UK shoppers spend 17 pence in every pound online throughout the first half of 2008 according to a latest report from Capgemini.

The total online spend rose 38% for the same period last year bringing the figure to over £26bn, the report suggest that the key driver for this increase is the rising food & fuel bills amidst the recent credit crunch.

With web-based shopping continuing to outperform high street stores the future of ecommerce looks very strong. StrawberryDigital offer a range of ecommerce solutions that can be tailored to your organisation.  For more information please visit www.strawberrywebshop.co.uk or email Jonathan Leafe, jonathan@strawberry.co.uk.

Well done to the development team at Strawberry for the launch of two new sites.

www.543dentalcentre.co.uk - is a great looking site for the Hull Dental Centre

www.westparkgraphic.com - is a new client, the website provides a great solution for their range of new and used printing presses

These sites are the latest from the StrawberryDigital stable, the effective use of new technologies and a strong understanding of the clients needs are proving extremly popular and more website are due for launch later this week.

Top level domains are the final element of your URL (website address) for example “.com”, “.co.uk” and “.net”. From 2009 you may be able to purchase your own unique top level domain - .hull anyone?

Although a £50k price tag may put some buyers off the idea these new top level domains may provide a frenzy when they are released next year.

Not everything is in a domain name however. Business.com sold for almost £4million, yet if you search on Google for “business” it is not on the first page.

As people search the web via the Google Search Box, we believe that having an effective search engine optimisation will be more important than a cool website address.

IAB and Price Waterhouse have released the latest advertising spend figures. 2007 saw an overall increase in advertising spend of 4.3% this equates to £756M online advertising grew by another 38% equating to £797M, so once again internet advertising grew whilst traditional advertising saw a reduction.

Why is this important to you?

More people are now transferring traditional budgets online this is increasing the competition and making it more difficult to secure a prominent position, over a period of time this objective is going to be harder to achieve and so we strongly suggest you review your promotional mix sooner rather than later.

StrawberryDigital can support you with every aspect of your online marketing activity including natural search listings (search engine optimisation) sponsored search listings (cost per click/AdWords) and email marketing. Give Paul a call on 01482 337145 for an informal jargon free chat about your organisation and the potential to develop your online presence.

Thank you to everyone that attended the Strawberry stand at this year’s Chamber Expo 2008. We found the event very enjoyable taking the opportunity to promote the value and need of internet marketing to maximise your websites return on investment.

Using an independent Sitescore analysis we were able to look at individual elements of organisations online presence and provide constructive feedback on what was working well and which areas require greater attention. These informative reports were receive extremely well and we would like to extend the offer of a free review to everyone who is interested in increasing the contribution their website provides.

If you would like more information or would simply like to request a Free Sitescore report please click here or contact paul@strawberry.co.uk.

Strawberry have been working very hard with a local lifestyle magazine 24seven to create an online that can complement their striking offline publication.

www.24sevenlifestlye.co.uk will include the current issue of the publication along with recent back issues, along with extended photo galleries from our featured events. The website will also increase the publications readership and make it easier for you to share interesting articles or embarrassing photographs with friends.

What is conquesting?
Conquesting is the deliberate use of competitors keywords to place adverts next to their products within search engines.

Until last month Google have not allowed this type of advertising to appear within its search results however, now BMW can advertise when a customer types Lexus and Orange can easily advertise to people searching for O2.

A number of people are lobbying against this change stating that conquesting is an unfair practice and will cost companies hundreds of thousands of pounds. Some are also investigating their legal position and may look to pursue a legal case if this is found to be viable.

Make sure you are protected, give Paul Smith a call on 01482 337145 or email paul@strawberry.co.uk for a free review.

24th May 2008 is an important date for two of our ecommerce clients, as Bristol City and Hull City walk onto the turf at Wembley in a bid to secure Premiership football there will be one guaranteed winner.

For a number of years, Strawberry’s Webshop has been at the heart of both clubs commercial activity. Great looking front end design is combined with an easy to use management and reporting system. Both sites are built using secure and stable technologies, to ensure that over 90,000 fans are kitted out in their respective colours.

If you would like to have a winning Webshop as part of your organisation, contact Jonathan Leafe: Jonathan@strawberry.co.uk

Hull vBristol Flyer

StrawberryDigital’s Website Development team have been very busy over the past couple of weeks producing a trio of great looking sites.

http://www.karaoke.cc/

Karaoke.cc is a digital download site for karaoke backing tracks. The difficult technical build of this site provided a challenge to our experienced developers however, the result is a great looking site that delivers the clients objectives.
Designer: Matt Nicolini, Development: Andy Russell & James Greenwood.

http://www.sittingeasy.co.uk

Sittingeasy.co.uk is a site designed for a local client specialising in high back orthopaedic chairs. The client understood the challenges the internet were creating for his traditional offline store. With a limited online knowledge the client worked in close partnership with our web development team creating a great looking and very practical website.
Designer: Mark Withers, Development: Andy Russell

http://www.leicester.anglican.org

The Diocese of Leicester new site was also made live this week, the site will become an integral part of their online communication. Ensuring the relevance and freshness of the content will be the most important element of the site. Leicester have also become the first client for StrawberryDigital’s professional content management service, formatting, editing and uploading fresh content on a regular basis.
Designer: Matt Nicolini, Development: James Greenwood, Content: Elizabeth Bottomley

The team are still busy and have another 4 sites going live in the next 2-3 weeks, including the new www.strawberrydigital.co.uk a fresh site built using our new version of SWAT 4 (StrawberryDigital’s Content Management tool) and new technologies including video.

StrawberryDigital are offering current AdWords users a free no obligation review of their current account. This health check will look at the structure and content of your account before providing you with a report highlighting areas for development, improvement and ultimately changes that will improve your AdWords effectiveness.

Common mistakes so far have included:

• Ineffective use of the content network
• Broad matched keywords with no negative restrictions
• Omission of Google Analytics to support the account
• Ineffective bidding strategies
• Poor landing pages and advert content

If you are interested in requesting a Free AdWords Health Check, simply email Paul@strawberry.co.uk or call me on 01482 337145.