Posts in category: Tech News

SEO is everywhere these days, but if you’re new to the world of Search Engine Optimisation, it can all seem a bit confusing, particularly if you’ve ever had any dealings with the Civil Service, where SEO stands for Senior Executive Officer!

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It doesn’t do to be behind the times in the digital age, so here’s a handy reference guide to the most common SEO acronyms and buzzwords that you’re likely to encounter, starting with the most obvious.

SEO

Search Engine Optimisation is not to be confused with SEM, which stands for Search Engine Marketing. According to Forbes, they are interconnected, but whereas SEM is focussed on strategic planning, SEO is functional, utilising analytics and data for the best UX.

UX

UX stands for User Experience, which should be at the core of every website. SEO may be about tweaking code and opting for the best keywords, but the goal is to provide the user with the best possible experience, and this should govern every aspect of your website. You’ll find companies such as https://www.elevateuk.com/seo-services/, who specialise in providing professional SEO services in London, offer an SEO audit to highlight problem areas in your website – and if you’re attracting fewer than 10,000 visitors a month, there’s no charge for the service.

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SERP

Sometimes used to refer to the State Earnings Related Pension, in the digital world SERP stands for Search Engine Results Pages. The ultimate goal of every website is to make it to the first page of results, preferably the top spot, although this is not always achievable.

Keywords

Keywords are an important aspect of SEO. They are the words that a website visitor types into the search engine page, and the aim is to match what visitors are typing within your content and meta data.

Long-Tailed Keywords

For even greater accuracy in search results, using long-tailed keywords requires you to choose three or more words or a phrase to match the search queries being entered into search boxes by prospective site visitors.

Paid Search

Also known as PPC or Pay Per Click, this is where a business bids for keywords, with the winner rising to the top of the search results pages for relevant keywords

Organic Search

A website with excellent SEO techniques will automatically rise to the top of search engine results.

When it comes to designing a website, there are lots of things to consider. The style and layout are generally given top priority, with content often coming as an afterthought. Experts argue that this shouldn’t be the case, however.

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Content first

In order to overcome the web content hurdle, it makes sense to put content high on your agenda when designing or re-designing a website.

According to Circle S Studio, designing a website before determining a company’s essential content is a misstep that can negatively impact strategy and waste a lot of time and money.

Even in a website re-design that may involve moving content across from one site to another, it pays to get an understanding of how much content you’ll have, and how it will be formatted, so that you can save yourself any potential extra work further down the line.

Making life easy

The problem with adding your content at the last minute, or filling a prototype wireframe with lorem ipsum or dummy text, is that you can’t get an accurate picture of how your layouts and structures will look. By getting your content across early, a professional London web design company, such as Redsnapper, can make an accurate and realistic design of your pages and layouts.

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Leave content inclusion until the last minute, however, and your developer might need to make some tweaks that could end up costing you extra time and money, and may even compromise the desired look and feel of your site.

Using web development services by Redsnapper, you can ensure that your site is designed and built with content in mind. This can help with the visual design aspects of your site. Your layout and styling options could be compromised or restricted with late content, and the length limitations set in place may not fit well with the content you want to include.

When should you include your content?

Web developers argue that the earlier you can get your content to them the better, and the more hurdles you can overcome from the start. You can even start the ball rolling from the user research phase, as getting to grips with the tone and messaging of your content lets you adapt your research accordingly, to understand customer motivations in relation to your content and messaging.

Most of the online revenue generated at the moment comes through selling services and soft goods, like premium memberships and e-books. E-commerce is combining new technology with traditional business, making it possible for an online store to sell even physical goods without relying on the use of a brick and mortar location.

E-commerce is not that hard to understand but being successful with an e-commerce business is difficult. We see businesses from all around the world using e-commerce from huge companies like NetBet to small neighborhood shops. What factors determine failure or success? Those below are the main ones to consider.

Conversion Rates

Conversion rate can be defined as being how many of the visitors complete a financial transaction after visiting the e-commerce site. It is expressed in percentages. Conversion rates are normally really low in online shopping, with the average being no higher than 3%. Knowing the conversion rate is very important for creating an e-commerce site that generates profit.

Acquisition Costs

Before you think about conversion rates you have to be sure that you get visitors to actually see the products you sell. Direct traffic is only possible for the larger, well-known brands. It is really important that you consider how much money is necessary to drive traffic to the site in the first place. When this factor is not considered it is possible that costs end up being way too high. Profit is thus not generated and businesses end up losing money. Generally speaking, investing in SEO for the long term is a very good idea to deal with acquisition costs.

Shipping Costs

Some time ago it was the buyer that paid shipping costs. These days there are many large e-commerce stores that introduced really cheap or free shipping in order to attract the customer. Because of this, shipping costs can easily make or break the success of any site that sells something. Free shipping is very common so it has to be seriously considered or at least a cheap alternative to the regular shipping fee has to be offered. When offering free or cheap shipping the profit the store generates drastically goes down and it can even disappear.

Brand Loyalty

It is usually hard to attract customers to an e-commerce website and to convince them to make a purchase. That is why you do want to develop brand loyalty, so that repeat business can appear. A shopper that has the best possible experience with the e-commerce site is going to keep coming back for more transactions. This is really important for the brand as it lowers running and acquisition costs while increasing overall profits.

Conclusions

A really important thing with online stores is to perfectly manage cash flow. The owners have to calculate everything and reduce the acquisition costs while increasing conversion rates. At first glance, this looks simple. However, when you start to do the work that is needed everything becomes complicated. It is very important to treat the business with the same seriousness as the regular stores and not assume it is easier online.

No matter whether you are already a computer science major and want to learn more, or if you are just getting your feet wet in the discipline for the first time, you came to the right place. Computer Science is a field that studies computer systems in depth, including how these systems interact with humanity more broadly. Computer Science is a lucrative, fascinating discipline that has yielded a wealth of innovation. It is also listed as the highest paying college major on several sites. Whether your goal is financial security or technological knowledge, here to help you navigate are five tips for aspiring computer science students. Continue Reading