NetSecrets Blog : Web Design and SEO

Adding MMS Capability to Websites

NetSecrets development team produced the UK's leading SMS platform NetMessenger, which enables over 4500 UK businesses and organisations to send and receive SMS text messages over the internet.

This puts the team in a unique position to blend SMS and MMS functionality into your website. Bespoke SMS developments have included delivery by text of horse racing tips, texting of order progress messages for a large retail group and delivery to phone of directions to hotels from a web request form.

If you would like to know more email sales@fastsms.co.uk or call 01386 791880.

2 Blogs for BNI

NetSecrets have now set live new blogs for 2 Worcestershire Chapters of Referral Marketing organisation BNI (Business Networking International).

BNI Black Pear meets every Friday at Bromsgrove Rugby Club and BNI Saltway meets at Gaudet Luce Golf Club in Droitwich every Tuesday.

As far as we are aware these are the first two BNI Chapters in the Midlands, possibly in the UK, to have their own blogs which will be used to publicise events, promote the groups and their members and make news available to the local communities.

The Bromsgrove blog is here and the Drotwich blog is here.

Download corporate_blogs.pdf from NetSecrets for more information on what we have to offer in this area.

BNI Saltway Launches Website

Sandy Burt of NetSecrets is a member of BNI Saltway, a referral marketing and business networking organisation that meets every week in Droitwich to help its members gain new business through word of mouth recommendations. This is one of over 500 such groups in the UK and is one of the newest, having been formed early in 2008.

NetSecrets have designed and built a new website for the group to give details of its meetings and present a list of the members.

To view the site go to www.BNI-Saltway.co.uk and if you would like to go along as a visitor contact Sandy on 01386 792972 or email info@bni-saltway.co.uk.

You can also visit BNI Saltway's blog.

Why Most Websites Fail (And What To Do About It)

Why Most Websites Fail (And What To Do About It)

If you run seminars or any events where you address business or development issues I would be pleased to offer a contribution based on a paper I have already presented several times. The abstract is as follows:

The I-Myth : Why Most Web Sites Fail (and What To Do About It) by Tony Burt

Tony Burt is the founder of NetSecrets and has been involved in the building of many successful web businesses for himself and for others. Through this he has evolved some very clear notions of what works and what doesn’t when looking to create commercial advantage through use of the internet.

He is outspoken in his disdain for the methods (or lack of them) used by most web design companies which result in mediocre results for the disappointed site owners. He will detail the most common omissions in most web sites and give solid, practical advice on how to achieve success. Topics covered will be:

• What constitutes a successful web business?
• How you can use the internet to increase your income and reduce your costs.
• Who do businesses typically use to build their web business? And why do they get it wrong?
• The importance of applying design and technical and marketing skills to the task. All three must be present.
• How to attract large numbers of “relevant” visitors – using search engine optimisation, pay-per-click advertising, link building.
• How to turn them into prospects and customers. Calls to action, embedded commands and great content.
• How do we get benefit from “social networking” or Web 2.0?

Tony will offer all attendees a FREE web site audit. This has been developed by NetSecrets to highlight any weaknesses holding you back and many of the remedies are so easy to implement that you’ll be shocked your existing webmaster didn’t know about them!

If you have an event where you think this presentation would be of interest email tonyb@netsecrets.co.uk

NetSecrets Launch Website for Central Storage

NetSecrets have today launched a new website for Central Storage Solutions Ltd.

They are designers, manufacturers and installers of mezzanine floors, storage platforms and partitioning. We met them through an introduction from our accountants, Worton Rock, who keep both companies on the financial straight and narrow.

The aim of the site is to attract enquiries via the search engines. The site has a large photo gallery showing some of the projects that Central Storage have undertaken and they boast that they can deliver a quotation in 2 working hours for most enquirers which is impressive to me!

LHP Law Sponsor Primrose Hospice Wills Page

Here's a good news story for a change.

One of our SEO clients, LHP Law, has decided to sponsor the Wills and Probate page of our web design client, Primrose Hospice in Bromsgrove.

Primrose Hospice is a charity that supports people suffering from cancer and other life threatening illnesses in the Redditch and Bromsgrove area of North Worcestershire. LHP Law are a legal practice based in Redditch, Bath and Bristol.

Hopefully the sponsorship paid will help Primrose continue their sterling work and LHP will gain some visitors to their website as a result of the publicity surrounding their sponsorship.

NetSecrets Are Recruiting!

As part of our ongoing expansion we are seeking two new team members to work out of our head office in rural Worcestershire.

Firstly we require a talented web marketing specialist to help achieve high visibility in search engines for our own websites and our clients' websites. Areas of work will include on page SEO, Pay-per-Click management, link building campaigns and copy writing. If you have experience of all these activities that would be fantastic but we don't expect to find the finished article and will develop the right candidate. Essential for the job is an excellent grasp of language and communication, accuracy and diligence in applying standards and a real hunger for success in an exciting environment.

For our PlanetStream brand, which provides a complete range of services for online video and audio streaming, we require an enthusiastic telephone sales person. We are great at generating hot enquiries from our websites and telemarketing activities so no cold calling is involved. At its simplest the role comprises taking sales enquiries, establishing the client's needs and helping them choose the most appropriate solution. It will also involve regular contact with users to ensure they are delighted with our service. This is not a highly technical role but the ability to understand client requirements will dictate familiarity with the internet and possibly web servers if only from a user angle. This could very well suit someone working in telesales for an IT or internet company looking to move to a more interesting area.

Both jobs offer massive potential for building an exciting career in a dynamic and fun environment. If you are interested in either position contact Sandy Burt on 01386 792972 or email sandy@netsecrets.co.uk.

Prolease Finance Launch New Website

Prolease Finance, a Hereford based finance broker, has today set live its new website developed by NetSecrets.

Prolease offer a wide range of lease and hire purchase schemes for all kinds of capital equipment such as vehicles, plant and machinery, IT equipment and even software. They have a particular speciality in the field of garage equipment, including MOT test stations, tyre fitting equipment and so forth as well as warehouse assets including racking and conveyors, mezzanine floors and even fire and security systems.

What sets them apart from bigger lenders is their personal commitment to their clients and the ability to source funding for "non conventional" assets the others can't be bothered with.

So take a look at their site, at www.ProLease.co.uk, or just give them a call on 01432 347770.

Excellent Tool For Responsible Link Building

I've just started using a very helpful tool called RealLinkFinder - click here to download it for free.

Basically you give it a keyword or key phrase and it will go find a number of blogs which appear relevant to that phrase. It can limit its results to only those blogs that do not apply the "nofollow" attribute which means any comments posted there will most likely be followed by search engine spiders and benefit your search engine rankings. It's not a spamming machine as it does not generate the comments themselves and strongly urges you to add high quality, relevant comments so that they get accepted by the moderator of the blog.

It's easy to use and saves time but you still need to put effort into the content, which is how it should be.

More stuff on link building here.