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Written by Matt Boseley | 31 January 2012

Top Tips for your Facebook Page

So, as a small business I guess you’ve got yourself a small business Facebook page? Yes?

No? Get yourself one now. If you want to promote your small business in Gloucester what better way that a free website page promoting what you do. And a link to your website. Can’t be bad can it?

Now that you’ve got one, there are lots of ways to make your Facebook pages look stunning. There are lots of ready-to-use applications available online. Do a quick Google search and you will find. You can also design your own marketing promotion strategies such as devising campaigns and organising contests for your fans.

So, you’ve created a Facebook page for your small business in Gloucestershire? Now you need to do some marketing and you need to grow your fan base. Before getting started, however, you need to identify what your marketing goals are. What do you want the fan page to accomplish for your small business? Getting loads and loads of fans may be great for your ego, but you have to decide whether you're happy with exposure alone, or whether you want fans to become customers. I think I’d go for the latter please. Do you want your Facebook page to help you sell more products and services?

So, start to define what you want to promote from your Facebook website page, and the goals you want to achieve.

For example, your small business could want to:

Build awareness: Reach a large audience with a widely targeted ad campaign on Facebook
Drive sales: Offer special deals and freebees to bring people into your shop or to your website
Grow you fan base: Encourage people to like your Page by offering valuable benefits for communicating with you

Don’t forget to think about the profiles (timelines) of the people you want to reach if you are going to use Facebook adverts, and select criteria based on what your audience is interested in, instead of what they might be looking to buy.

You can target you Facebook adverts by:

Location, Language, Education, and Work
Age, Gender, Birthday, and Relationship Status
Likes & Interests: Select Likes & Interests such as "websites", "google", or "searching" instead of "internet" or "www"
Friends of Connections
Connections

We’d also recommend that you add a Facebook "Like" box to your website. You can do so by going to Edit Page, Resources, Use Social Plugins and selecting Like Box. Fill in the fields and then click the Get Code button. After you copy the code and paste it into your small business website, and then visitors will be able to "Like" your Facebook page directly. Facebook's 'Social Plugins' section under 'Resources' has a number of useful tools for websites, too.

If you are already on Twitter, give some compelling reasons why your Twitter base should join your Facebook community. If Twitter is the new cool Gloucestershire meet up place, think of your fan page as an invite to come in and chat.

For example, you could use Twitter to tweet something like, “Wanting to find out more about us than 140 characters will allow? Join us on Facebook at http://facebook.com/lampshademarketing.”

Want to know more. Pop in for a chat, email us at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/lampshadeweb or old fashioned call us 07735 031707

Written by Matt Boseley | 29 December 2011

New year, New website

Ok, so the days are getting longer, the kids are starting a new term, that new website design that you've been promising yourself should be high on the 'to do list'. So you've chosen your website design company (It's OK if you didn't choose Lampshade Marketing!) but have they covered all the angles that they should on a new website design?

If they haven't, ask yourself if they are right or not. Here is a couple of things to think about.

Website design Content Management System

So, they've recommended a new website Content Management System (CMS) and it's probably different from your existing one (If they aren't even doing it on a content management system, back out now!!). What having a new system means is that the URLs will be different on your old website from your new, and Google, your customers, and you, will get quite confused! The solution to this is to use permanent 301 redirects. Make sure your website company does this.
Also you should contact all the websites that link to pages on your old website and ask them to point to your new website. This will have a better direct effect on your Google rankings.

New website, new content

So, you've got your lovely new brochure and you think that you can use the same copy? Wrong. Unfortunately brochure copy doesn’t translate well online. You either need to get some help from a professional or follow some simple steps.

Write like a newspaper. Get all the main information you want to put across in the 1st paragraph, and then expand later on. People scan read online, so getting the important information out there as soon as possible is... important.
Key words. What words will people use to get to your new website? What will they type in Google? Think about this, then use them in your website copy.

Website Architecture

Think about what's important to your company and to your customers. If you sell Cardigans, Jumpers, Jeans and Trousers, but you also sell buttons, zips and thread, but they are less important, don't have them listed on the main navigation. List them under Accessories, or something. This will help your customers, and Google determine what's important.

You can let Google know which of your pages are most important on your new website by how you link to them. Be sure that the pages you are going to try to get to the top of Google are linked from your main navigation so that they will receive the best possible internal link popularity. This way your new website will bring your higher quality customers rather than those that are hidden in the depths of your site.

Written by Matt Boseley | 11 November 2011

Googles latest update - Freshness

Basically Google is only trying to do one simple thing (apart from making bungles of money!), to serve you the best search engine results it can.

It wants to deliver relevant information based on your search. One of the key ways that it’s always done this is by how up-to-date your website is. The latest release from Google formalises that with the ‘Freshness’ Update. It’ll impact around 35% of you and your websites, so you need to make up to date content as part of your website content strategy, if you want to continue to rank well in Google.

Make your content timely and relevant. For example, if I’m searching for ‘Shops in Gloucester’, I don’t want a list of Gloucester shops that is from 2007, many of which may have closed. What’s I want is a list of shops, with websites, in Gloucester or Gloucestershire. It should now hopefully give me that. Searchers are looking for the latest, freshest content about a topic rather than older web pages.

Make your website have current fresh content and you’ll do OK.