Findings by Accenture, a global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company, reveal that more users are using online services and that 44% of those surveyed stream media content to their smartphone or tablet.

The 2012 Global Consumer Electronics Products and Services Usage Report showed that 56% have changed their behaviour as a result of online services; and 25% admit to sharing more personal content with family and friends.

BATTLE FOR CONSUMER ATTENTION

The study, which involved 10,000 people being surveyed from the US, Sweden, South Africa, Russia, Japan, India, Germany, France, China and Brazil, concluded that the battle for consumers’ eyeballs and time is intensifying as viewership continues to disperse.

More than half of the survey respondents owned a smartphone, which is a rise from 28% in 2010. So as consumers increasingly use other electronic devices in their daily lives to access media content, target your business online too.

Top tips include;

-Meet the audience on the platform that they regularly converse in and get your brand noticed with unique content. It seems trivial trying to get your firm noted where there are no onlookers; follow the latest technological trends and social networking sites.

- Increase traffic to your website with engaging content in the form on blogs, press releases and linkbaits. Entice consumers to your brand with tips, quirky stories, topical news and Top 10 pieces.

- Employ an expert digital marketing agency with a vast experience of in-house writers to produce quality online content writing.  

Experts in the sector have begun to realise how imperative it is for a business to produce unique, engaging content to drive traffic to the website and to increase sales.

Online PR is hugely beneficial to boost a brand’s image but unless the content is useful, original and interactive nothing will come of it.

A webinar is taking place to discuss how well-known firms such as Aston Martin, Disney and Warburtons are using Computer Generated Imagery (CGI) and what impact Computer Generated Content (CGC) is having on the brands.

The debate, which is being led by CGI and digital content creation company Realtime: UK, will outline how CGC can influence consumers but the fundamental concept is that multimedia is the way forward.

Fresh content is important to gain maximum exposure but the consensus from the managing director of Realtime:UK, Tony Prosser, is that the content that corresponds with CGI for TV commercials should be shared and interacted with to deliver a two-way communication with users.

Online PR is a huge part of our internet package here at Custard Media and not only does it increase consumer’s trust in a business but it also helps to improve search engine rankings in Google.

As a specialist SEO agency, we strive to ensure that all content is engaging for audiences to ultimately drive them to your site. Make sure that you are using a digital marketing company that is keeping on trend with the latest techniques and ‘get in touch’ today for professional and experienced online PR services.

The findings derive from a global SEO pricing survey by SEOMoz which covered 500 consultancies from around the globe but the below infograph specifically relates to 81 digital marketing agencies in the UK. So with regards to SEO, how much does it actually cost?

The general consensus was that 70.4% of firms use a monthly retainer charging model with 69.1% of those surveyed charging on a project-base. A majority 56.8% priced their SEO services on an hourly rate with 51.9% having a fixed fee.

How much does it specifically cost though? Well 19.8% of those asked said that their hourly rate was £49-£65. And of those who charge on a project-base, 8.6% have the fee of £324- £485, £970- £1615, and £6461- £9691.

The study further found that those who charge a monthly retainer, 12.3% charge £162-323 and 12.3% have the price of £1616- £3230.

All this is based on the fact that 22.2% of the SEO agencies have between 2-5 active clients and 25.9% had been operating 1-2 years.

All data by SEOMoz, Graphic by Dan Barker

Here at Custard Media, we offer different SEO price packages for a whole host of clients on varying budgets. In our experience, a £1000 SEO campaign may deliver fantastic results for one company in a competitive market however, it may not be ideal for another organisation which is quite niche which is why all our prices are bespoke to the client’s needs.

Our digital media agency may differ slightly to the infograph’s results but we have discovered over the years that by offering a range of budgets, we can deliver what the client needs the most.

Want an online marketing company that will cater the SEO pricing to your individual requirements? Contact the experts today by clicking ‘here’.

Verified accounts feature a blue tick which is meant to prove that they are the celebrity or public figure that they say they are, however the fake account for @Wendi_Deng was authenticated by the site with no checks.

However, the blame cannot be fully placed on Twitter as they weren’t the only ones to say the account belonged to Mrs Murdoch – members of the News International press team told a number of journalists that the account was real.

Over 16,000 accounts are verified by Twitter (a complete list is available here) but the process has been thrown into doubt after the owner of the Wendi Deng account said that no one got in contact with them to confirm their identity, and neither did anyone from NI before the press team made their blunder.

A spokesperson for Twitter said: “We don’t comment on our verification process but can confirm that the @wendi_deng account was mistakenly verified for a short period of time. We apologise for the confusion this caused.”

Although the Wendi Deng saga has left some NI and Twitter staff with red faces, there has been no real damage done. However, this is not always the case. For businesses that use social media, the amount of fake accounts can be worrying especially as apart from contacting the sites to get them removed there is often little they can do about it.

A scam was doing the rounds online last year offering free Asda giftcards and in the last week Argos have fallen prey to a scam event saying that people who mark themselves as attending will receive a gift cards.

Internet users that fall for these scams will find that they end up clicking on links which provide commission payments to the people behind it and see their details sold on, and many businesses may worry about the implications this could have for their reputation.

If you’re concerned about reputation management or dealing with your social media management, then contact Custard Media. As an experienced digital marketing and social media agency our friendly team can help your business with all aspects of your online marketing strategy, so get in touch with us today!

Facebook

And don’t expect it to stop there with even more on the horizon as The Facebook Timeline begins to roll out. If you haven’t heard of it before, take a look at Jake’s blog post here. Essentially it is a way for Facebook users to “express who they are.”

With everybody trying to get in Facebook’s success, it was only 2 weeks after the launch of the Timeline that Google announced Google+ Brand Pages (another leaf taken out of Mark Zuckerberg’s book) that looked suspiciously similar to Facebook’s facelift and now it seems it is Twitter’s turn with a new, improved version of the site being announced last week.

Twitter

As with previous updates, it’s likely you won’t have seen the improvements yet as it is being rolled out to a small number of users at a time, if you own an iPhone or Android device you can simply update the Twitter app and soon enough the desktop version will update too.

Other than the obvious cosmetic changes, Twitter has joined the ranks and launched their own brand pages allowing businesses to extend their customer base to the masses of micro bloggers. The new brand pages will be accompanied by the introduction of a Discover tab, allowing you to find users relevant to your interests and more importantly enabling potential customers to find your company.

StumbleUpon

Of course, there is more to the social web than just the aforementioned and it isn’tjust the powerhouses making changes to their service. Link discovery engine StumbleUpon have made major changes to their service, complete with rebranding.

Where the site used to focus on procrastination by letting users “stumble upon” sites submitted by other users, the new design is more targeted to letting you engage with other users and showing you what others have been up to on the site having a great effect on a business by helping people who wouldn’t necessarily search for your services miraculously find things they weren’t even aware they needed.

Youtube

In a similar vein, popular video-sharing site Youtube has launched a new look to mirror the rest of Google’s empire with the homepage now focusing on which users are uploading videos you might be interested in instead of the previous system of giving you videos you might be interested in videos to suit your interests. With this update, businesses will be able to reach a wider audience who will be able to bring in more potential interest just by uploading a video at the right time.

The examples listed above are but a few means of engaging fans of your brand and potentially reaching a whole new audience. However, with the popularity of these sites constantly on the rise it is easy for your message to get lost in a sea of hashtags. To help you engage the right audience, you should speak to Custard Media about what a Social Media Agency can do for you.

Of course there is always more they can do, and our very own Matt Fielding has presented a wish list of changes he’d like to see to Twitters service on his blog - here.

You need to be social

We go on about it time and time again, but with so many people posting statuses on Facebook, sending tweets on Twitter and checking in on Foursquare, businesses need to have a good social media marketing strategy to connect with the users of these sites. Using social media can really build up brand loyalty, so an effective strategy can keep customers coming back to you time and time again.

2012 is the year of mobile

Matt blogged about this a few months ago, and embracing mobile internet is vital for all businesses with an online presence. More people than ever before are using the internet on smartphones and tablet devices, so having a mobile optimised site or even a mobile app is becoming the norm for many businesses. With such a crowded marketplace, if your site isn’t mobile optimised potential customers will simply go elsewhere, so ensure you’re not missing out.

Use QR codes

QR codes are gradually popping up everywhere, allowing users to scan a barcode with their mobile device which will then complete an action. These codes can do so much – from getting someone to visit a website, to entering a competition, to leading them to download an app and if you’re creative enough, the possibilities are almost endless.

Don’t forget your SEO!

You might think that once you’re ranking well in the search engines, you don’t need to invest in SEO anymore. However with Google doing regular algorithm updates it is important to continue your search engine optimisation strategy to ensure you don’t drop down the rankings.

If you need any help with any aspect of your online marketing or SEO Preston based Custard Media could help! Have a browse of our website or contact us for more information on all of the services we offer.

All websites need links to rank highly in search engine results. What’s not quite as straightforward is the type of links a site needs to obtain the kind of trust that is rewarded with high rankings in Google and other major search engines.

Google wants to rank high-quality sites, not reward link builders. The key is to build a link profile that appears natural, rather than one that is obviously the result of a link-building campaign.

Custard Media know how to do things the natural way, which is why our link building services help our clients rank highly in Google. Below are the five key points needed to understand what makes a strong, natural-looking link profile.

Ratio of Links vs Linking Domains

Google counts links as ‘votes’ from other websites, so it might seem like a good idea to get a blogroll or sitewide link to increase the number of ‘votes’ for your site. However Google would much rather see votes from lots of people than lots of votes from the same people.

Therefore the lower the ratio of links:domains, the better. In other words, 1,000 links from 100 different domains is much better than 1,000 links from 10 domains, because 100 different people have voted for your site, rather than 10 people.

Anchor Text

A good way to ensure you rank for a search query is to build links using anchor text (the clickable text) that matches that search term. However, if Google looks at custardmedia.co.uk and every link to our social media page uses the anchor text ‘social media’, it will realise that we’ve been doing SEO link building and not acquired the links naturally.

Anchor text variation is a great way to avoid penalties from Google: mimic the way people naturally link by varying the anchor text, using non-keyword focused anchor text (click here, website) and using brand anchor text (Custard Media, custardmedia.co.uk etc) – all mixed in with a sensible amount of exact match anchor text links.

Outbound Links

The idea behind this is 1) to obtain links from pages that link to as few other people as possible 2) to appear next to links to high authority sites.

If a site links out to every Tom, Dick and Harry it’s unlikely that Google will hold it in very high regard, whereas links from pages linking out to a few sites with high authority puts you in a very exclusive club.

If you’re the only link on a page, it’s an indication that this person thinks you’re the only site worth linking to – another reason for Google to reward you with high rankings.

Relevance

This is a big one. Look for links from relevant sites to your own, because when it comes to car alarms (for example) Google doesn’t give much authority to the opinion of dog groomers.

Links from related sites also indicate to Google which topics and keywords your site is relevant to. In the case of ambiguous keywords like ‘trainers’, links from sportswear sites rather than personal fitness instructor sites will show Google which camp to place you in.

Link Velocity

Link velocity is used to describe how quickly a site accumulates links. A low-ranking site would only be expected to gain a lot of links as rankings pick up, anything else looks unnatural. This is why simply building as many links as possible doesn’t work – it just trips Google’s filters and results in penalties.

Similarly, stopping your link building campaign can have disasterous consequences as it is a clear sign to Google that all your previous links were acquired unnaturally. Would your rankings survive if Google suddenly disregarded all your links?

If you’re interested in improving your link profile, contact Custard Media today.

Findings by Pew Internet & American Life Project show that 91% of those surveyed use social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to keep in touch with current mates.

The vast majority of respondents stated that they use social media to stay connected with their pals-not to find new friends or partners as previously thought.

The study of 2,250 Americans shed some light on the real reasons many people use social media platforms and it found that 87% admit to using it to keep in touch with family members.

Further results from the research revealed that 86% use social media sites to connect with old friends that they had lost touch with and that only 3% used them to find potential dates. A minor 5% said they joined the platforms to follow celebrities online.

The insightful survey will prove beneficial to anyone working in the online marketing sector, such as ourselves, as it offers an understanding it what drives people to use social media. Social media trends across the world are proving similar, for both the UK and the US, and it is always helpful to know what is going on in the industry to determine the future of it.

Custard Media is proud to be at the forefront of the industry when it comes to developing social media marketing campaigns for our clients and as a social media agency, we strive to be up-to-date in what the latest techniques and tactics are.

The use of social media marketing services is crucial in developing business’ overall online profile, so target the vast audiences on social networking sites and boost your brand image by ‘getting in touch’ today.

But the general consensus of where a brand can publicise is evolving and expanding. Now it is even possible to target anyone, anywhere, even in the gents’ toilet!

A toilet gaming technology has been unveiled to fight urinal boredom and the technology allows brands to engage with its audiences in a fun and memorable way.

Shoot and score

The ‘hands-free’ video gaming console has been created for men who usually stare blankly at the wall tiles as a bit of toilet humour and entertainment. The urine-controlled device enables users to aim for targets to score points. Captive Media is the firm who developed the product.

Games available include a skiing challenge and a multiple choice pub quiz and the customers can then post their scores to Twitter and a live leader board via their mobile phones.

The console reportedly sits behind toughened glass, has multiple sensors and is free of collateral damage and can be easily cleaned. Apparently a similar product is already displayed in Japan but it begs the question, how powerful can digital marketing be?

Attention grabbing know-how

According to the BBC, Trade paper Adweek calculates that on average men are rooted to the spot for 55 seconds while they relieve themselves which equates to nine months over the course of their lifetimes. This makes it the ideal opportunity to target men with related-advertising. And apparently the firm is planning to roll out similar units for ladies’ toilets.

Other forms of in-restroom advertising already exist but the most important thing is to reach, target and influence your audience which is what Custard Media can do for you. We may not be able to offer you advertising above a urinal but by creating an overall mix of online digital marketing strategies, we can improve your search engine rankings and website traffic.

Digital marketing is the leading route to attract and retain customers, so ‘get in touch‘ with our expert Digital Media Agency today and let us help your business flourish and showcase your brand using expert digital platforms.

In the age of conversion optimisation, it’s not enough just to have well-written content. So not only do we produce site content that reads well, it’s also conversion-friendly.

Why Conversion is Important for Content Writing

Some of the best writing on the net is unfortunately published on websites with poor conversion rates. Big blocks of text just aren’t visually appealling and if busy web users don’t like the look of a page, they’re unlikely to even read your content.

Would you read all this text?!

This page about hang gliding includes a link lower down asking visitors to join the association, but personally I wouldn’t read far enough down to see it. This huge block of text is unsightly and just gives the impression that I’m going to be reading forever.

How to Structure Your Page Content for Conversion

• Appeal to skim readers

Notice how this page includes sub-headings? This is to allow those who are short of time to skim over the content and get straight to the section they’re interested in.

• Break up the content with bullet points

This makes the text more digestable and more visually appealling. Compare this page with the one in the picture above – which would you prefer to read?

• Make your text dynamic, not static

In case you hadn’t noticed, the first set of bullet points at the top of this page actually link to the relevant sections of the post. Credit to Matt Bessent for finding this page about how to add internal anchors using HTML. This allows readers to move directly to the section that interests them, as if by magic.

• Make it visual

Images like the one above help readers to visualise what you’re talking about. So even if you rabbit on like me, use jargon or struggle to illustrate your point in writing, the pictures help persuade your audience that what you’re saying is the truth.

How Custard Media Can Improve Your Conversion

Custard Media’s content writers are well-trained in the art of conversion optimisation. Let us loose on your website and your content will be transformed into a conversion-friendly masterpiece of online wordplay.

If you’re interested in revamping your content writing and improving the conversion of your website, contact Custard Media today.