• Could the use of Internet Marketing transform your business performance?
• Do you want grant assistance to help to pay for training, consultancy, or equipment?
• Are you looking to develop new markets, implement online marketing technologies, or improve your overall business efficiency?

Click here for Update July 2009:  Grants available to businesses in the East Midlands

Business Link are offering the Business Transformation Grant which is available to small businesses across the East Midlands region. The grant can provide 50% funding for both consultancy and capital projects up to a value of £10,000. The capital grant will usually be in conjunction with mentoring, training, or consultancy.

Of course the grant funding isn’t limited to Internet marketing. But this is my company marketing blog, after all. And as a Business Link Quality Assured supplier, you may be able to get grant funding for my consultancy and training services.

The process involves meeting with a Business Link Business Support Adviser. After an initial review, if your business is likely to qualify, then you will carry out an in-depth diagnostic which results in an Action Plan. Appropriate elements of your Action Plan can generally be funded on a 50/50 basis.

Get in touch if you want to discuss your project with me.

You can contact Business Link East Midlands:

phone: 0845 058 6644
web: www.businesslink.gov.uk/eastmidlands

I’ll be running my next Search Engine Optimisation Training course on 8 November.

This one day course is ideal if you have taken the first steps optimising your website, and want to learn more.

It will be a fast moving update on what’s new in search engine optimisation, including:

• inbound linking strategies
• blogging
• localisation
• Web 2.0
• keyword analysis and tools

Full details are available on the SEO course flyer (PDF).

Just drop me an email to book your place.

Summer holidays are coming to an end, and I’ve got an exciting new line-up of training courses:

The new International Web Marketing course is for those of you wanting to learn how to use your website to compete on an international level.

Take a look at the Events section of the website to see the rest of the courses covering:

• Blogging and podcasting
• Getting found in Google
• Promoting your website on a shoestring
• The Internet: staying on the right side of the law

Search Engine Optimisation:  Nottingham NG1 2AS UK

Hallam’s SEO services can help your company to stay competitive in the fast paced and growing online market.  Our targeted advice will help your company to reach your potential customers.

What is SEO?

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is a technique for making your website more visible in search engines.

With more and more businesses going online it is more important than ever to ensure that your website ranks well in search engines.  More customers finding your website more easily will, for most cases, have a real impact on your sales figures.

We don’t believe in a one-size-fits-all approach to SEO.  We will work with you to develop an SEO strategy to suit your company’s needs and targets.  Your strategy will use a mix of tried and tested SEO techniques.

Initial Website Review

Before we can develop an effective SEO strategy for you we first need to analyse your website.  We look at the factors that may be affecting your current performance in the rankings and based on this we will describe the best way forward for you.

We can also help you to identify the words that your customers are using to find companies like yours (known as keywords).  We can then help you to optimise your website for the keywords that will deliver practical results.

At this stage we will also analyse your competitors’ websites to discover their successful SEO secrets.  This information will inform your SEO strategy and will give your company the competitive edge.

On-page SEO and Copywriting

To improve your website’s rankings for the keywords that matter to your customers we can:

• Edit existing content to make your site more search engine friendly
• Write new pages for your website that your customers will want to read
• Help you to create a blog or other social media campaign

Link Building for SEO Success

There are many different elements to a successful SEO campaign.  While well-written and keyword-rich pages are important, you also need to build links with other reputable websites for SEO to work.

We can find the most appropriate websites for you to link to and from.  We will suggest and create high quality links that will boost your rankings in the search engines.

We may submit your website to topical directories, or produce engaging articles for submission to reputable websites including links to your pages.

PPC and Organic SEO

So far we have described organic SEO methods that will increase your search engine visibility without advertising.  Yet Pay Per Click campaigns can be a highly effective way to reach your customers.

We will advise you on whether a PPC campaign will help you get the results you need.  If you decide to include paid-for advertising in your SEO strategy we can manage the campaign on your behalf.

Search Engine Optimisation Training

We want to give you the skills that you need to manage an SEO campaign on your own.  So we run a series of highly-regarding SEO training courses in Nottingham, London, Manchester, Dublin and Belfast.

You will leave all of our training events with a practical plan of action detailing the specific steps you need to take to optimise your website.

You will also be provided with a comprehensive set of course notes, articles and reference guides. And following the course, you will have access to Hallam’s password protected online library of SEO support resources.

If our public courses do not suit your needs we can also offer bespoke training programmes.  We would work with you to identify the SEO skills that your staff need, then deliver quality one-on-one or group training.

All of our SEO services are delivered from our offices in Nottingham City Centre.  Get in touch if you have any questions or would like to sign up for our SEO services.

Just to let you know I’ll be teaching a DIY Search Engine Optimisation for Small Businesses course in London on 18 July.

Learn how to improve your search engine rankings in just one day, in language that you can understand.

Venue: Oxford Street, London W1D 2EU
Fee: 255 plus VAT

This one day workshop is designed to provide small business owners and managers with a complete understanding of how to improve their rankings in Google and the other search engines.

Get in touch if you would like to book a place

In a single day, and in plain English, Susan will cut through the jargon to deliver practical search engine optimisation information and the latest techniques that can be instantly applied to your website.

Every business regardless of its size is able to take advantage of the opportunities offered by search engine marketing. This workshop will provide you with practical steps you can take to grow your business using search engine optimisation.

You will be provided with a comprehensive set of course notes, articles reference guides, and a course certificate. Following the course, you will have access to the Hallam online library of Small Business SEO Resources.

Seminar Programme

• Understanding how search engines work
• Seeing your website the way the search engines see it
• Identifying your ideal key phrases
• Crafting simple but perfectly optimised web pages
• Building powerful links from other websites
• Learning why other websites rank as well as they do
• Jump starting poorly performing websites
• Understanding the most important SEO principles
• Clearing up search engine optimisation myths
• Staying out of trouble with search engine
  

Book your place now

Our first Advanced SEO training course was sold out, so we have scheduled to run it again on 3 July 2007. Get in touch if you would like to book your place.

I hope you don’t mind me sharing these rave reviews:

I recently attended Susan’s Advanced Web Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) course. Thanks to the superb delivery and comprehensive content of this course I now have more clarity, energy and enthusiasm for all things SEO AND what’s more I couldn’t wait to recommend this course to my peers. With absolute honesty this has been, by far, the best course I have EVER attended. In my opinion, what Susan doesn’t know isn’t worth knowing!

It’s been a busy couple months, with a few items worth celebrating:

I’ve been appointed to the board of the East Midlands International Trade Association (emita) which helps East Midlands businesses to trade in the global marketplace. All credit to Costa at emita for recognising the importance of Internet marketing as part of any business export strategy.

Internet World takes place in London from 1-3 May. It’s free, and if you’re there come and see me speak in the Revolution Zone: “Can You Spot These Top 10 Online PR Mistakes.”

Need eBay training? I’ve just been successfully accredited as an eBay Education Specialist. I don’t work for eBay, I’m not affiliated with eBay, but they consider me a safe pair of hands for delivering their training.

I’ll be speaking about Blogging and Search Engine Optimisation at the Women, Business and Blogging conference

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Connected Nottingham and the East Midlands eBusiness Club are offering a range of free courses for local businesses. Take advantage of half day briefings covering eBay, blogging, PR, and news about search engines. Excellent in-depth courses over 3 days covering Online Marketing, managing web design projects, and online marketing for web designers.

Small businesses anywhere in the Greater Nottingham area are eligible to take advantage of this programme.