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Marketing Proposal


Wilko
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OK, the searches: I just took the title of the first client listed and searched for it in yahoo's directory, result: "We didn't find any Directory pages matching the following criteria". That's what happens when you only use automated submission tools. In my view, you should also enter your clients websites in directories.

As I said, I've no problem with you having a house style and it even looks nice. My own preference is to do original sites for people where possible, but that's a personal preference.

The French seems, to me, to be a bit stilted. I would get a native French speaker to read over it if I were you, to get some feedback.

No, I'm not saying that having a French version of your site isn't wise. Just that the return on investment for other languages is much higher basically because the French don't use the internet a great deal. In practice, I've found that I make more money from the Spanish version of my website. I'm sure that, at first sight, to have an English/Spanish website when you're in France seems daft but it's more profitable than an English/French combination. I suspect that it might be difficult to convince your clients of that though.

I agree that internet advertising is very cost effective and I know that there are internet only B&B places too. There are also places that have come unstuck in using a single component of the marketing mix like that.

I hope you do watch my sites. I really do welcome the criticism but, as I said earlier, this is not the forum for it. One of the things that developed another site I did was the competition with a friend to get the top site for biker holidays. It helped the rankings of both our sites no end. You seemed to reject out of hand all my criticisms of your own site; they were honest criticisms and, if you examine them, I really do think that it will improve the service you provide to your clients.

I say that ourinns isn't commercial because it's not intended to make a profit. I suppose the American term "non-profit" would be more accurate.

 

Arnold

 

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Searches - Not sure what site you are talking about - it doesn't really matter TBH, none are in the Yahoo! directory - I dont see that £299 is currently worth the return on investment - it was several years ago then the Yahoo! directory was important - not so now, and I advise my clients exactly this, if the situation changes I will advise them accordingly.
On top of that the default search at Yahoo is the web search NOT the directory search making it even less important

I really do not have a house style - I design what people want, designs are pre-approved, the customer provides the lead on this - I advise on marketing, usability, accessability etc and how that effects the design - truth is at the end of the day the site looks proffesional and does its job

The French lang thing - OK now I see where you are getting this from - something you wouldn't have known is that our clients get FULL control over their websites, adding, editing text, pages, images - whatever they want - through a web based management system, so content is in control of the owner. As I said before, theres more to building a site then meets the eye ;-)
FYI - We are finding french versions of our sites to be very 'worthwhile'

Arnold I'm not rejecting critisim, I welcome it, IF its based on solid opinions, the above should provide an answer to a few of them

Cheers for now

I've just read my post - it does sound like advertising, its not meant to be - just answers to Arnolds posts, I have removed my sig

(edited to add the above line)

 

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Hello

It appears that there have been some 1865 views of "marketing proposal". If 10% of these viewers own B&Bs why dont we have more people on the Ourinns site? Am I missing something here or do people prefer to pay? are they all fully booked for the season?

Seems to me that Ourinns is a win win situation so why not give it a go?

Lastly is there anyone out there who can explain, in layman's terms, the differences between what Arnold and Splash are talking about. It's all too anorak for a simple soul like myself, and I suspect I'm not the only one.

Wilko

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Yahoo have a free submission option; anyone who pays them £299 is crazy, especially so as it's an annual charge. The directory entry is not the default any longer as you say. However, as you should know google operates on the basis of links to a site and prioritises those links so that a link from a directory is more important than from a normal site ie directories remain important.

Your sites come across as having a house style. I don't criticise that; it looks good and your clients are seem happy with it.

Your customer didn't translate his site into French - you did. In under 12 hours according to him and that was including running up the site in French too. I don't know about you but with my degree level French, I'd find translating such a large site quite a task in 12 hours.

For the B&B market I have found that a French language website isn't as good an investment as one would expect. You have non-B&B clients and I don't doubt that for some (possibly even most), the French version of their site is useful. However, this is a B&B forum; French is not the most useful language for a website for a B&B in France and, yes, I know that sounds daft but it's a consequence of the French not using the internet nearly as much as us Brits would expect.

Incidently, if you do pick up clients from your postings, all the best. I have no problem with your sites: they appear to be technically good. Starting off by attacking fellow professionals is not the way to go though; we hit back.

 

Arnold

 

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Arnold wrote >> Your customer didn't translate his site into French - you did. In under 12 hours according to him and that was including running up the site in French too. I don't know about you but with my degree level French, I'd find translating such a large site quite a task in 12 hours

OK now you are talking cr*p, coming up with so called facts are that are rubish, but i will indulge you, here is the quote you are reffering to:

Our site was built in just over a month and a translated site was made live in under 12 hours once he had received the information from me!!

Notice the bit in red? Arnold you need to understand english before you start stating your so called facts

Arnold wrote: >> Starting off by attacking fellow professionals is not the way to go though; we hit back.

Here is my original post:


Good ideas, I would add that TBH the above sites need a professional touch added to them, or at least more time spent on the ‘look’ - to stop them being perceived as a bit "homebuilt" this would add confidence for the website user - broken images, unformatted content, broken links all add up to the 'un-maintained website' look - implying the listings are out of date and the user may get no reply to enquiries


Does that read like an attack? I could do much better than that  ;-)

I honestly do not think I attacked a professional - a least not in my line of work - advice on how it would be better for the end user is what I originally posted

>> fellow professionals
jeez you havnt in even bothered fixing the broken images pointed out earlier!!

Professional na.....

Wilko - I to think its a good idea - but as i said I think the site needs sorting out, you prob hit the nail on the head here:

If 10% of these viewers own B&Bs why dont we have more people on the Ourinns site? Am I missing something here or do people prefer to pay? are they all fully booked for the season?

<added> I hope that will be my final post on this subject - unless of course more untruths arrive </added>

 

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Mike,

It still reads to me like you translated his site. Apologies if this is not the case.

The images themselves had been fixed. However, you have highlighted a limitation in the software that I'd been using to check the site which I will keep in mind in future.

I notice that you haven't still haven't indexed your clients on any directory yet. Not doing so is losing them business.

You certainly did attack two websites. Neither is even a month old. I can't comment about Neil's site but ourinns was always intended to be an evolving site which has already changed quite a bit from the first version less than a month ago. It will continue to change, evolve and improve to help the owners listed on it get more guests. I'm grateful for the many people who have offered assistance and comments that have gotten it this far (yes, that includes you Mike).

There have been no untruths from me. There have however been considerable exaggerations, unhelpful and, in this forum, confusing comments from you.

You have pointed out things that I can do to improve ourinns and I have pointed out things that you can do to improve your service to your clients. That is how it should be in a professional arena. I actually believe that since we come from different starting points, we could learn a lot from each other but an aggressive style is not the best way to approach that.

However I say again, this is not the forum for this discussion.

 

Arnold

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This feels a bit like walking into a duel to sell hot dogs, but...

I thought I wold just point out in case anyone is considering a directory listing on Yahoo:

- there isn't a £299 fee, it is $299 per year on yahoo.com, and a one-off payment of £199 for Yahoo.co.uk.

- free submission is only for non-commercial sites, so not applicable to gite or B&B sites.

If you are on yahoo.co.uk, you automatically get onto yahoo.com. Is £199 worth it over the course of your site's life-span? I don't really know! If you want to find out more I recommend the High Rankings forum at www.highrankings.com/forum - this is where the experts spend all day talking about this, but they keep it surprisingly comprehensible for us laymen.

En garde!

Paolo

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I said I wouldnt post again, but........

Paolo, you are correct with Yahoo! - its a personal call on paying or not, Jill does run a good forum, along with several others I spend a lot of time reading and contributing in
I would also reccommend anyone who wishes to promote their site spends time reading up on best practices

Arnold - you really do not know what service agreement I have with my clients, individually or collectively, and unless you have scanned every directory on the internet you also have no idea where they are listed or how old the site(s) are - so how you feel you can comment is beyond me

>> There have been no untruths from me.

>> There have however been considerable exaggerations, unhelpful and, in this forum, confusing comments from you
Please do point these out and I will rectify / carify where ness.

Cheers

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To Arnold and Mike

Boring,boring,boring.

If you both feel you have to see who has the biggest ####, then use the internet to find a room together whether it be on from a good site or not!!!!

 

Captain H (speaking for all the bored spectators)

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 "Good ideas, I would add that TBH the above sites need a professional touch added to them, or at least more time spent on the ‘look’ - to stop them being perceived as a bit "homebuilt" this would add confidence for the website user - broken images, unformatted content, broken links all add up to the 'un-maintained website' look - implying the listings are out of date and the user may get no reply to enquiries

Please don’t take offence these are just my observations, on the marketing side, we offer free marketing to both individual sites or sites similar to the two being discussed, I wont put the URL here but anyone can contact me if interested"

Going back to the post that started it all ... is it really proposing help or is it just being patronising...?

I'm not connected or even know any of those involved but I do sign off web development contracts every once in a while , so I guess I know a little about the business. Good luck to those of you that have kicked off the web site. Ok its not the best, but it does the job and it will grow to get better and better. What has impressed me the most is the raw enthusiasm that has taken an idea and put it into reality in a  few weeks. Job well done.

As for  Mike (Adamson?)  of Splash you haven't exactly done you or your company any favours in this feud - after all there's a lot of competition these days in the low-mid budget web site design business , even here in the Tarn.

regs

Richard

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Hi Richard, my first post was an observation from a users perspective - I still stand by those comments, and yes I could have helped with those points - so yes it was genuine, and not touting for work as was suggested several times

Although i commented on the site what really got my goat up was the direct reference to our company and then our clients

While I was making observations on the site(s) in question I have never questioned the posters business, clients or other sites under their control - only the ones in discussion - and Im sorry if anyones offended, but I do tell it like it is, sometimes that hurts, sometimes it helps, either way its my truthfull opinion

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It's getting silly now, so no more comments from me on Mike. Lightpens at dawn, anyone?

Yahoo might say that it's $199 or whatever for commercial sites (which would, in principle, include B&B sites) but in reality they appear to list everyone that applies without charge in my experience. My understanding is that the free submission is actually better than the paid for one because they drop you after a year if you pay upfront whereas you stay there if you haven't paid.

An example: France > Languedoc-Roussillon > Pyrenees-Orientales > Perpignan > Hotels includes me and I certainly didn't pay for it.

 

Arnold

 

 

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If 10% of these viewers own B&Bs why dont we have more people on the Ourinns site? Am I missing something here or do people prefer to pay? are they all fully booked for the season?

So tell us, what do you think you are missing then Mike ?

The day a fair size B&B is fully booked for the season at this stage, is when all the hotels and gîtes have burned down.

People HAVE to pay NOT prefer to pay, simple facts. Arnold asked if people would like a site and I and others felt it was only right to back him, as it were, if I get sod all, well, tant pis.

I don't think G de Fr will lose any sleep but a lot of little sites can sometimes fill in those odd nights that one of the big sites haven't been able to do so.

No way 10% of people on here have B&B's so that equation doesn't even come in to it. Many people go over to each others different depts and post, doesn't mean they live there or even live in France.

There could be one reason for some not wanting to go on the site though, perhaps they run clandestine B&B's...ooooh dread the thought !

Just a thought Mike, there are a few on here that I have tried to help privately (and like to keep it like that on occasion and my guess is, others do the same) did you ever think to help Arnold privately ?

With all those online techie words that most of us have BIG problems with, for me and others, you might as well have been talking Ukranian between you

 

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>> So tell us, what do you think you are missing then Mike ?
Miki, thats not my quote its Wilko's - see my first post which tells you what I think is missing, Im not running through it again

>> did you ever think to help Arnold privately ?
Hindsight is wonderful isnt it - and its a public forum - private comments are usefull to one, not all the users

 

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I agree with the captain, this is getting boring. So Mike how about showing us a small example of the way you would do it and then we can all take it on board and have a sensible discussion. We might then be able to advance the cause.

"Come together"

Regds Wilko 

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The captain will be impressed

OK - here you go <removed by buntina - see further posts> please note this is one large image, so it may be slow to download and the quality is not there  - also some designs/images on that page are subject to copyright and are only used for this example - also note this design needs more work - currently 1.2 hrs

hope the above helps

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[quote]The captain will be impressed OK - here you go http://www.splash-internet.com/mock/ please note this is one large image, so it may be slow to download and the quality is not there - also some de...[/quote]

The captain will be impressed

 

Do you think i need to see references to myself? I'm not interested in just my comments but like to read others. Do you think Im some kind of god?

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Thank you Mike. That is useful.

I haven't updated ourinns to the tabbed format as yet but was intending to do so over the course of this month. My practice is usually to put something up fairly quickly to give as much time as possible to get into the search engines and then tidy up as that's happening. I'm still working on the search engine angle with ourinns at the moment and will be moving onto the tidy up phase in a week or so all being well.

Hopefully, once the tidy up is complete (in perhaps a couple of weeks), you will agree that it is a fully professional site.

Whilst I feel that your comments could have been put across in a more constructive way, they have been useful. I regard ourinns as a co-operative project and always welcome comments and criticism that can move it forward.

 

Arnold

 

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Hindsight is wonderful isnt it - and its a public forum - private comments are usefull to one, not all the users

Hindsight ? What has that got to do with anything in this instance ? It was a considered post and after the first few posts, hindsight can be given to any posting surely ?

You have to admit that you did drag it on a bit and then the last one with your portrayed site, cancelled out all the others and surely, could have been offered from the start, or close to the start, it was almost as if your offer of help had to be dragged out of you in the end !

Private comments to one, are because it is private to that one person, not rocket science is it, unlike Web Designs !

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Miki - it was offered from the start - well the 2nd or 3rd posting - but the 'observations were taken in the wrong way and from then on I was defending my work

How the hell you think my 'portrayed site cancelled out all the others' is once again beyond me

Public forum - public comments - isnt that the point? that others learn, that this becomes a resource? after all, you should know as a forum Guru

>> how about showing us a small example of the way you would do it and then we can all take it on board and have a sensible discussion
Doesnt seem to be happening does it

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For me, enough, anyone else want to speak with Buntina ? 

It can be boring and you might need to break out into Ukranian on occasion but it passes the time of day and stops you getting in to trouble on the streets

How the hell you think my 'portrayed site cancelled out all the others' is once again beyond me

Well it coudn't have been more simply put...............

 

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>>For me, enough,
Obv. not as you added to your post

Anything can be boring if your not interested in it - if you are interested then post

Maybe we need more 'active' minds around here - just because 'you' dont understand something doesnt mean it souldnt be posted - other people may understand and learn

>> Well it coudn't have been more simply put...............
Thank god you understood that!!

<edited> misunderstood Miki's post</edited>

 

 

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