A Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year

We wish you all a very Merry Xmas and a peaceful and prosperous New Year as we shut down at lunchtime today (23rd Dec) until 9 a.m. on 3rd Jan.

Our email will be monitored and telephone answered over the festive period for emergencies such as websites failing, email collapses, etc. and the usual numbers and email address s on the website will function, If you telephone and do not get a reply please leave a message and we will get back to you.

Our advent calendar is still running - so why not pay a visit and see what there is each day.

New Web Designs & SEO work

This week has seen us developing new prototype designs to update a client's website and for new clients plus some SEO work for a new client.

In designing new websites we generally create a framework design to give the client an idea of the proposed look and dimensions of the new website. We put this in a password protected area of our test site and modify this until the client is happy. This is usually done as pure html/css.

We then add the individual elements of the site and once the client is happy with the complete design of one page we convert the relevant areas to php to allow for dynamic content and ease of editing for repeated areas such as footers.

When all is complete the site gets transferred to the live domain and all the SEO content and monitoring tools are added so the site goes live.

No Let Up As Xmas Approaches

Another busy week saw meetings to finalise plans for new websites with clients with two new websites to be launched early in the New Year plus e-marketing packages for these and some other clients to be created as well.

We also had a really useful meeting with Charlotte Allen, Creative Industries Advisor from Redcar and Cleveland Council. They have great plans to help creative businesses develop and we look forward to greater involvement as these progress. It was good to meet Charlotte again - we both worked at Teesside Tertiary College many moons ago and I didn't realise it was the same Charlotte until we met.

Another positive meeting took place with a large local organisation as we plan to develop a web-based application. We are hoping to have some input from a University of Teesside student in the New Year by providing a work placement to help develop the application. We have a follow up meeting with our potential partner organisation this week and hope to develop a specification for the planned application so a prototype can be created and tested in a live environment. This is a long term project and we would hope to launch around in the middle of 2012.

This week saw the creation of a couple of Wordpress powered website for a client who organise sailing holidays and own a ski chalet for hire in Tignes in the French Alps.

The week included the usual regular work of updating SEO content and updating a few bits and pieces including making the final CMS additions to Ann Kenney Yoga. The week also saw a new regular event - the preparation of a VAT return, our first. The joy and excitement of doing the accounts and sending money for the Government to squander!

Xmas is Coming ...

On 1st Dec we launched our 2011 Advent Calendar http://bit.ly/ty8mQ4 with offers, tips or competitions for freebies such as free business cards each day. Each new "window" will be available from 9 a.m. each morning - take a look and see what's behind the window today.

During the last week we've also been compiling a number of quarterly SEO reports for clients. The reports we supply look at how the site has performed and suggest areas for improvement. Once improvements are agreed we make changes to the site to attract more visitors and improve its search engine ranking - all as part of our SEO or e-marketing packages.

We have also launched a new website for Ann Kenney, a yoga teacher in Berkshire, and made some design changes to her hypnotherapy site so that they largely match to give a consistent image. We still have a little work to complete for Ann's new site but wanted to get it up and running with SEO content included so that search engine's are showing it well for the New Year. We will also be creating Ann's Google Adwords campaigns which will be launched at the start of the New Year to help those of you who want to tone up after the Xmas excesses.

It was also another busy week on the marketing front with two new websites commissioned and an e-marketing contract agreed. More details of these will be posted later and we have meetings with our new website clients next week to finalise the details. Next week also sees us meeting a potential partner for a long-term web-based business application plus meeting a potential client for a new website. It's great to be busy despite the economic doom and gloom and great to see that new contacts and existing clients are also doing well.

This week should see the launch of our new plumbers and heating engineers directory which has been developed by Manoj, who is really impressing me with his ability and work ethic. This will continue to be developed over time but will list businesses based on town/city and county. Each entry will be editable by the client with a banner, testimonials and images included. We are giving away lifetime listings for the first 3 relevant businesses in each town and will build it on a county by county basis starting with Cleveland. So if you are a plumber or heating engineer, or have friends and family who are, get them to contact me and we'll add them for free.