Website Features – Focus on Blogs
Some Common Features of Websites ● Information ● Marketing messages/brand ● Benefits ● Contact Details ● Specialised interactions ● Shopping ● Parcel delivery tracking ● Blog ● Social Media
Modern Marketing ● Marketing used to be “broadcast marketing” until 6 or 7 years ago ● The new wave of marketing involves the audience ● Social Media can be used for broadcasting ● Social Media & blogging facilitate conversation ● It's power lies in conversation, feedback, involving people. ● You can have conversations with your exact target audience
Blogging Example ● http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/how-the-u-s- army-is-using-bloggers/
What is a Blog? WebLog ● A discussion or information site published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete entries ("posts") typically displayed in reverse chronological order so the most recent post appears first. (Wikipedia).
Questions to consider ● Who do you want to speak to? ● Your target audience ● Where are they ● Do they use SM? ● What impression do I want them to have of me? ● How do you want your reputation to be perceived? ● What are my goals? ● e.g. to have 20,000 followers, to increase turnover ● What can of commitment can I put in?
Why do people blog? ● To “add value” to visitors. ● Additional insightful information, IFA comments on Budget ● To show off competence & expertise ● To interact with target audience ● The main reason... ● To add changing, relevant content to the website which will positively affect Search Engine Optimisation
Blog Options I ● Ready-hosted solutions ● e.g. Blogger.com, wordpress.com ● Usually free ● Advantages: ● Quick and easy to start ● Disadvantages ● It's a separate site, not integrated with your website ● Lack of control on layout, restricted to predefined themes
Blog Options II ● Self Hosted ● You download software and install the blog application on your own server ● e.g. Wordpress – see wordpress.org ● Advantages ● You have complete control of the application ● Can modify themes, colours ● Disadvantages ● Still takes some effort to seamlessly integrate into your website
Wordpress ● By far the most popular blogging platform ● Advantages (the downloadable version) ● Fairly easy to install and use ● Thousands of themes ● Built-in blogging functionality & plugins – e.g. moderate feedback & comments, push blogs out to social media channels ● Disadvantages ● Security ● Still a challenge to integrate with an existing website (best option is to base the site upon Wordpress)
Questions? Email: nigel@amodeowebdesign.co.uk
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