There has been a lot of uncertainty regarding the new law, but with the 26th May fast approaching, we have put together some solid information, along with some guidelines, to assist you with compliance.

What is a cookie?

A cookie is a small text file, which is stored on your PC after you visit a website. They are often harmless, with their main uses revolving around user ability (remembering passwords, user functionality) and showing site stats (number of visitors pages and what device is being used).

The Cookie Key –

There are different types of cookies, which all perform different functions, as stated in the below key.

What is the law?

The new law states that –

1. The user must physically consent to allowing cookies to be stored on their computer or device.
2. There is a clear explanation (see below) regarding what the data is used for.
3. Social networking sites must also comply with the new legislation.

From the 26th May 2012, the law will be enforced and penalties will be issued. The law states that third Party cookies are strictly forbidden on sites, as they are being submitted from external sources (data collected from these types of cookies are often related to advertising). However, the BBC are still using third party cookies on their site (http://www.bbc.co.uk/privacy/bbc-cookies-policy.shtml) as are other popular websites.

What can you do?

We would encourage you to do the following –

• Detail what cookies are used on the site and their purpose (and how long they remain on the pc), along with a privacy statement (an example can be found here http://www.phewinternet.co.uk/about-phew/privacy-policy/ )
• Detail what a cookie actually is (the media seem to of turned it into this intrusive monster)
• Remove all 3rd Party cookies
• Explain to users how to manage/delete cookies

If you need any further advice on Cookies, please feel free to contact us on 0845 125 9070. Alternatively, please email hello@phewinternet.co.uk .

Picking your @

On setting up your account, have your Full Name as your company name. Depending on the length of your company name, your twitter name should aim to be no more than 12 characters as when you are writing a tweet you are limited to 140 characters.

Therefore, a short and sweet username takes fewer characters out of the tweet plus it is easier to remember.

Designing your Profile

Do not do anything to fancy to the design your profile, as unless it has been done professionally it can look tacky. You just need a simple background (choose a company colour) and your company logo as the profile picture.

Writing your Bio Section

In your bio section, keep it relevant to the business, quite often we see “Lover of all things French, wife of 8 years to Joe Blogs.” which is nice, but does not really say what their business is about or what they might be able to offer.

A good example would be “We are a Bedford based Digital Marketing agency founded in 2001, experienced in getting our clients more customers and engaging with stakeholders”

TOP TIP: Always include your website address in the bio section.

Interacting with other users

When it comes to gaining followers, the best thing to do is follow other businesses in the local area, associates, customers, suppliers etc. Generally most businesses will follow you back (out of courtesy!) and often tweet you to say thanks for following, gaining you more exposure.

TOP TIP: Once a week, pick a particular industry, do a people search on it and follow 10 companies.

Using the #

A hash tag allows twitter to categorise tweets, allowing users to track what other users are saying about a subject. You should only # tag words if it is relevant, a good example can be seen below -

#thingsifindannoying when companies do not include a phone number on their website.

TOP TIP: Twitter recommends no more than two hashtags per tweet.

Managing multiple Profiles

If you are using LinkedIn, creating an account with HootSuite. http://hootsuite.com/. HootSuite is free and enables you to manage your LinkedIn and twitter accounts as if they are one, meaning you’re able to post updates to both accounts at the same time.

You are also able to schedule when your updates are sent, so you could write five updates on a Monday and then schedule one to go out on each working day, keeping your profile up-to-date. (and leaving you to forget about it)

If you ever have any questions regarding social media or any other form of marketing, please feel free to contact Phew on 0845 125 9070, alternatively, please email hello@phewinternet.co.uk

The Client –

CSCS was set up to help the construction industry to improve quality and reduce accidents. Phew have been working alongside CSCS for many years, supplying Digital Marketing Services.

Their Problem – It is a problem we would all love to have, CSCS “suffered” a large rise in traffic to the site over the last 5 years, specifically from users on mobile devices in the last year. Whilst the CSCS web site worked on a mobile device, it was not mobile/tablet friendly due to its vast content and image use.

The Stats –

The stats were hard to ignore, not only had visits to the CSCS site nearly tripled, now 10% of hits were coming from mobile devices.

Our Solution – Firstly, we had to determine whether the solution needed to be an App or a Mobile Site (see Web App vs. Mobile App article). Working with CSCS, we researched heavily the varied devices that were being used to view the site. Whilst the iPhone accounted for half of the mobile visits, we could not ignore the other 50% of devices. Therefore, it was agreed that we would develop a mobile site, which is available on any device and does not need to be downloaded.

We then complied some further research, specifically looking at mobile users “footsteps”on the site and what they were trying to achieve from being on the site. Being able to determine all this information gave Phew an insight into how the mobile site needed to work to meet the needs of the user.

Then we looked the design aspect of the site, the mobile site had to reflect and be branded as the main site, but still fulfil its purpose on mobile. The mobile site is simpler in design and focused more on the content rather than images.

Having tied all above together, the mobile site is live and already receiving positive feedback.

To view the site, please visit www.cscs.uk.com using your mobile device.

A full case study will be available shortly.

Who do we need to complete our mission?

- Organisations that have a website, which needs some TLC.

Your website is live and is ticking along nicely; but when was it last updated? Is it really full off case studies, promoting the benefits of your product or services and giving a true reflection of who your organisation is now?

Whether it’s a complete redesign or just a couple of amends, our marketing team analyse your site and make valuable suggestions on how to enhance it. You won’t pay for the analyse, just the work that’s carried out.

- Organisations that have a website, which is not showing results.

What good is a brilliant website if no one is using it? Your website should be working overtime to attract potential customers, allowing you to turn them into sales. If it’s not, you need a fix, fast.

Our internet consultants are the best of the best, they’re able to spend as long as they need to determine who you are and what your potential customers are searching for. They then use this information to optimise the site and direct the enquires straight to your phone or email.

- Organisations that need to be mobile compatible.

The key trend of 2011 was increase in traffic to websites from mobiles, with all the big brands launching smartphone and tablet friendly sites. It might not be necessary, do you even know? If your visitors are using smartphones or tablets, do you need to consider how you are presenting yourself to them?

We don’t sell things you don’t need, Phew works with our clients to review where you are, where you want to get to and work with our clients to bridge the gap, delivering solution that are fit for purpose.

If you fit into any of the above groups, we’d love to hear from you. Please contact a member of the sales team on 0845 125 9070 or email sales@phewinternet.co.uk to hear how we can improve your digital communications.

Over and out. 

Phew Internet are a Digital Marketing Agency based in Ravensden and we are looking to recruit an experienced web developer to join our small but growing team.

The Role

Reporting to the Project Manager, the successful candidate will ideally have at least 2 years web design experience and have experience with CSS, XHTML, MySQL and PHP.

Experience of telephone customer support is an advantage but not essential, however you must have excellent communication skills.

The Duties

• Maintaining the current portfolio of client websites.
• Developing new websites for both new and existing clients.
• Communicating with both clients and other team members to deliver the highest quality of work.
• Providing ongoing support to our Clients.

How to Apply

Send your CV along with a covering letter in your own handwriting to the Project Manager.

Please send to -

Phew Internet – The Courtyard, Crowhill Farm, Ravensden Road, Wilden, Beds, MK44 2QS

They always, without fail, keep innovating and have a new tool that will make reporting activity on our clients’ websites easier and more detailed than ever.

Google are in the process of launching a new version of Analytics. The key features are –

Real time reporting
This is an ingenious feature; you have the ability to check exactly what is going on with your site, as its happening.

You are able to see active visitors on the site, where they have been referred from, what part of the world they are in, the active pages they are on and the keywords used to find the page.

Multi-Channel Funnels
A fantastic way to monitor the businesses objectives for your website. Your able to set up a goal, such as a completed “Contact” form or a Sale, analytics will then track the process and “conversion rate” the client took to get there. 

Mobile Reporting
Google have taken notice of how mobile compatibility is becoming more and more important to digital marketing. Many users are now browsing with mobile devices; this new feature gives you a detailed breakdown on what device (including iPads) they are using and what network they are on. 

Flow Visualisation
This is brilliant for visually displaying how users navigate through your site. You are shown a clear “Visitors Flow” which you can customise to show the starting point at which the visitor started. You can then follow the different interactions they have on the site and focus on the pages that seem to be most visited.

Key Benefits –
• If you see several visitors to your site at one, you could add an interesting article to engage and intrigue them (real time reporting)
• Shows how successful Social Media and eMarketing campaigns are (Multi Channel Funnels).
• The ability to see which devices are being used to access your sites means you will be able to justify the need for an app or web app. (mobile reporting.)
• If patterns start forming on the Flow Visualisation you can use this to improve links between your pages and look at site navigation (flow visualisation).

Phew’s Verdict -
These updates are very exciting for the digital marketing industry. With these new features, there is now a very clear way to see how your site is being used and what devices visitors are using. 

We’ve been using Google Analytics as a tool for many years, and in particular using it to understand user interaction with our clients websites so visitors to our client’s sites receive the best customer experiences; this new tool just give us more scope to support client and make what we do more effective.

If you’d like to talk to Phew about Google Analytics or Mobile Compatible websites please call a member of the sales team on 0845 125 9070 or email sales@phewinternet.co.uk.

There are two main types of app -

A Native Application (App) is a piece of software that has been developed specifically to perform tasks on a specific mobile device; these tasks can be in a variety of formats and are customisable to suit your brand and requirements. Native Apps are downloadable and can be created using a variety of different platforms depending on how compatible the App needs to be.

A Web App is an application that is available to anyone with an internet connection. These apps can include calendars, document sharing tools etc. Web applications are available by sending a link and do not need downloading (like native apps).

Phews Verdict -

Both platforms are good and both serve different functions. We honestly think it is down to your requirements. Both will improve user experience but -

Native- prestige of being in the apps stores (ITunes and Android Market Place), potentially using features on the phones like cameras and GPS, offline access to information

Web – happy for user to be online to access information, need a quick solution, expect many updates to the application, want to cater for the whole mobile market in one go.

If you would like to know more about Apps please contact a member of the sales team today, 0845 125 9070.

http://www.alterra-consulting.co.uk

Alterra Consulting offer a range of services to improve your business, specialising in Business Planning, Marketing Strategy and Social Media Marketing. 

Amanda Brown, Managing Director, Comments:

“I appointed Phew Internet to design and develop my new website. I can highly recommend them for a professional approach with a well-organised process which has resulted in a website I am proud of. They over-delivered with an online courses page with contact form and Google checkout. They integrated 2 blogs, provided training to keep the website fresh and migrated my emails. Simon and Nick’s patience is a credit to their experience and expertise. 
Coupled with Matt’s on-page SEO, I am anticipating a real increase in the traffice to my website in the future.” 

http://www.bedfordcornexchange.co.uk/

This is something we hear daily, but you shouldn’t fear as there are options.

If you asked for me to give you some ideas on de-risking your websites future, there are a number of options you could look at;

Domain names:

If you are the rightful owner of the domain there is always a process you can follow and it isn’t difficult with the correct authority. Have a look at http://www.nominet.org.uk/, these guys look after all domain that end with *.UK especially issues regarding.

Hosting:

Most hosting companies will take a pragmatic view in these austere times, if your web developer has gone bust. Some websites can be simply cloned, others might need full source code (dependent on the complexity of the site).

Software:

The challenges arise when you use a developer with a proprietary content management system or ecommerce system and thus won’t let you have the code. This is definitely something to think about when choosing a provider.

Design:

You should hold the rights to the design and content of your website, you may need to check your contract about this.

It can be a challenge to move developer completely. Web Developers can be much like other trades “I wouldn’t have done it like that”. However we have successfully inherited a number of sites and manage them on an on-going basics so this isn’t insurmountable, and I’m sure other would consider taking them on too.

Search engines:

There should be no issue in taking on search engines optimisation for a third part website. In fact it makes sure you have fresh eyes on it.

Our tips:

• Manage your own domains, so you have control of them
• Host your site with a third party so you have control if you ever need it
• Don’t use proprietary software for contentment management or ecommerce, go open source!
• Don’t use freelancers (I know I would say this as I run an agency, but the number of client we’ve picked up due to this astonishes me!)
• Make sure you can get on with the team at the company you appoint, websites are a long term game!
• Make sure you get a long term support agreement and the details of what the gives you so there are no surprises.

By making a Phew of these simple changes  you’ll improve your online exposure and no longer be “scared” of your web developer as you’ll be in full control.

www.photofab.co.uk

From mobile internet communications to content management systems, from emarketing to website design, Phew’s strategic plan is provide clients with fully integrated internet communications and in particular to help SMEs to make better use of the web.

We continuously analyse the way in which the industry and technology is evolving, making sure our client has the best technology available to suit their individual needs.

We pay particular attention to the emergence of new technologies and how our clients can use these.