Clean It Up
UK Floor Cleaning Forum => Carpet Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: wynne jones on January 12, 2011, 03:39:09 pm
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Just out of interest how many calls do you get that you know came from your website or some presence you have on the web?
As well as voting I'd like to hear whether you are well chuffed with your work from the web or hacked off with the resullts after shelling out.
How does it compare to other stuff you do?
Wynne
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I get enquiries but web customers aren't the best, they can be too hung up on price comparison lots of tennancy enquiries and also no shows and cancellations to me the web is just another form of advertising.
Shaun
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You are right Shaun, it tends to get people who have a list/directory in front of them. So the quality overall may not be as good as other sources. I've experimented with blatantly up market sites to deter EOT and shoppers but of course you get far less nibbles.
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I'm completely the opposite, I tend to get better class of customer from the web. Comparing it to phone directories and newspaper ads (that i used to do)
Tony (the tiger)
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Must say i do get a fair few price shoppers from the web or maybe i its the same from y pages too now ::)
Still had a few nice jobs form it mind from clients who dont mind paying a litle more than the cheap guys.
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You're just a smooth talker though Clinton not like that rough arse that uses a meat waggon to take his Ninja out to work ;)
Shaun
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Learnt it all of you shaun ;D
Yes he is a rough arse really never thought of that,there again once he gets the home made scones out them housewifes are putty in his hands..
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Hi Guys
I get lot's of enquiries which enables me to sort the wheat from the chaff.
I don't try to sell on price so am not hung up on it.
The web is where 90% of my marketing effort goes.
Cheers
Doug
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Work Ive had off the web tends to be better than average. Am I chuffed or hacked off after shelling out? Well I have to say well chuffed because apart from Domain Name cost it doesn't cost me a penny and i designed it myself. I have thought at times that it doesn't look like a professionally designed site, and it probably doesn't but customers don't seem to mind and those that do call me say they really like it. They must do otherwise why would they book me.
Dave.
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Doug how many sites do you get work from?
I find in my area that the most common search term is Sheffield or Rotherham etc etc where as if you cover the same area in miles sq then if the places are smaller and more of them that there are more search terms ie Sheffield could be the size of 10 villages so 1 term to 10 (if this makes sense?)
Shaun
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Results from websites is probably comparable with recommendations, so it does work to a degree.
What I can't get my head around is the number of unique hits we get on the main side which currently is around the 50 per day rate, but only get about 2 per day enquiries on average. The phone numer is at the top of the front page for those who are too lazy to read all the rest of the stuff we spend ages typing out >:(
The thing is: how do you get hold of the people who have visited the site but weren't impressed enough? It's all very well asking customers you get (because they obviously liked it) but what about the ones who weren't?
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Wynne covered this in another thread somewhere. Basically he said, give them some sort of incentive and try to capture their e mail addresses and build a list.
Neil, would you be happy with a 4% return from a leaflet drop?
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Neil, would you be happy with a 4% return from a leaflet drop?
Without doubt yes, but....
If 50 people have search for carpet cleaning that must mean 50 people are seriously interested in getting their carpets cleaned.
This is different to leaflets whereby only those 1,2,3,4 people in a hundred who receive a leaflet have carpets or need it doing.
So as it stands I'd love to know what didn't do it for the 48 visitors. This of course is in it's basic form because of the 50 some of those will be marketing companies etc
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considering the biggest percentage of us have said they get less than a job a week, I don't understand why we spend so much time talking about it :-\ :-\ .... it seams every day we get a post on websites or seo.
we should be finding out what does work and start asking questions on that :D
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Neil, would you be happy with a 4% return from a leaflet drop?
If 50 people have search for carpet cleaning that must mean 50 people are seriously interested in getting their carpets cleaned.
Neil, do you know that for sure via some sort of analytics?
What you may well find is many of those visitors searched on unrelated terms that just so happens you rank for.
There are lots of other reasons as well.
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considering the biggest percentage of us have said they get less than a job a week, I don't understand why we spend so much time talking about it :-\ :-\ .... it seams every day we get a post on websites or seo.
we should be finding out what does work and start asking questions on that :D
Mike maybe you could moderate peoples posts beforehand to see if they are in keeping with what you think is interesting?
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Trouble is, most things don't work for most people.
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Neil, do you know that for sure via some sort of analytics? Yes it's part of my 1and1 package
What you may well find is many of those visitors searched on unrelated terms that just so happens you rank for. Again yes, it lists the routes that lead to my website like google, yell etc, I can even tell how many came via CIU
There are lots of other reasons as well.
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Well that's good in a way then Neil, better to know than not to know. So change something on the site and see if it improves, then another thing, then another. Ideally have a smartnumber for the site so you know for sure your conversions.
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When i first got my website i was getting a nice steady stream of work from it.
However on the run up to xmas (nov/dec) i got very litte work from it, I got most Nov/dec work from the leaflets i put out oct/nov
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considering the biggest percentage of us have said they get less than a job a week, I don't understand why we spend so much time talking about it :-\ :-\ .... it seams every day we get a post on websites or seo.
we should be finding out what does work and start asking questions on that :D
Mike maybe you could moderate peoples posts beforehand to see if they are in keeping with what you think is interesting?
or we could ignore all the waffle you write, each would keep the board more 'interesting' :D :D
I never said websites and seo question are not interesting, only that based on the figures above we should search out what really works and discuss that as well
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considering the biggest percentage of us have said they get less than a job a week, I don't understand why we spend so much time talking about it :-\ :-\ .... it seams every day we get a post on websites or seo.
we should be finding out what does work and start asking questions on that :D
Mike maybe you could moderate peoples posts beforehand to see if they are in keeping with what you think is interesting?
or we could ignore all the waffle you write, each would keep the board more 'interesting' :D :D
I never said websites and seo question are not interesting, only that based on the figures above we should search out what really works and discuss that as well
Alternatively based on the figures above we should carry on talking about SEO, because clearly some of your sites are not working.
PS: I voted at least 2 a day
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To be honest like Shaun thought the other day there didn't seem many new threads so I thought I'd start one, it's all I could think of. :-\ I know it's waffle and hardly anyone is interested but the odd one may find it useful I hope.
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Wynne my comment above was not aimed at this post, but generally about the last few months were website & seo have become a very hot topic.
steve are you saying 65% of the people who responded have sites that are not working because they don't have effective seo, bit of a generalistion I think,
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Wynne my comment above was not aimed at this post, but generally about the last few months were website & seo have become a very hot topic.
steve are you saying 65% of the people who responded have sites that are not working because they don't have effective seo, bit of a generalistion I think,
That's exactly what I am saying Mike and the sooner people realise that SEO is more than simply "carpet cleaning anytown" the better.
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I think it all goes in cycles Mike. Wasn't long ago everyone was very interested in LM, before that something else, then it all come back round again.
Steve
I agree with you there. I must admit though, compared to a lot of other markets carpet cleaners are far more clued up.
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Web enquiries are just part of the marketing mix along with YP, repeats and referrals and, amazingly, a steady stream of enquireis from my free, one-line entry in Thompsons.
The fact that enquirers can send the same email to multiple cc firms without too much trouble-and which is far easier than telephoning multiple companies (usually during working hours) means that there is far more price shopping.
So yes I have far fewer clients who take me up having sent an email, but I'm expecting that. Those who ring me having seen the website I get a better conversion rate but not quite as good as those who have rung me having read either YP or Thompsons. Conversion rate obviously increases again when it is a referral.
Having reviewed my stats I've done at least one job a day on average which has come from my web site albeit I was looking back at my busiest 4 months of the year.
Perhaps because it seems to work I've never really bothered about the SEO, stats, visitors thing. Perhaps I should and get even more work.
By far the biggest part of my marketing effort goes into telephoning my top 20% of clients on a regular, agreed basis to tell them that's it's time I came and cleaned their carpet(s) again.
Shaun, Clinton; I can't possibly imagine who you may have been talking about ;)
Rog
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Wynne my comment above was not aimed at this post, but generally about the last few months were website & seo have become a very hot topic.
steve are you saying 65% of the people who responded have sites that are not working because they don't have effective seo, bit of a generalistion I think,
That's exactly what I am saying Mike and the sooner people realise that SEO is more than simply "carpet cleaning anytown" the better.
on that basis it would interesting to find out of those 65% whose website is already on the first page of google, as that is what seo is really about..... get that elusive page one position, because in my case I'm there but still get less than a call a week ( not an actual job, just a call)
if they are on page 54 then ok they need help, but I bet this isn't the case
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Getting on page 1 Mike is just the start, then you've got to engage the prospect to actually stay on the site for longer than 10 seconds and bait them enough to pick up the phone.
SEO is a minefield, the guys on here with a bit of knowledge on the subject will vouch for that.
Speak to an SEO "expert" and then you begin to appreciate just how deep it goes.
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From a pretty good stream of web enquiries in July and August mine dramatically decreased on a monthly basis in the last part of 2010 to the point of just 2 in the whole of December.
This is despite my site steadily climbing the rankings on google during that period.
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Guys
anything where you dont have control is a risk but lucky with google for most its only time. but for those that spend out getting others doing the work its a bigger problem
SEO is dead. mark my words, putting most my eggs in one basket nearly wiped me out. I still recovering from it today.
one interesting point is that most cleaners have the town name in their main keyword. its my view that this puts you behind from the start, why? well type in carpet cleaning into google and you will get the real top slot for seo and whats above them ppc and they will be local. the results you get with the town name will be different from a prospects.
plus lets not forget your ip. i live in Southend and my local google is ipswich. thats BT for you. if i changed my phone supplier it would be somewhere different. factor this in for prospects and you get a different picture.
The only way to insure you hit prospects in your town is ppc or the maps
respect
Ian Harper
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SEO is dead. mark my words
Really ? I must tell all my SEO mates they will be disappointed ::)
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Must admit I follow Ian's posts (if that's possible) and he is usually right, about 12 months ago he was on about companies keeping your browser history now everytime I search for a holiday then go onto my emails in the advertising box there's a Thompson advert or something like, SEO may not go out of business but will probably mutate into something else I think the ever changing Google will see to that!
Shaun
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SEO is dead. mark my words, putting most my eggs in one basket nearly wiped me out. I still recovering from it today.
Sorry Ian, I strongly disagree with that. Even on a local level online marketing is still vital.
For example, in Birmingham, there is a new (Dec 2010) site that is racing up the results. It looks like all of their links are paid ones (from a private blog network). OK it may be violating Google's guidelines but it shows that good old backlinking still works well.
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If you had a strong position in the SERPs Ian for your website then it should be fairly easy to sort out your Places entry to get in the pack. If you don't have a local adde for going further afield this does present a problem.
With every change there is an opportunity.
Garry, can't see anyone knocking you off that spot for quite some time, and that's assuming you do nothing. I think you need a bit of healthy competition stop you getting lazy. ;)
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It's not the top one I'm worried about, it's my second site that is propping up the Places entries (waiting to jump into second place above Doug!). :)
Or maybe it's the fact that I'm annoyed that someone else in my area is getting backlinks Shouldn't be allowed ;D
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I sometimes see graphs of competitors rankinga and link and think Christ if they carry on like that then... but usually what happens is it suddenly levels out. Either they run out of money, get bored with it or run out of ideas. :-\
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This is despite my site steadily climbing the rankings on google during that period.
I'd guess this will have something to do with the increase in the number of telesales organisations in our area.
Enterprise aren't alone so it appears in the mass telephone calling market, there's one in Southampton also doing it, although they do give set prices.
This method is clearly going to scoop more customers in much the same way as trawlers scooping up tons of fish as opposed to an angler with one rod & line.
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plus lets not forget your ip. i live in Southend and my local google is ipswich. thats BT for you. if i changed my phone supplier it would be somewhere different. factor this in for prospects and you get a different picture.
I'm with ntl/virgin and when I tried that (just putting 'carpet cleaning' into google) it brought up Reading which isn't much use when I live and work an area 20 miles away.
I can only hope that searchers would have a bit of common sense and move the map closer to Basingstoke so it picks up more local businesses.
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I sometimes see graphs of competitors rankinga and link and think Christ if they carry on like that then... but usually what happens is it suddenly levels out. Either they run out of money, get bored with it or run out of ideas.
If it's the sort of network I think it is, it will be on auto pilot. They normally scrape related content and then auto post to PR2 + blogs.
It may however, show up in a way that you mentioned a while ago. A whole load of just one way links from blogs would look a bit suspicious. 64 One way links from blogs to a new carpet cleaning site (6-7 weeks old!) ain't exactly natural looking!
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I'd better check Garry, hope it's not something we're doing. If it is we will stop at pos 2. ;D
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I have stopped advertising in yelow pages have stopped doing leaflet drops and all of my marketing effort apart from approaching the customers that I really want to do business with, goes into web marketing. Internet business is the largest growth area by far. If you think s.e.o. is dead then you are a clown. As generatiosn move on our customers are being relaced by people who have been born in the computer generation. My kids spend hours browsing the web from their mobiles. I am 50 and my first introduction into computers was an amstrad pcw9512 when I was 25. I was one of the first to get into data bases and mail shotting customers and my business advanced quickly. The internet is just another marketing tool but one which is changing the way that everone does business, ignore it at your peril.
I have 100,s of pages of information on the internet and many people that call us have already done their reseach and have chosen us.
You need to give people the access to enough information to make their decision, a lot of our younger customers have not even been spoken to until our arrival. It may be a way of doing business that you cannot comprehend but it is big business and you change of get passed by.
Peter
www.carpetcleanercardiff.com
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Well said Pete.
"SEO is dead" - got to be the stupidest thing I have ever read on this forum.
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I have to say I am baffled by the suggestion that SEO is dead or that the internet isn't worth the time and effort.
The vast majority of people use the internet to search for service providers in this day and age. Even OAPs are being dragged into the 21st century now. You only have to look at the diminishing size of the Yellow Pages for evidence that other forms of advertising are on the slide. Give it a few more years and it will start to resemble a pamphlet just like Thompson does!
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Maybe Ian was talking about how SEO is changing (which it has always done) not seo itself.
There are big changes coming and this will mean some of the sites people have will drop off the face of the earth. It will be no good simply having a site with a domain name the same as your main keyword. It won't be enough to build a site and then forget about it and expect it to rank.
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Hi Guys
Ian does indeed mean that SEO, swapping links and all that are dead and I tend to agree.
What are the big changes you predict Wynne?
Cheers
Doug
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Backlinks not getting indexed (or not as easy as it used to be) is one big change already in place.
RSS feeds, pinging and social bookmarking backlinks just doesn't cut the mustard anymore. The G can be annoying at times! I'm sure its a woman lol
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So if these SEO people are all pretty good then.....................
When I type in "search engine optimisation companies Leeds"
in effect all the companies should come up in joint 1st place.
What happens if they get 2 companies doing the same thing
a couple of miles apart from each other and they both approach
the same SEO firm and say get me the top spot.
Who do they optimise to numero uno?
If they do their job to the best of their ability then both firms will
optimised the same so who gets it?
John
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So if these SEO people are all pretty good then.....................
When I type in "search engine optimisation companies Leeds"
in effect all the companies should come up in joint 1st place.
What happens if they get 2 companies doing the same thing
a couple of miles apart from each other and they both approach
the same SEO firm and say get me the top spot.
Who do they optimise to numero uno?
If they do their job to the best of their ability then both firms will
optimised the same so who gets it?
John
Simple John, Some so called seo experts talk pooe :) No one should garantee you number one spot. Too many varibles. It can be done though given the right circumstances, time, dedication and knowledge of course.
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So if these SEO people are all pretty good then.....................
When I type in "search engine optimisation companies Leeds"
in effect all the companies should come up in joint 1st place.
What happens if they get 2 companies doing the same thing
a couple of miles apart from each other and they both approach
the same SEO firm and say get me the top spot.
Who do they optimise to numero uno?
If they do their job to the best of their ability then both firms will
optimised the same so who gets it?
It could not really ever happen.
1/ It would be a pretty dumb SEO firm that takes on two clients in the same niche in the same area.
2/ Even if the websites were identical in layout, content and age, the backlinks would almost certainly be different (or indexed at different times).
3/ Search engines may place different emphasis on where those links came from. This could vary from day to day let alone week to week. Nothing is static.
All this stuff about on site "optimising" and keyword density nonsense is not half as important as it was (keyword "density" has been irrelevant for a long time anyway).
I think where Ian does have a point is the social aspect (the "third arm") where visitor comments and general "web chat" will be given greater emphasis. Maybe that is what he meant above?
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Doug
A couple of things that I heard (all speculation of course)
Downgrading the weighting given to domain name keywords.
More weighting to consistent addition of relevant content - additional pages.
Therefore if someone buys a static website and it has no easy mechanism to add content, like a blog or feed then will lose over the long term. This can happen now but not to same degree.
re seo firms
Most good seo firms are picky who they work with and many find the client rather than having a website or advertising their wears. You sort of want to 'back the right horse' because you would pick one vertical market in an area and just work with them. Quite often companies are going after different keywords but usually it would be a conflict of interests.
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A few years ago geting 1st place on google was quite easy, a website owner just needed to submit their site on the various search engines they wanted it to appear on. The search engine would then send a spider to crawl the website and would store its cache so it would be checked and ranked, this was done on meta tags. If you had good keyword content and more than your rival, your site would appear higher than them.
Search engines had to combat this flaw... so started checking more points in their algorithms to ensure websites were truly relevant :) meta tags, domain names, header tags, bold text, keyword weight & prominence, alt tags, file names, link anchor txt... Wynne has made a very valid point in his last post, I am no seo expert but... dont optimize for your domain name ;)
Seo is not dead and never will be ;D