Relaunch of ecommerce store to buy your PA Systems from

The New PA Super Centre website has now been launched.

The new website builds on the success of the old website and has improved the experience for the website visitor greatly.

Built for Suffolk based PA Super Centre who are part of Gofer Ltd, the new site allows users to compare products as well as create customer accounts and get much more detailed information on the products. The new website will be backed with a Pay Per Click advertising campaign as well as using email and search engine optimisation to attract new, relevant visitors.

Please take a look at www.pasupercentre.co.uk.

PAsupercentre is one of the UK's leading suppliers of PA Systems and Sound Equipment. Gofer are a leading supplier of sound equipment and cabling to major UK venues and festivals including Glastonbury, Tea in the Park as well as live bands. The website has been built using Magneto Commerce by Newcastle SEO and Internet Marketing agency Mancala

Blog Post appear in Google Quicker than normal web pages

Something I have noticed recently is that Google adds blog posts to it's index a lot quicker than normal web pages.

I posted an article on a sister blog last night ( www.buymagazines.co.uk ) at about 11pm - by lunchtime today it was in the Google index - amazing. Of course this could have been a coincidence, but I have noticed this time and time again - so here are my tips on getting your blog index rapidly.

1. Make sure it is already being visited by Google. The easiest way to do this is to get a link to your blog from a website that is already in the Google index.
2. Make sure you have a xml sitemap and submit it to Google Sitemaps. Automate the site map to update at least once a day.
3. Get links from other blogging websites if you can.
4. Update your blog regularly.

And that is all there is to it.

Happy blogging

Updating the content on your website

One of the most effective ways I find to maintain high positions in search engines is to make sure that you do the following

• Regularly update the content of your website - search engines periodically visit your website and look at the content on it. If your website has changed since the last time it visited it will see that you have 'current' website which is likely to rank better than your competition that is not as well update.
• Try and add a new page every week (at least). As your website grows you will increase your opportunity to target search phrases.

Internet Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation are the keys to your business's Internet success.

New Magazine Subscription Review Site

If you are looking for somewhere to get honest reviews on magazine subscriptions then you should look no further than www.buymagazines.co.uk.

The site is aimed at those who are looking to purchase a magazine subscription but want to know a bit more about other peoples experiences when ordering via the internet.

Visitors are encouraged to post comments and rate the magazine.

Check it out at www.buymagazines.co.uk

New Blog Launched

Mancala has launched a new blog. Mancala Today is the official blog of Mancala - Newcastle based SEO company.

The blog will give advice, background and general chit chat about Mancala, its staff and what is happening in the world of Internet Marketing.

Please feel free to check out the blog today.

Mancala Today

Google, Yahoo and Microsoft colabarate to launch the Canonical Tag

So what is a Canonical Tag?

A big problem with large website is the amount of duplicate content caused by the same page being displayed but with different URLs. This is a problem we at Mancala have already gotten around by rewriting out URLs to be search engine friendly - but the Canonical Tag reinforces this even more.

How does it work? basically a tag is included in the code of your web page to tell the search engines what the definitive URL is for this page. That is then the page that should appear in the search engine results.

So what? Well it means that in the future the results you get from searching should contain less duplicate information from the same website and so you should get to the content you want easier.

Simple.

SEO Newcastle is now on Twitter

In an experiment to try out all the new fangled communications devices on the internet I have set up a Newcastle SEO Twitter account. For those of you not familiar with Twitter it is basically blogging for the text generation.

I will try and use my Twitter account to give short sharp SEO tips. Please follow me by Visiting Twitter and then click on Follow! (that sounds a little desperate - but is still a heart felt plea).

Make sure you have your Products in Google Base!

There will be some of you who can remember when Google decided it was going to enter into the shopping comparison market. That is when you search for a product and a list of results for that product are presented to you with price comparisons against all the stores that sell that product. Googles version of this was called Froogle - which was a hit in the states, but struggled to get off the ground in the UK. Well now Google has Google Base - which is pretty much the same thing but is integrated into Googles Universal Search (or click on the Shopping tab in Google if you only want to search Google base results).

So what do you have to do to get into Google Base? Firstly you need to be able to export all of your products in to a csv file or xml feed. The information in here will tell Google the name of you product, the category it sits in and most importantly the price you are selling it at. It then makes this available for searching.

So for example, one of our clients sells PA Systems to the general public, bands and businesses - they have around 300 products - so we integrated a Google Base export. If someone now searches for a specific product that is in the company online catalog then it is like to come up in the Google search WITH the price next to it.

So why is this different to normal search engine optimisation (SEO)? well if you think about the mind set of the person who is carrying out the search - if she knows the exact product name she is looking for and when she searches not only is there a link directly to that product but there is a price as well - how much more of a qualified lead do you get? Should get pretty good conversion rates as long as your prices are competitive.

Give Google Base a go and see how it improves your ecommerce store.

Search Engine Optimisation - SEO Newcastle

Here at Mancala we don't just specialist in SEO in Newcastle. Of course SEO is a big part of Internet Marketing, but don't be fooled that it is everything to do with Internet Marketing.

Ask yourself this - if I drive a lot of traffic to my website is that enough? Well I will help you out if you are struggling to answer this. NO if is definately not enough. Have a think about how you are going to convert these extra visitors to leads or sales - most website are bad to woeful at doing this.

Download my podcast on Internet Marketing where I give some real tips on how you can generate leads from visitors.

PA Systems and Sound Systems to make a noise about

We do work far a field on all sorts of search engine optimisation projects. One of our latest client is a well know sound systems supplier based in Suffork. PA Supercentre provides PA Systems to buy for any one who needs to be heard - this might be a touring band to a church who would like the vicar to be noticed.

PA Supercentre are based in Ipswich and their parent company, Gofer, are well known in the festival circuit regularly supplying equipment to festivals such as Glastonbury, Tea in the Park and Reading.

Of course we know that PA Supercentre are market leaders in their field, but if you would like more information about complete pa systems for your band, or maybe a sound system to fill your room, how about the right kind of microphones or even mixing desk - you should be contacting the guys at PA Supercentre. And what this space for their search engine rankings to go through the roof nationwide!!

Alternative Ways to Get Visitors - Social Networking Optimisation

I often talk about search engine optimisation (or SEO) to help drive good quality traffic to your website. I also promote pay per click advertising (or PPC) as an alternative way, and a quick win way of getting traffic to your website.

Well I am going to look at a few other alternatives that will also help you get visitors. How about exploiting the advertising potential of Social Networking websites such as Facebook, Myspace and Bebo? These website collect (or more accurately are volunteered) masses of information about the people who use them. What do they do with this data? well now they are offering you the opportunity to target the exact niche for your business. Admittedly you are more likely to succeed in some markets more than others but here is the crack -

If you have a product, say you sell very baggy jeans - you know the sort I mean, the ones that seem to be below the bum line yet still just about stay up - well you business would know that the age group to target these is the 16 - 24 year olds. But there is more, you are likely to know people in this age group who are into Hip Hop music are likely to be interested in your product. Well the likes of Facebook will allow you to specify that you only advertise to these people when they are looking through Facebook. Something worth trying out? I think so. Try our Social Networking Optimisation

Internet Marketing and the Credit Crunch - what to do, what to do

When the going gets tough make sure you spend your marketing budget right!!

I was reading about how businesses are tackling the fear of recession a few days ago. Of course now is a really good time for a lot of businesses to roll out the excuses for not doing well, business is drying up - customers are not spending - generally bad times ahead!! I don't happen to agree and there a lot of businesses out there who are approaching this time of difficulty with a very upbeat and positive attitude.

In the early nineties when the last recession hit us one of the first budgets many companies would cut would be the marketing budget - of course this made things worse, not only were customers leaving (going bust or tightening their belts) but there was also no process to attract new customers. This was insane in my opinion - but I can't blame them.

Now some businesses will want to do the same, but I would urge them not to. The trick to marketing is having a budget and spending it wisely. So I would suggest the following

1. Monitor every advert/ piece of marketing to find out how much businesses it brings you - if you are unsure if something is working i.e an advert in a newspaper, then stop it - chances are it is not working and until you are sure it is you should not be wasting your money.
2. If something is working, replicate it.
3. Start off small and test if something is going to work. Don't commit a huge budget to something that you have not proved will work for your business. You should always be prepared that you may lose the money you spend, so only spend what you can afford to lose.
4. For the ultimate in traceability do most of your marketing via the Internet using Pay Per Click, email marketing or Search Engine Marketing (SEO)

I strongly endorse marketing on the Internet, it is proven to be the most effective form of advertising EVER. If you want to find out more why not attend one of my Internet Marketing seminars which will give you the lowdown on how you can make Internet Marketing work for your business.

Good News if you Trade Online - The Internet is completely bucking the Credit Crunch

It's a great time to be an online trader. The Internet is fast becoming the first port of call for shoppers with sales up 38% on the same period last year.... that's incredible when you consider that high street sales were down 3.9% in June. (Read the Sundays Times Article )

Many organisations are now investing heavily in Internet marketing to ensure that they beat the credit crunch - and who can blame them, year on year Internet sales have massively grown by almost double each year - it is expected that 50% of all sales will be carried out online by 2011.

Of course this isn't just happening in the retail sector, the service sector needs to make sure it is keeping up. In my experience most people do not use telephone directories to find a business, be it a plumber, electrician, accountant or lawyer - their first port of call is to do a search on the Internet. If your website is not figuring near the top of those searches then you are not going to generate any business from the web - and with all that extra money being spent you are missing out.

That is where a great internet marketing strategy comes in - imagine how much more successful your business would be if you coud -

• Drive more traffic to your website
• Convert that traffic into leads for your sales staff to follow up
• Be able to continually marketing to those leads until they turn into a sale

Are you doing that at the moment with your website?

Consider your website as an additional sales person, and invest in some Internet marketing .

I have created a podcast on the basics of Internet marketing . Download it and listen to see what you could be doing.

If you are interested in my next Internet marketing seminar then visit www.marketingontheinternet.co.uk to find out about the next session.

Don't be satisfied with just beating the Credit crunch, you could actually improve your business!!

Another Successful Internet Market Seminar

Once again we ran the Internet Marketing for Business seminar and I have to say that this one was even better than the last.

The seminar was held at La Riviera Restaurant on the Quayside which for those who are not familiar with it is a great quality Italian Restuarant Newcastle & Gateshead.

During the Internet Marketing Seminar we covered the three principles of great internet marketing.

1. Driving visitors to your website - this could be using SEO, PPC and email marketing - plus a whole host of other tools and options - including blogging ;)
2. How to convert the traffic ito leads and sales.
3. Using continuous marketing techniques to convert the leads into sales

The comments we got back from the seminar were great -

"Very good presenter and easy to follow presentation. Good hand out material and all very relevant" - Sue Pender, Business Link North East

"Excellent - all made sense. My concentration do not slip at all which says a lot about the quality of the presentation" - Maggie Cottier, MSC Training, Newcastle

"Really well covered, informative, relevent and practical with REAL tips. Very Good" - Penny Jones, Business Link North East

"Very understandable, pitched at a 'Laypersons' level. Excellent" - Judith Falla, Business Link North East

"Enjoyed the whole session" - Peter Moran, Newcastle City Council

"Well presented and very easy to follow. Informative" - Bruce Allison, Design Aid

We are running the next seminar in September - please visit www.marketingontheinternet.co.uk for more details - or if you want a taster of what it is all about why not download our internet marketing podcast