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Web Facts |
| Having a website gives you the ability to sell and promote your services to a world wide audience of potentially billions of people 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks of the year. It is now a fact that more than 50% of homes in the UK now have Internet access, and similarly in the rest of Europe, America, and Japan. This figure is growing at a fast rate throughout the world giving people access to information on an unprecedented scale. It is estimated 35% of all accommodation bookings currently being made involve some online activity. The case study example of Windrush Guest House underlines the fantastic benefits of having a good Internet presence. |
Absolute Essentials |
| You may have lots of experience, you may have your own website, or you may have kept clear of the technology altogether. Hopefully you all will find the following information useful, straightforward, and demystifying and help you to avoid the common mistakes made by many people who reckon to know what they are talking about when it comes to giving Internet advice. |
Having your own meaningful Internet presence, however, is not easy or straightforward, and has many pitfalls. To clarify, it is easy to have your own website, but to have one that brings you customers is a totally different matter.
Here we cut to the quick and in plain English give you the absolute essentials to assist you over some of the hurdles. |
• Domain Name |
This is one of the most important decisions you are ever likely to make, and you probably thought it was the easiest. To have your website ranked in a high position they need to be able to relate to key words, not only, in the body text of your website but also in the first words they spider ie. your domain name. If you choose only the name of your hotel or B&B then that is meaningless to them and also to most people searching the web for accommodation.
If your holiday cottage is, for example in a well known town of Northleach, then your domain name should include it in addition to the name of your cottage eg.www.northleach-honeysuckle-cottage.co.uk.
If your B&B is not in a well known spot then your domain name should at least contain the name of the county eg.www.gloucestershire-windrush.co.uk |
• Marketing Partner |
Once you have got your website up and running it can take several months for it to get listed on search engines and even then it may never reach the first few top pages until it has been specially optimised.
This a where you need a marketing partner. These come in all different shapes and sizes and can be for example a website that will give a listing to your business and has the benefit of good search engine rankings.
Unfortunately, many of these are only interested in taking your money for little effort on there part in getting and maintaining high search engine rankings. If they do not do this they will not attract high volume traffic and in return you will not! Also, many listing sites are not very generic to your location - they will cover Britain or United Kingdom rather than specifically the Cotswolds. Consider an American wanting to have a vacation in the Cotswolds - what search word/phrase will they use - yes 'cotswolds', maybe 'cotswolds uk' - but not Britain or United Kingdom.
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