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Author: Christophe

  • News and offers for friends of Seven Creative (7th September 2010)

    Sheffield Cathedral
    Sheffield Cathedral

    A party invitation, my prediction and a special offer…

    Sheffield Cathedral Launch party – Monday 20th September

    Here at Seven Creative Towers we’re busily beavering away like busy beavering bees to get the new Sheffield Cathedral suite of websites up and running in time for the launch event on Monday the 20th September

    As friends of Seven Creative it would be great to see you there and it could also be a useful networking event for you.

    It’s taking place between 5.30 and 7.30 pm at the Cathedral. We’ll no-doubt be heading out for a Pimms or two afterwards and you’d be welcome to join us.

    If you’d like tickets for the launch event, drop us an email letting us know how many you’d like

    The future of websites

    I predict that video will revolutionise the internet in the same way that it revolutionised pop music. There. I’ve said it.

    In fact, you can already see this happening – many websites prefer to include a video as a way of presenting their products and services as this caters to bigger cross section of visitors. This doesn’t, however, mean you have to exclude the other content – it’s an extra! Readers can still read, scanners can still scan but, with video, those visitors who respond better to a visual narrative have a more engaging way of finding out about you.

    To this end, Seven Creative will shortly be launching a new video production service providing professionally filmed, edited and produced video presentations for your website.

    Prices start from £400 – please email or call us for more information on 0114 383 0711

    Special offer

    If you missed our recent message, Chris Seaman – a long term personal friend – has kindly designed a photography package for friends of Seven Creative.

    A picture of you taken at a barbeque with a hotdog in one hand a beer in the other may be OK for Facebook but it might not project that professional image you’d like to convey on more professional social networks – so, maybe it’s time for a professional portrait!

    For only £14.99 (normal price £29.99), Chris Seaman will take several pictures of you in his studio on London Road, in Sheffield, and provide you with 6 web optimised professional portraits in digital format for you to use on Twitter, LinkedIn, Blogs, etc.

    Simply mention Seven Creative when booking to receive the discount

    Call Chris Seaman (or Andrew) on 0114 258 5695 or contact him through his website

  • Great news for friends and customers of Seven Creative!

    Great news for friends and customers of Seven Creative!

    Seaman Photographer, Sheffield
    Seaman Photographer, Sheffield

    Chris Seaman of Seaman Photographers, Sheffield, is offering friends of Seven Creative a great social networking and business photography package which will provide you with a professional studio quality portrait to use on your social networking pages such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook

    Give him a call to book yourself in and he’ll provide you with 6 web quality studio portraits!

    More great news? Yes; if you ask him nicely he’ll even do a same-day turnaround and will send the pictures to you by email!

    Surely there can’t be any more great news? There sure is – Friends of Seven Creative get 50% off if they mention our name when they book!

    For real? You bet your ass! That’s 50% off the standard price of £29.99 meaning you get 6 professional studio portraits for use on business cards, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. all for only £14.99!

    To book, call Seaman Photographer directly on 0114 258 5695

    Address: Seaman Photographer, 193 London Road, Sheffield, S2 4LJ

    Google Maps link to Seaman Photographer’s studio

  • Kenneth Hudson Interiors – Business profile and testimonial

    Kenneth Hudson Interiors
    Kenneth Hudson Interiors

    About Kenneth Hudson Interiors

    Kenneth lives just outside Milton Keynes on the borders of Buckinghamshire and South Northamptonshire with his wife Sarah and two daughters, Gracie and Eliza.

    Kenneth Hudson Interiors was founded in 2000. Prior to this, Kenneth worked for 18 years in and around London on many residential refurbishments. In 2010, Kenneth Hudson Interiors became a Limited Company.

    He enjoys the contrast of working on contemporary interior projects as much as traditional.

    Kenneth and his team currently have projects in the surrounding areas ranging from decorating single rooms to complete restorations.

    Kenneth develops strong working relationships with his clients which allows projects to run smoothly and professionally. The team produces a design that suits the needs of the client, taking into consideration the available budget and type of property concerned.

    The painters and decorators, plasterers, plumbers, electricians, carpenters and carpet fitters are all qualified, highly experienced and skilled craftsmen who have worked with Kenneth Hudson Interiors for many years.

    Kenneth Hudson Interiors brings together all aspects of making a house a home.

    About Kenneth Hudson’s website and branding

    Kenneth Hudson originally approached us from a recommendation to rebrand his business including a new logo, colour scheme, website and stationery set design.

    We worked closely with Ken creating many different styles and variations of logo and colour scheme before building the website.

    As a member the Guild of Master Craftsmen and as a Dulux Select Decorators it was important to communicate the high quality and professional standard of the work Ken Hudson produces so the website was carefully planned and designed to reflect this

    With an integrated Content management System, Ken is able to update all aspect of his website to keep it fresh and up-to-date.

    Advanced Search engine optimization also means that the site indexes very well for his keywords and phrases allowing potential customers to easily find his website

    What Kenneth Hudson said about working with us

    “An existing client of Seven Creative,  “Penny Bruce” of “Denton Drapes” recommended that I use Seven Creative to design a website and logo  for my business.

    Chris  was extremely quick in designing several logos that he thought would compliment my interiors business.

    Chris promptly made any alterations that where necessary. He also went on to design  letter-heads and business cards. Needless to say, we are more than pleased with the end results.

    After many conversations with Chris about the design of my site, I was very impressed with her knowledge. It was great to know that when I had sent her my content and images , Chris would produce a  professional and contemporary looking website.

    Having worked with Chris , I would have no hesitation in recommending  Seven Creative. In fact, I have done so already!

    Many thanks for all your hard work.” – Kenneth Hudson, Kenneth Hudson Interiors Ltd

  • Janet Wass’ – Business profile and testimonial

    Janet Wass Jewellery Design
    Janet Wass Jewellery Design

    About Janet Wass

    Based in Sheffield, Janet Wass designs and creates simple, elegant jewellery for the contemporary individual.

    She fuses her passion for jewellery with her love of photography, lacing her designs with photographically produced imagery using laser-cutting and photo-etching alongside traditional jewellery making techniques.

    Jewellery is designed to be comfortable and wearable.  It’s elegant use of pattern and subtle combination of colour, together with its playful quality appeals to a range of people within our integrated world; the chic, the stylish, the playful, the subtle and the visual.

    About Janet Wass’ new website

    Janet initially approached us in despair for some advice has her ‘web developer’ hadn’t done what they said they would do and she was left with an ineffective and non-functional website.

    From our experience, this is quite a common story, however, this didn’t change the fact that she had ended up with a site that was effectively useless so we rebuilt it providing her with a well search-engine-optimised website that allows her to edit and update every part of her website.

    Here’s what she said about working with us

    “I approached Seven Creative after I experienced difficulties with my existing website.  Chris offered fantastic help and advice – going above and beyond what I would ever have expected.  Because of this, I decided that I would have my website rebuilt by them.

    I can honestly say that it was a decision I have never regretted – I now have a website that I looks completely professional, that is easy to navigate around, and that I can completely content manage myself.  I am absolutely thrilled with it!

    Chris is completely professional and obviously works extremely hard to produce websites that are tailored to the clients’ needs.  I am so impressed with the speed they created my website and how approachable and understanding they were.  They fully explained technical issues in a way that I could understand and responded instantly to my requests for modifications – actually, I saw the site change whilst I was on the phone making the requests – that really is great service!

    I am now really proud of my website and have Seven Creative to thank for this – I think it goes without saying that I would wholeheartedly recommend their service!” – Janet Wass, 2010

  • The importance of having a website

    "If your website doesn't do what it’s supposed to do, it’s pointless"
    The website pictured here is a perfect example one that provides virtually no practical function whatsoever – neither form nor function.

    Introduction

    I was recently commissioned by the Chamber of Commerce to write a short article about the ‘importance of having a website for small businesses’.

    When I looked at the ‘subject’ around which to write an article, I have to say I was a little stumped. The problem is that I just don’t agree with that statement! You might think this is a little paradoxical seeing as I earn a living building websites; however, the reason I disagree is due to the omission of several important words.

    On the one hand, of course I think it’s imperative that a business has a website. The problem lies in the fact that unless the website in question is built properly, they may as well not have one.

    In my many years in the business, I’ve seen countless examples of pathetic websites that are either invisible to search engines, don’t communicate their message or are just so user-un-friendly that they will never fulfil any useful function whatsoever.

    For a website to actually fulfil its function it needs to be properly built, to allow it to be found on search engines, its keywords and phrases need to be properly incorporated in order for the site to appear in relevant searches, but most importantly, before a site is started, it needs to be properly planned to make sure that it actually does what its supposed to do!

    If anyone were to ask me for advice before starting a website, I would tell them that the first thing they need to do is sit down and list exactly what your website must do for their business and also what other functions they’d like it to fulfil. These are the primary and secondary objectives that allow you to properly evaluate whether or not your finished website site is successful.

    Obviously, I think that it is important for a business to have a website, but that website must be a successful website. If it doesn’t do what it’s supposed to do, its pointless.

    The importance of having a website

    Getting yourself a properly planned and well built website may be one of the smartest business decisions you ever make, and I should know: My entire career I’ve been involved in helping businesses with their sales and marketing from start-ups and sole-traders to large blue-chip organizations such as the BBC, National Geographic and Motorolla.

    A good website opens up a whole new world of possibilities for your business. It will work tirelessly for you, promoting your products and services twenty-four-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week. It’ll save you money in print advertising and it’ll even help you break through geographical boundaries to reach people you could never normally have hoped to reach!

    From a potential customer’s point-of-view, the internet will often be the first place they look to check your credentials! Your website will help you to quickly differentiate yourself from the cowboys out there by providing customer testimonials and a clear and open means of communication. Also, having your own domain name and email address @ your domain will show people you’re not a fly-by-night organisation.

    Businesses who think they’ll be ‘just fine’ without a website run the risk of being left behind. Every day, people become more and more likely to use the internet as the first place they look for products, services, tradesmen and suppliers. That ‘over-the-fence’ recommendation is now an ‘over-the- internet’ one and the convenience a website provides to a potential customer has become less of a luxury and more of an expectation.

    Over the past decade, business has changed, meaning traditional marketing methodologies have evolved.   A website means there’s a good chance you’ll be there at the right time, when your potential customers are ready to buy. Without a website, however, you run the risk of being, effectively, invisible.

  • How to create a screen-capture of a web page in Windows

    Example web page screen dump
    Example web page screen dump

    Here are a couple of methods to create an image of a webpage.

    Method 1 (simple) – will capture the visible screen only

    1. Go to the web page you’d like to take a screen capture of
    2. Press F11 to go full screen
    3. Press the ‘PRTSC’ button (print screen)
    4. Press F11 to go back to normal
    5. Open up Microsoft Paint
      1. Either from the RUN box type ‘mspaint’
      2. Or browse through start/programs/paint
      3. Press CTRL + V to paste screen capture
      4. Press CTRL + S to save the image

    Method 2 (complicated)- will capture the whole page if required

    1. If you’re not already using Chrome browser, download and install it
      1. I’d recommend making it your default browser by clicking the little spanner icon in the top-right corner (options) and then choosing options. Under the ‘basics’ tab there’s a button to make Chrome your default browser – you won’t regret it!
      2. Navigate to ‘https://chrome.google.com/extensions/’ and find ‘webpage screenshot’ (by Amina) and install
      3. Click the little camera icon at the top right of the page once the plug-in is installed
      4. Choose whether you’d like a full-page or viaible page screen-capture
      5. When the screen-cap if done, right-click and ‘save image as…’

  • Convert text to lower-case, upper-case or capitalised the easy way!

    CAPS-LOCK
    CAPS-LOCK = SHOUTING

    This tutorial is specifically for Microsoft Word and Outlook, however, as with many keyboard shortcuts, they’ll often be supported by many other applications

    Ever accidentally hit the CAPS LOCK button and written a whole paragraph in capitals? Or how about got one of those shouty emails all in caps that are difficult to read?

    Good news – there is an ultra-simple way to swap between capitals and lowercase! It’ll even capitalise the starts of paragraphs for you!

    Simply, highlight the offending text, hold down ‘SHIFT’ and press ‘F3’. That’s it!

    In Outlook, you’ll have to click reply or forward first to make the text area editable but it still works!

    Very handy!

  • What is a webloc file or the .webloc file extension?

    A Webloc file shortcut to a webpage or URL and is usually created by Safari the Mac OS X by dragging a website icon to a location on a computer

    Using windows

    To find the URL, open this file with any text editor such as Notepad or Opera Browser and copy the URL to your browser address bar

    Example .webloc file contents

  • Sales and marketing optimisation

    Consider the alternatives

    If you were in any doubt that offline advertising spend had fallen in 2009, this physical comparison between the Yellow Pages directories from 2009 and 2010 should convince you. The 2010/11 edition is literally 40% thinner than the 2009/10 edition.

    According to IAB (2010), in the UK, the entire advertising sector contracted by 16.6% in the first half of 2009, however, the online advertising share grew by 4.6% to a record 23.5% share of the market.

    Obviously, in the midst of a recession, you’d expect advertising spend to decline, however, it seems as if many companies are realising that the traditional forms of advertising and marketing may not be the best way to reach customers and deciding rather to look towards the internet.

    Google dominates the pay-per-click (PPC) advertising world with a 65.4% market share (AFP, Feb 2010) and for most people, they’re the only place they’ll ever think of advertising online.

    There is, however, another way!

    The primary objective, when deciding your marketing approach, will be to give you the best return-on-investment (a.k.a. ROI) which, to put it another way, basically means get the most customers for the least spend.

    Google advertising is great for some businesses, but for others, it’ll never work – potential customers simply don’t use the internet to find some kinds of suppliers. Even for the businesses where it potentially works well, so much money is sometimes wasted through poorly researched and implemented key-phrases and badly-planned campaigns that they never reach their potential. Besides this, as the main player in the PPC world, competition for key words and phrases can be fierce!

    Social network advertising, on the other hand, has shown some fantastic results with campaigns we’ve run recently. One of the main problems with Google PPC  is you are only able to target customers geographically. Social Network Marketing, on the other hand, allows you to also target customers demographically and psychographically!  As a relatively new avenue, the current costs can be much lower than Google PPC and you have the option to also pay by impression if you’d prefer.

    Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) as another way to boost your organic search engine rakings. Whereas the results can sometimes be much less tangible than the PPC campaigns; a well optimised web site can give a much better ROI over time.

    If you’re certain that traditional Search Engine PPC is the one for you, consider Bing, Microsoft’s search engine competitor to Google and Yahoo. Bing is currently gaining search engine market share from Google and Yahoo remains a force in the market.

    Whichever you choose, as ever, the key to getting it right is good planning.

    More information

    With many years experience of online and offline advertising campaign planning, setup and management, Seven Creative are perfectly placed to help your business get the best ROI by optimising your sales and marketing activity

    If you’d like Seven creative to help you with your marketing strategy, give us a call on 0114 383 0711 (international: +44  114 383 0711) or contact us through the website

  • Protecting your online store

    Owning an internet shop or accepting money for goods or services is common practice these days for many website owners; however, as we’re all aware, criminals are forever finding new ways to defraud business owners.
    An example of a common scam is where a fraudster, posing as a customer, asks to have an item shipped abroad using their own preferred haulage or courier company. It usually goes something along the lines of this:

    • The fraudster sends the payment up-front to the vendor in the form of a cheque or by Credit Card for the cost of the goods AND the cost of the haulage
    • The vendor arranges and pays for the haulage using the fraudsters requested haulage company which turns out to be a fake company
    • It later transpires that the payment to the vendor was made using either a fake cheque or stolen credit card details

    The signs of internet fraud

    The problem with payments made using stolen credit cards or fake cheques is that it may take several days or even weeks before this is spotted by the bank and the vendor is often liable for the money.
    In order to avoid falling for a scam, it’s useful to be aware of the common signs of fraudulent activity, such as:

    • Customer asks to pay using Western Union Money Transfer
    • Customer asks to use their own courier or haulier
    • Customer pays by cheque but demands the item be shipped immediately
    • Customer asks for item to be shipped to an address other than the credit card billing address
    • Customer attempts to place an order by email
    • A single order placed using multiple cards
    • Orders requested to be rushed or ‘shipped overnight’
    • International recipient addresses – these need to be checked very carefully
    • Unusually large orders
    • Orders from ‘high-risk’ countries
    • Telephone number disconnected or wrong

    If you have any concerns, please contact you bank before accepting orders. You may also want to request a fax copy of the customers’ credit card together with another form of ID such as driving licence beforehand
    For more information, Visa has a guide to protecting your online store:
    https://www.visa.ca/en/merchant/fraud-prevention/fraud-warning-signs/protecting-your-online-store/
    Of course, you’re always welcome to phone us if you have any concerns!