The Importance of a Good User Experience: Calls to Action and Positive Engagement

user experience

The user experience is an essential part of any website. It’s what keeps people engaged and makes them want to return.  It can be difficult to get the balance right when designing a site – how much information should you provide? What are some calls to action for your visitors? In this blog post, we’ll explore the importance of creating a good user experience by incorporating a range of different calls to action in order to increase orders from your website and keep your users happy! Continue reading “The Importance of a Good User Experience: Calls to Action and Positive Engagement”

The Changing Skyline of Manchester

Manchester is a major city in the Northwest of England. It is the third most populous metropolitan area in the whole of the United Kingdom. The Manchester skyline is an ever-changing scene with cranes constantly working and taller buildings cropping up each decade.

Not so long ago the Manchester Town Hall was the tallest building to grace the skyline of the greater Manchester area. The Hall stood at 85 meters high, which makes it a dwarf now when it is compared to the more modern structures like the Beetham towers. Completed in 1877, this iconic building has graced the skyline for almost 142 years now. The town hall is still there to date, but it only serves as a landmark because of its iconic clock and the general location. The town hall was surpassed in 1962 by the CIS tower which measured 118 meters high. When the CIS tower was completed, it was the tallest building not only in Manchester but also in the United Kingdom.

Manchester SkyscrapersIn the present day, there are several colossal buildings that decorate the beautiful skyline of Manchester, the tallest of them being the Beetham tower. Located in Deansgate, this tower houses some residences and a hotel. At the conclusion of its construction in 2006, the tower was the 12th tallest structure in the entire United Kingdom, measuring 168.8 meters tall. It comprises of 50 floors with 219 residential apartments.

Its overall cost for construction is £150 million. Whilst not being the most expensive project in comparison to the latest building projects in the city centre, it is no small fee. Working closely with Google here at SEO Manchester Ltd, we recently heard that Google was fined by the EU for €1.49 billion for unfair advertising violations. Whilst this is a huge fine, it would only enable you to buy a few floors of the Beetham Tower building.

Things will change in a few months when the Deansgate Square Towers open. The towers are located along Owen Street and their construction started in 2016. The project constitutes of four towers namely North, South, West and East towers. The South towers will be the tallest of the four buildings, standing at 201 meters tall. This will make it the tallest building in the Manchester area. The tower will be a residential building consisting of 66 floors with 496 apartments. It will have some pretty exclusive penthouses. This surge in residential skyscrapers can be credited to the expansion of the economy in Manchester over the last thirty years. This expansion caused an upsurge in the population and a very high growth rate. The residential buildings may be an indication that there is a continuously increasing demand for housing in the city.

In terms of commercial space, the City Towers takes to the sky with 28 storeys standing at 107 meters. The building acts as the transmitting station for Manchester’s main radio station. Its 28th floor offices are the highest commercially available office space. The City Towers are also used to house SEO Manchester based companies like SEO Manchester Ltd.

The city’s lust for gigantic structures is yet to be quenched. The skyline of Manchester is bound to change again within the next few years. A recently approved development project will see the emergence of Trinity Island. The project will have five towers and will make the Trinity Island Tower X the tallest structure in Manchester bearing 67 storeys and standing at 213 meters. Construction is set to start this year, 2019, and will be finished in 2022. This mega structure will definitely be a game changer. In addition to the trinity island, a host of buildings will also be completed in the future, including the remaining phases of the circle square project.

The buildings are just a stone throw away from Pleer House where you can find the best SEO in Manchester companies. Contact us on 0161 820 5471 or email any enquiries to sales@netsixtysix.co.uk.

Google Say… Use Voice Search

Why Google wants you to use voice search instead of your fingers for their search app

Who remembers Trigger Happy TV on Channel Four? A long running joke of Dom Joly’s television comedy series features a giant mobile phone. Shaped like a 1980s cellular phone, we saw the comedian shouting into his handset. He would spout out random bits of nonsense or state the obvious from the top of his voice. If Channel Four were to commission a new series, he could be doing the same with Google’s Voice Search facility. Continue reading “Google Say… Use Voice Search”

Spotlight on Romiley Board Mill

In the first of a series of posts related to our clients, we look at our most prestigious one to date

Where would we be without cardboard? How would Net Sixty Six SEO be able to store odd computer cables and kettle leads? Could you imagine a world without cardboard tubes? We wouldn’t be able to ourselves. Without Romiley Board Mill, there would be a plethora of packaging problems (and the Royal Mail wouldn’t be too pleased).

Continue reading “Spotlight on Romiley Board Mill”

Google Hits Out At Fake News

Fact Check feature introduced to counter spread of fake news stories

Apart from the fact there may be no World War Two Bomber On The Moon type of stories on Google, the search engine’s clampdown on fake news could see improvements to its news section, with stories backed up by linked sources.

Hands up who used to have a paper round? All these mornings or evenings carrying The Daily Telex or The Daily Moon to the top of the world? Sometimes, disgruntled of 56 Rochdale Road would give you an ear bashing over her missing copy of Yesterday. Ah, those were the days where yesterday’s fake news would become chip paper. On the internet, things are different: tomorrow’s chip paper is still on the internet. Five years on. Or longer.

Continue reading “Google Hits Out At Fake News”

Are You Oversharing Your Office 365 Documents?

Reports of Office 365 documents being seen on Bing and Google results

Beware of identity theft: oversharing on Office 365 could divulge sensitive information on search engines like Google and Bing. Image by ValterZ (via Shutterstock).

Sometimes on social media sites, we might share a few items that other would regard as embarrassing. For example, the debauchery of a Saturday night out. Or our political and spiritual beliefs. Or saying that Mr Blobby’s eponymous Number One single was several times better than The Specials’ Ghost Town. Imagine if something personal was seen on Bing or Google? It has been revealed that some Office 365 users had shared their private documents publicly. Continue reading “Are You Oversharing Your Office 365 Documents?”

Net Sixty Six’s Street Smart Signage Solution

Net Sixty Six’s new signage stands head and shoulders above the rest

NetSixtySix signage
An artist’s impression of the swish Net Sixty Six signage that will be displayed in the front window.

If you’re familiar with Central Manchester or have found us via Google Maps, you would know that Net Sixty Six SEO’s base is slap bang in the middle of our city. Unless you know where we are physically, it is a case of ‘blink and you miss it’ if you miss our HQ at 40 – 42, John Dalton Street. You may have seen our offices through the window of a Bolton-bound 37, or a Leigh-bound Vantage V1 bus. From this month, spending the best part of half an hour trying to find Net Sixty Six Towers will be over. One of our first floor windows will be adorned with Net Sixty Six’s spiffy signage. Continue reading “Net Sixty Six’s Street Smart Signage Solution”

Matt Cutts Cuts Ties With Google

Matt Cutts officially resigns from search engine and media behemoth

The Pentagon, Matt Cutts' new workplace. Image by David B. Gleason (Creative Commons License: Attribution-Share Alike).
The Pentagon, Matt Cutts’ new workplace. Image by David B. Gleason (Creative Commons License: Attribution-Share Alike).

An end of an era for Google was marked this week by a high profile departure. That of Matt Cutts, one time head of Google’s Webspam team. Today, he is now the Director of Engineering at USDS (US Digital Service). Before taking on his new role, he joined Google in 2000 where he became part of the furniture.

On the 31 December 2016, Matt Cutts handed in his resignation to the search engine and media behemoth in Stanford. A few months before then, he took a leave of absence to work for the US Digital Service. He enjoyed his brief stint and has decided to stay there. On his blog, he said:

“When I joined the US Digital Service, I only planned to stay for three months. That quickly turned into six months after I saw the impact of the USDS. In the last month, I made a big decision. On December 31, 2016, I resigned from Google.” Continue reading “Matt Cutts Cuts Ties With Google”

Now We Are Thirteen: On Friday the 13th!

Net Sixty Six at thirteen years old

Birthday Cake: Net Sixty Six at Thirteen. Image by VictoriaSky1 (via Shutterstock).
Tasty, though sadly not the birthday cake for celebrating our thirteen years in business (on Friday The 13th). This creation was photographed by VictoriaSky1 (via Shutterstock).

So to misquote our previous female Prime Minister, we have become a teenager. Yes, Net Sixty Six is thirteen years old. By rights, this means we should be sulking in our bedrooms if something goes wrong. This means we should be out chasing members of the opposite or same sex for a future significant other in later years. Or we should be fretting about our GCSEs or Key Stage 3 SATs. Continue reading “Now We Are Thirteen: On Friday the 13th!”

The Ten Commandments of Ethical Social Media Posting

Ten tips on how to make effective social media posts without offending or alienating your audience

Social Media Ten Commandments image by Kues (via Shutterstock).
Think Before You Link Or Before You Post: one ill-thought out post could be ruinous to your professional or personal reputation. Image by Kues (via Shutterstock).

You may have come across this familiar phrase in your time. The author of this piece most certainly has: “Engage Brain Before Putting Mouth into Gear”. One of his ex-teachers had the sign above the chalkboard. He would have said to any pupil (about to put his or her foot in it): “Read the sign, Boy (or Girl).” Imagine if Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, et al had this sign at the top of their pages. There could be fewer libellous tweets or salacious memes. There’s no way that any social media related sites from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe would do this. There would be cries of ‘censorship’ from Aberdeen to Zennor. Continue reading “The Ten Commandments of Ethical Social Media Posting”