be different so why not have quirky board names, descriptions and profile picture, your audience will become intrigued.
Once you have established your presence on Pinterest you will need to tell people about it. Add a ‘follow me on pinterest’ button to your website and remind people on your other Social Media accounts that you are on Pinterest.
Get started on Pinterest today!
As a design agency we are often asked; What is the best way to market my business? The answer to this is that, a marketing strategy that may work for another company may not work for you so you will need to do some research into your target audience and the best possible ways to reach them.
For instance, Circleline Design is a business to business organisation and the effective ways in which we market our business would be through social media (in particular Linkedin and Twitter more so then Facebook and Pinterest), networking and mailshots.
Below are the most common ways in which companies market their products and services, it’s all about what works best for your business.
Your website is your online shop window so it will need to attract customers in the first instance, first impressions count. Keep them engaged with good and informative content, eye-catching images and easy navigation. Promote your products and change your content on a regular basis either through blogs, updated content or new pages.
Overall, the reasons why small businesses choose to use Social Media as a marketing tool is it connects them with customers, it increases visibility and can be used as self promotion. Business to consumer companies tend to acquire more customers through Facebook then they do Twitter and vice-versa for business to business companies.
Word of mouth is still one of the best ways to get new business. Attend your local chamber of commerce meetings, go to exhibitions or exhibit at one yourself and join local groups. You will soon start to build up a nice network of business contacts and potential customers.
Email is still an effective marketing tool and is very cost effective. If your email contains something that is of interest to the customer, it will get opened. First of all you will need a catchy subject line and content that is useful to them, try not to be too “salesy”. Emails can be easily measured via open, click through rates and conversion rates.
Your mailshot needs to stand out from all other post that land on your potential customer’s doormat. A mailshot is not very cost effective so you will need to spend time on getting it right. Research your target audience and carefully think about what you need to put in your introductory letter. If what you want to say in the letter can easily be explained in an email then we would suggest sending an email as it’s more cost effective. If however, you want to send out a brochure featuring your products to accompany the letter then a mailshot is recommended. Remember to ALWAYS follow up on your mailshots.
We have experience in both digital and print marketing, if you would like more help and advice please call us on 01502 712800.
If you are responsible for sales and marketing, like everyone else in your position you will want to increase the brand awareness of your company and to ultimately increase sales. We know that a successful marketing campaign will help us do this and a successful marketing campaign includes Social Media Marketing, but how can we get customers to interact with us on Social Media and eventually buy our product or service? You can’t get away from Social Media Marketing, it is likely that your competitors will be doing it so you will need to include this into your marketing plan. If you are not an expert it is hard to know what you should be posting on Social Media sites and when to post it.
We have put together a few tips on the ways in which you can create the perfect post on Facebook and Twitter.
The new Facebook Insights are perfect for finding out what time most of your fans are online, you can then schedule your posts to these times. The average lifespan of a post is 2 hours and then it gets lost in the news feed.
Variety is the spice of life! Use a mixture of posts to keep your audience interested and engaged, i.e. links, images/photos and videos.
Images receive the highest amount of engagement; make sure that you use the right size image for your post.
Use simple imagery, ones that can be seen on mobile phone,
70% of your users will see your post on their phone.
Links are good for SEO especially when you link back to your website or blog. Make sure that you use a link shortening service like Bit.ly to track who has clicked on your link.
It is vital that you check your spelling and grammar before sending a post. Using poor spelling and grammar will look unprofessional.
Although it is good to schedule your posts using tools such as Hootsuite and Sprout Social, sometimes these can seem a bit….robotic. It’s good just to say what you really feel at that time, be light-hearted with your posts and fans will see that you have a personality and they will want to interact with you.
You only have 140 characters so use them wisely. Make it clear to your followers what you would like them to do i.e. click on a link to your blog, view your latest logo design on Pinterest, or enter a competition on your Facebook page.
Just like Facebook remember to use Bit.ly or another URL shortening tool to shorten your links. People tend to switch off when reading a long link and your text will get lost.
Use the Hashtag ‘#’ to highlight important words, but don’t use too many in one tweet, tweets that contain 2 or less hashtags get retweeted the most. Be brave and use a ‘RT’, if you have something important to share, people will be kind and retweet.
Check all spelling and grammar before you send out your tweet and refrain from shortening your words into text language, I know that you only have 140 characters to use but this looks very unprofessional.
To find the optimum time to share tweets and Facebook posts it is a good idea to research this by looking at your page insights. Generally the best time to post is between 1pm and 4pm, these are the optimum times for Facebook and Twitter but may vary depending on the type of business you are and your customer base.
Here at Circleline we have the expertise to handle your Social Media marketing, please find out more on our Social Media packages page.
Facebook has recently announced an update to the page insights, if you are unable to see the changes at the moment they have said that all pages will see this change by the end of the Summer. The reasons for this? To make the Insights more actionable (or so Facebook says) they hope that it will help businesses to understand what insights are all about and how they can use these statistics to help drive better results.
Do we really know why we have Facebook insights and do we care or are we just concerned about how many ‘likes’ our business page has?
Well… if you are serious about increasing your brand awareness it should in fact be more about the popularity of a post, how many users a particular post reaches and the percentage of the people who have created a story from your page post (this can be a like, comment or a share). This way you can then work out what posts are doing well and which ones aren’t.
Overview – An overview of all your page’s insights
Number of posts – total amount of posts your page published on a particular day
People talking about this – people who have created a story from your post, i.e. liked, shared, commented
Weekly total reach – The number of unique people (not fans) who have seen any content associated with your page
Likes – a fan of your page who likes what they see so would like to receive regular updates of your business on their newsfeed. The likes insights tell you the gender and age of your fans, what city and country they are from and where they have come from, i.e. from a recommended post, from someone else’s timeline or from the pop up window.
Reach – how your business page reaches people;
People talking about us (PTAT) measured how many people were liking, sharing or commented on your page and this was built as one metric. Facebook have decided to split this metric into 5 different insights;
Facebook virality metric has also changed, before it measured when someone liked, commented or shared a post but it now measures when someone clicks on the post.
You can now find out more about how an individual post has engaged users. In the ‘post’ metrics you can click on an individual post and it will give you information on how many people your post has reached, likes. comments or shares, how many people clicked on this post and any negative feedback. Other type of information the new insights will give you is when your fans are online and the best post types.
It seems that Circleline fans engage more with photos then they do normal posts.
A new way of telling you not only the age, gender and country of people you have reached but also who you have engaged and not just your fans.
Facebook is hopeful that with these new insights, marketeers will be able to make use of these statistics and be able to tell which posts engage more people and the best time of day to post an update.
If you would like some help on social media marketing, please take a look at our social media packages.
According to a research report done in 2012, 60% of small businesses do not have an online presence.
Your potential customers will be online 24/7 so you will want to make your business as accessible as possible for them to find you, this will mean having a website. Remember that your website is your online shop front so you want to make a great impression.
Find out where your customers spend time online and research keywords people use to find your site. Research customer demographic such as gender, age, location and also their income as you will need this information when writing the content for your website.
How your content is written will depend on who your audience is; a website that is primarily for teenagers will have a different format to that for a website for business professionals. The content on your website will need to be relevant to your business and free from any spelling mistakes or grammatical errors. Interact with your audience by asking questions and encouraging feedback.
Be consistent across your website, make sure that all pages are styled the same and we would recommend using just one person to write the content for your site. Choose a memorable domain name and associate all email addresses with this domain name as this will come across more professional. Create links to your website from other resources such as social media platforms and work in corporation with other big brands and get them to link to your website. Use testimonials on your website, these are a great way to promote your business; people trust other people’s recommendations.
Use social media to market your brand and find the best social media platforms for your customer pool as not all of the Social Media sites will be suitable for your brand. Be consistent across all your social media platforms use the same logo and profile picture and make sure all descriptions of your company is the same.
I think that you will agree that you would want your website to show in Google’s listings and the best way to achieve this is to employ a SEO strategy. This means that your website will need to be SEO friendly; check that your website has page titles, image titles, keywords and meta description tags. To find out more about how we can help increase your brand awareness online and through print and also how we can help with SEO and Social Media, please call us on 01502 712800 or visit our Social Media section.
So you have created the perfect email campaign to send out to your subscribers to promote a new product, special offers, or your new website. You have just the right amount of content within your email, you have attached links directing customers to your website or blog, you have included Social Media links so that they can share your content with their friends and you have also added eye-catching images to make the email look appealing.
Now… you are stuck on what to put as the email subject line. This opening line of your email needs to catch your audience’s attention, it will determine whether the reader will open the email or delete it, never to be seen again.
An average working profession receives more than 100 emails a day in their inbox, so how can you make your email stand out from the others? We have put together some hints and tips on how to create a subject line that will get your email noticed.
Ask Questions – We have found out that if you ask questions on Facebook these posts generate more interaction then any other post. This also works in an email, so don’t be afraid to ask a question in your subject line, i.e. want to find out more about our forthcoming events? What is your dream holiday destination?
Capital Letters – Don’t be afraid to use capital letters or exclamation marks, especially if you have something very important to say, i.e. 10% OFF TODAY ONLY!
Try not to be too “salesy” – Don’t make your subject line too salesy and promotional as people can get fed up with seeing too much of this and they will lose interest.
Make your subject line relevant to the content – Do not promote something in the subject line that only gets mentioned in the very last paragraph of the email. The main feature in your email should be the main objective of your subject line.
Know your audience – Think about who your audience is, will they respond more to a line that contains the word FREE? or will they respond more to a sentence that prompts them to do something or asks them something?
Keep it short – Studies have shown that longer subject lines have lower open rates than those that were shorter, try to keep the subject line between 28-39 characters.
If you want to know more about email marketing and how we create beautiful email marketing campaigns for you please call us on 01502 712800.
They are two of the biggest Social Media platforms in the world with 16% of online adults using Twitter and 67% of online adults using Facebook, but do you know everything about them? We have come across some interesting facts about Facebook and Twitter and here are just a few of them.
The Twitter account Notebook of Love has the most engaged Twitter followers
Tweets sent between 2pm and 5pm tend to generate more response
The average tweet per day for February 2011 was 140 million
1 billion tweets are posted per week
82% of Social Media leads come from Twitter
Twitter has 200 million active monthly memberships
Twitter engagement rates for brands are 17% higher on Sat and Sun
Twitter has a 30% higher interaction rates between 8am and 7pm
Twitter gets 300,000 new users a day
Twitter has 175 employees
Facebook has 1 billion active monthly users
140 billion photos are stored on Facebook
1 million websites has integrated with Facebook
91% of local searches say they use Facebook to find local businesses online
83% of companies prefer Facebook as their preferred social tool for brand marketing
The average user has 130 friends
Facebook is the most trafficked site on inflight Wi-fi
There are over 250 million photos uploaded to Facebook daily
95% of Facebook wall posts are not answered by brands
87540 Maldivians are on Facebook
So there you have it a list of facts that you may or may not have known about Twitter and Facebook. If you are unsure how to best utilise Social Media for your business, we can help. Call us on 01502 712800.
There are many blog articles that will tell you the best ways in which to optimise your website so that it appears higher in the search engine ranking results. If you are not familiar with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) then trying to keep up with what the experts are telling you can get very confusing.
We have listed some SEO ranking factors that we know Google loves. If you start with these small points and continue to work on them then you will already be on your way to a successful SEO strategy.
Page titles – tell search engines what your site is about and you should include keywords and phrases within your page titles. Each page within your website should have a different page title.
If you are unsure of where the page title is shown in the search results, it is the piece of text that is bold and underlined, the website address and page description follows this. Depending on the type of website you have will determine where you will need to add your page titles and other meta data. If you have a CMS this can be done via the administrative section and if you have a flat website, this will need to be hardcoded in so you may need to ask a web developer to help.
Alt tags – within your images will make your website more accessible. The Alt tag is used when the image is not visible on the page it is also displayed when a user hovers their mouse over the image.
The Alt tag should be very descriptive and contain keywords to explain exactly what the image is and if it’s descriptive, concise and clear it will help with your search engine rankings.
Links – Make sure you link back to your website/blog anywhere you can. Add it to your Facebook and Twitter account, Google+, and Pinterest. Good quality links will be recognised by Google and this will push up your search engine rankings. It is also worth linking to other websites as well but make sure that they are relevant to your business. Backlinking is also very important to the Google Algorithm, use content to backlink to your website.
Content – The idea is to create useful, unique and helpful content. Take time writing your website content as it does pay off in the end. Remember that Google isn’t human so it will not read your content but there will be people who are genuinely interested in what you have to say, offer readers something that they will want to share. The most important point is to make sure that your content is relevant to your business and include keywords that are based around the services that you offer. Think about what keywords/phrases people would search for to find your business.
Keywords – All though there is much speculation about keywords and if they are as important today as they were a few years ago, it is still advisable to create content that is keyword rich but remember not to get carried away with keyword “stuffing”. Make sure that your content reads well and that your keywords are added in the right place, i.e. title tags, alt tags and within your website content.
Bookmarking – The only way in which you will get your website noticed is if people share your content! So, make sure that it is interesting. If you have an E.commerce website make sure you use eye-catching images and quality product descriptions. If your content is useful people will want to share it to their friends via Twitter or Facebook, this will lead to valuable visitors to your website.
Easy Navigation – Once you have encouraged people to your website, ideally you would want them to stay there. Make sure they your website is user friendly and it is easy to navigate, products are easy to find and contact details are clear.
Social Networks – Another way in which you can increase Google rankings is to push your content on Social Networking sites and create natural links back to your website. Share your blogs on Social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook too as Google tracks these links. Having a Google+ account will also be very beneficial after all having a presence on Google+ and having a +1 button on your site will help increase visibility search.
Remember to keep your website content updated, avoid duplicate content and make sure your content is fresh, you can do this quite regularly with blogs and news posts.
It may be hard to believe but the printing industry is bigger than the automotive industry, online advertising industry and the video gaming industry and 1 million printers are still manufactured daily.
Did you know? Things are read 10-30% faster on paper. With Social Media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and Pinterest etc. taking over the way in which we market our products, it seemed that the printing industry was going to suffer as more and more businesses were switching to digital marketing. Most businesses concentrate their efforts on marketing on the web because of its cost effectiveness. Some businesses however, still say that leaflet distribution, local newspaper advertising and direct mailing are still among the most effective of marketing strategies as they can reach niche audiences by carefully targeting their market.
Marketeers have realised that joining together print and digital marketing could potentially reach out to a larger audience. QR codes are being used in conjunction with printed media and they are used on all sorts of printed materials from flyers, business cards and catalogues to banners and t-shirts, customers are now expecting immediate response and QR Codes are a great way to utilise this. It has been proven that the addition of QR Codes on printed material increases business.
Marketing through brochures and leaflets etc. can help create a long lasting, memorable campaign on a small budget. Small business that target local companies have found that print marketing campaigns have proved to be very successful when it comes to winning new clients.
Did you know? 96% of news reading is still in print
You may have a fair argument if you said that digital marketing is more environmentally friendly than print marketing but changes have now been made to make the printing industry more green;
Many print products are produced using recycled paper
Many printing companies use recycled ink
For every tree that is cut down by the printing industry, three more are planted
Digital versions of reading materials produce more CO2 emissions than a printed version.
Printing marketing can be just as effective as digital marketing and there is no longer a need to worry about the effect it could have on the environment.
A landing page is a web page that a visitor reaches after clicking on an advert or link. The page should contain information about the product and/or service that has been mentioned within that piece of text. Any page that you want a visitor to be drawn to and visit can be a landing page.
It is important to consider what you would like the “calls of action” to be on your landing page once the visitor has arrived there. Would you like them to purchase a certain product? Help them learn more about the product or service? or to contact you for further information?. All the relevant information of that particular product/service should be within that landing page. There will need to be a different landing page for each goal. For example if Circleline Design were to place an ad on Google advertising web design, we would want our landing page to be our Web Design page where the visitor will find our web design case studies. It’s very important that the landing page matches that of your ad or link. Potential customers could be lost if this information isn’t correct.
The landing page should provide all the information the visitor will need and is searching for on that one page without them having to go through the all of your website, this will significantly impact on your conversion rate. Your landing page should also be filled with keywords about your product, a relevant Page Title and maybe internal links to other pages on your site that is connected with the product/service on this page.
The Landing page should include focused and relevant information of that particular product. Images, PDFs and video clips also help when optimising a landing page, new content should be added on a regular basis to encourage returning visitors. The purpose of your landing page is to ultimately lead to a “calls to action”, either encouraging the visitor to contact you with an enquiry or to click a button to download a brochure or to purchase a product if you have an E.commerce website.
The page should catch the visitors attention, so use catchy titles and a mixture of images and text within the page. Make sure all links on page work and all PDFs open and there are no spelling mistakes. Here is a short list of what you should include on your landing page.
Keyword rich Page Title
A catchy heading/sub heading
A “calls to action” section
Informative and keyword rich content
Links to other pages within your site
Remember that “content is king” so make sure your content is relevant to your service/product, make it interesting, readers may want to share this with their followers and it also must contain keywords.
Here at Circleline we have an SEO package that would suit any type of business, why not find out more?
Responsive sites use code to adjust the layout of the template to fit to the screen of that particular device. Adjustments may be made to the size of the text, images, menus and columns to fit the width of the device the website is being viewed on.
Some of our clients are requesting their website template to be built using responsive technology, this is because most of their customers are accessing their website through mobile devices such as iPads, tablets and Smartphones and as we have found out, most websites are not so user friendly on mobile devices as they are on PCs or laptops.
Many websites in the past have been built using a fixed width layout and this has changed throughout the years. It used to be that the website designer would work to 800 x 600 pixels, but this has changed to 960 pixels to allow a site to be viewed on a monitor that is 1024 pixels. We know that laptops, notebooks and Smartphones have different screen resolutions so designers have had the difficulty in catering for all of these.
A way in which designers would get around the different screen resolutions would be to build a mobile version of the website. An example of a company that has done this is Amazon; they have built a different version of their site for when users are browsing their site on mobile devices. The idea of the mobile version is to eliminate the never ending scrolling of the website to improve the user experience, so effectively two websites are being built. This works well but there are time and budgeting constraints when it comes to building two separate websites.
A way in which to overcome this is to build the website to that it can respond to different any screen size from a PC to a mobile phone. The way to do this is to create a set of sizes that adjust depending on what device the website is viewed on, this would provide the best experience possible in regards to navigation and usability, and this is where responsive technology would work well.
For more info on responsive designs, have a look at responsivewebdesign.co.uk
We can also raise the question, would the customer expect to see different content on desktop then they would on a mobile version? This is where two websites would have to be built.It is also worth mentioning that Smartphone sales overtook PC sales last year so having a mobile version of a website is becoming more and more important.