by Michael Cropper | Mar 24, 2015 | SEO |
We recently attended the Manchester Digital #DigitalRevolution conference hosted at AutoTrader in Manchester. The event, as usual, was another fantastic event full of insights from the digital world and how things are significantly changing for businesses of all shapes and sizes.
With the recent announcement of a £4,00,000 fund for Manchester to support the launch of Tech North, this is a clear commitment how the world is changing and how every businesses needs to adopt digital technologies throughout every aspect of their business. While this isn’t a huge sum of money, it is a great start and builds upon the work from many other digital organisations, groups and partners within the Greater Manchester region.
We first heard from a panel of speakers who took a step back in time to look at where we have come from and how we have got where we are now. Taking Google as the example in comparison to the dominant search engines of the time, Alta Vista and Lycos (if you can remember those!) and looking at how Google managed to gain such an enormous market share. Current data puts Google’s market share in the up at almost 90% which is unbelievable. The one thing they did though is make their search engine easy to use for people. While all other search engines at the time kept adding more features, functionality, content, widgets and other clutter to their homepage, Google kept things simple and just allowed people to search. After all, that is what their entire business model is built on so why get in the way of people searching? In addition to this, Google’s AdWords platform was, and still is, industry leading. To the point whereby there is no real competition to this for targeting potential customers searching for your products or services.
The discussions soon turned to the skills gap that every business currently faces related to digital technology. A topic of conversation at every Manchester Digital event. The point was made about continual learning and about how essential this is for anyone and any business touching on digital. If you don’t move, you get left behind. It really is as simple as this. Whether this is related to personal career development or as a business. The build it once and forget about it approach is not suitable and if this is still your approach, you will soon (if not already) be in a position whereby your website and digital assets are out of date. We take continual learning extremely seriously which is why we are always getting out and about to industry related events, conferences and exhibitions along with sharing our insights on our client friendly blog and our developer blog.
On a personal level for your staff, are you investing enough in their skills and career development? Most companies within the SME bracket aren’t. I’m sure you have heard the saying “What if we invest in training and people leave….What if we don’t invest in training and they stay….” This couldn’t be truer with how fast the digital world moves. We run regular digital training events and also run bespoke training sessions for your individual business needs which cover many of the topics and more listed on our events page.
Next it was reiterated about utilising all of the digital marketing opportunities open to your business, SEO, PPC, Email Marketing, Social Media, PR, Branding, Marketing and more. Simply doing things in silos isn’t going to cut it, there needs to be an integrated marketing approach across all channels.
It was also predicted that by 2020 we will have homes with no computers. To the point whereby regular devices around us would allow us to connect with the digital services seamlessly. We have already seen the proliferation of smartphones and how this has changed customers’ lives. Only last year, the BBC announced over 50% of their traffic to iPlayer and recently announced that now over 65% of traffic to the BBC website is now using a mobile or tablet device. This is an enormous change in a very short space of time. Which is one of the reasons why Google recently announced that they are going to be giving a boost in the search engines for mobile friendly websites and penalising websites that aren’t mobile friendly. This point was stressed to the point whereby if your website isn’t being built with a mobile first approach then it is soon going to be obsolete if people simply cannot use key functionality on your website. People are inherently lazy and don’t want to go back to their laptop or desktop computer to complete a task.
Another prediction, which I personally don’t agree with, but it was predicted that Facebook would lose 80% of their users within 5 years. We will see how accurate this prediction was. With over 1 billion monthly active users on Facebook globally, I can’t imagine this changing so dramatically.
Going back to the point about continually investing in all digital areas of your business, we were reminded about how giants can fall with examples cited including Nokia and Blackberry. Continual innovation of your digital assets, products and services is essential to survive.
Discussions soon turned to educational establishments, with a bit of unfair bashing as we are starting to see many leading organisations such as MMU and Salford University running courses designed for the needs of the digital world. That said, there are still many educational establishments who are still running marketing courses that don’t even touch on the digital world, which are totally pointless in this modern day and age we live in.
Google’s recent 5 predictions were highlighted on the day which I’ll expand on a little to put them into context;
- Acceleration of everything: This needs no further explanation. The rate of change for digital technologies shows no sign of slowing
- Ubiquitous internet: Internet is soon going to be available anywhere and everywhere. People expect this. Manchester city centre now offers free WiFi, most bars/cafes/restaurants offer free WiFi. This significantly changes how people behave, to the point that they have access to everything from anywhere. This does raise some serious security related issues which we will cover in more detail in another blog post as it is a serious area businesses need to consider and plan for.
- Any and all screens are a gateway: The idea of a computer has gone. Anything can be a computer these days to the point whereby screens and devices are simply a gateway for you to access anything you need online.
- Everyone is informed: No longer does information or knowledge have to sit in silos. The Government Dashboard is a prime example of the UK Government leading the way in this area.
- Internet of Things: This is going to change the world we live in
The idea around watching YouTube on the TV, Game of Thrones on the PC, playing games on a mobile device and watching iPlayer on a tablet is natural to the younger generations. There are no longer clear boundaries of what activities you perform on different devices. KPMG put together a global report that looks at The Changing Landscape of Disruptive Technologies [PDF] which is well worth a read through the key statistics and findings. Putting this into perspective, a piece of technology launched a few years ago from NEC was brought up. The technology turns traditional billboards into smart billboards whereby content is personalised to you as a person. The billboards can understand your gender, approximate age, facial recognition and more. Personalised advertising using traditional methods. More information can be found here and here. While I’m not too sure this will come to fruition on the masses, it is never the less interesting technology and shows where the future is heading.
Next we looked at open data and the importance of sharing data across towns, cities and countries. Leeds have the fantastic Leeds Data Mill which shares over 140 open data sets within the city. With data sets ranging from locations of parks, fire stations and more, it is a good starting point to a fully open data platform for anyone to access.
All in all, another insightful event discussing lots of topics that businesses of all types need to take advantage of. With endless changes in the digital world, it can be confusing for a lot of businesses to see how these apply to your own situation. We speak with a lot of companies in very similar situations, whereby they are a little confused about where to start. Let’s meet up for a coffee to see how we can help your business.
by Michael Cropper | Mar 24, 2015 | Events |
We recently attended the Manchester Digital #DigitalRevolution conference hosted at AutoTrader in Manchester. The event, as usual, was another fantastic event full of insights from the digital world and how things are significantly changing for businesses of all shapes and sizes.
With the recent announcement of a £4,00,000 fund for Manchester to support the launch of Tech North, this is a clear commitment how the world is changing and how every businesses needs to adopt digital technologies throughout every aspect of their business. While this isn’t a huge sum of money, it is a great start and builds upon the work from many other digital organisations, groups and partners within the Greater Manchester region.
We first heard from a panel of speakers who took a step back in time to look at where we have come from and how we have got where we are now. Taking Google as the example in comparison to the dominant search engines of the time, Alta Vista and Lycos (if you can remember those!) and looking at how Google managed to gain such an enormous market share. Current data puts Google’s market share in the up at almost 90% which is unbelievable. The one thing they did though is make their search engine easy to use for people. While all other search engines at the time kept adding more features, functionality, content, widgets and other clutter to their homepage, Google kept things simple and just allowed people to search. After all, that is what their entire business model is built on so why get in the way of people searching? In addition to this, Google’s AdWords platform was, and still is, industry leading. To the point whereby there is no real competition to this for targeting potential customers searching for your products or services.
The discussions soon turned to the skills gap that every business currently faces related to digital technology. A topic of conversation at every Manchester Digital event. The point was made about continual learning and about how essential this is for anyone and any business touching on digital. If you don’t move, you get left behind. It really is as simple as this. Whether this is related to personal career development or as a business. The build it once and forget about it approach is not suitable and if this is still your approach, you will soon (if not already) be in a position whereby your website and digital assets are out of date. We take continual learning extremely seriously which is why we are always getting out and about to industry related events, conferences and exhibitions along with sharing our insights on our client friendly blog and our developer blog.
On a personal level for your staff, are you investing enough in their skills and career development? Most companies within the SME bracket aren’t. I’m sure you have heard the saying “What if we invest in training and people leave….What if we don’t invest in training and they stay….” This couldn’t be truer with how fast the digital world moves. We run regular digital training events and also run bespoke training sessions for your individual business needs which cover many of the topics and more listed on our events page.
Next it was reiterated about utilising all of the digital marketing opportunities open to your business, SEO, PPC, Email Marketing, Social Media, PR, Branding, Marketing and more. Simply doing things in silos isn’t going to cut it, there needs to be an integrated marketing approach across all channels.
It was also predicted that by 2020 we will have homes with no computers. To the point whereby regular devices around us would allow us to connect with the digital services seamlessly. We have already seen the proliferation of smartphones and how this has changed customers’ lives. Only last year, the BBC announced over 50% of their traffic to iPlayer and recently announced that now over 65% of traffic to the BBC website is now using a mobile or tablet device. This is an enormous change in a very short space of time. Which is one of the reasons why Google recently announced that they are going to be giving a boost in the search engines for mobile friendly websites and penalising websites that aren’t mobile friendly. This point was stressed to the point whereby if your website isn’t being built with a mobile first approach then it is soon going to be obsolete if people simply cannot use key functionality on your website. People are inherently lazy and don’t want to go back to their laptop or desktop computer to complete a task.
Another prediction, which I personally don’t agree with, but it was predicted that Facebook would lose 80% of their users within 5 years. We will see how accurate this prediction was. With over 1 billion monthly active users on Facebook globally, I can’t imagine this changing so dramatically.
Going back to the point about continually investing in all digital areas of your business, we were reminded about how giants can fall with examples cited including Nokia and Blackberry. Continual innovation of your digital assets, products and services is essential to survive.
Discussions soon turned to educational establishments, with a bit of unfair bashing as we are starting to see many leading organisations such as MMU and Salford University running courses designed for the needs of the digital world. That said, there are still many educational establishments who are still running marketing courses that don’t even touch on the digital world, which are totally pointless in this modern day and age we live in.
Google’s recent 5 predictions were highlighted on the day which I’ll expand on a little to put them into context;
- Acceleration of everything: This needs no further explanation. The rate of change for digital technologies shows no sign of slowing
- Ubiquitous internet: Internet is soon going to be available anywhere and everywhere. People expect this. Manchester city centre now offers free WiFi, most bars/cafes/restaurants offer free WiFi. This significantly changes how people behave, to the point that they have access to everything from anywhere. This does raise some serious security related issues which we will cover in more detail in another blog post as it is a serious area businesses need to consider and plan for.
- Any and all screens are a gateway: The idea of a computer has gone. Anything can be a computer these days to the point whereby screens and devices are simply a gateway for you to access anything you need online.
- Everyone is informed: No longer does information or knowledge have to sit in silos. The Government Dashboard is a prime example of the UK Government leading the way in this area.
- Internet of Things: This is going to change the world we live in
The idea around watching YouTube on the TV, Game of Thrones on the PC, playing games on a mobile device and watching iPlayer on a tablet is natural to the younger generations. There are no longer clear boundaries of what activities you perform on different devices. KPMG put together a global report that looks at The Changing Landscape of Disruptive Technologies [PDF] which is well worth a read through the key statistics and findings. Putting this into perspective, a piece of technology launched a few years ago from NEC was brought up. The technology turns traditional billboards into smart billboards whereby content is personalised to you as a person. The billboards can understand your gender, approximate age, facial recognition and more. Personalised advertising using traditional methods. More information can be found here and here. While I’m not too sure this will come to fruition on the masses, it is never the less interesting technology and shows where the future is heading.
Next we looked at open data and the importance of sharing data across towns, cities and countries. Leeds have the fantastic Leeds Data Mill which shares over 140 open data sets within the city. With data sets ranging from locations of parks, fire stations and more, it is a good starting point to a fully open data platform for anyone to access.
All in all, another insightful event discussing lots of topics that businesses of all types need to take advantage of. With endless changes in the digital world, it can be confusing for a lot of businesses to see how these apply to your own situation. We speak with a lot of companies in very similar situations, whereby they are a little confused about where to start. Let’s meet up for a coffee to see how we can help your business.
by Michael Cropper | Mar 24, 2015 | SEO |
We recently migrated over to a UK leading web hosting infrastructure which involved migrating a large number of websites from one web server to another, and we did this with zero downtime. Which meant that the business websites involved never suffered from lost traffic, sales or enquiries. This is not as straight forward as it sounds on the face of things and requires planning and careful implementation to ensure all data, databases, files, settings, configurations and more are transferred with ease. As this is a common problem for people I thought it would be good to document the steps we took which served us well. Depending on the server technology you are moving from and to will depend on how simple (or difficult) this will be for you to implement. To Buy Server, you have to understand these guidelines are generic so you should be able to take what you need from these and see how this fits in with your technology.
DNS Records
Depending on where your DNS records are setup, if you are using your current DNS records, if you are using new DNS records or something else – will fully depend on if this is relevant for you.
If your current name servers are set to your old hosting provider such as ns1.your-web-host.com and ns2.your-web-host.com then this makes life a little simpler for you. When the time is right, you can simply point your domain names at the new web server by changing the name servers to ns1.your-new-web-host.com and ns2.your-new-web-host.com. That said, many people prefer branded name servers, such as the ones we run for ns3.contradodigital.com and ns4.contradodigital.com. This causes a few more challenges when migrating branded name servers.
If you are wanting to migrate branded name servers then you need to set up an interim stage. For us, our old branded name servers were set up as ns1.contradodigital.com and ns2.contradodigital.com which pointed to the old DNS server (a specific IP address) which then handled the traffic to websites with these name servers and pointed this traffic to the correct web server. If we were to simply migrate the DNS server IP address for ns1.contradodigital.com and ns2.contradodigital.com over to the new DNS server, this would take time to propagate, up to 48 hours which could cause inconsistent behaviour for users accessing websites listed.
Instead, by setting up new name servers which point to the new DNS server we can have ns3.contradodigital.com and ns4.contradodigital.com which can then propagate throughout the Domain Name System until we are ready to officially migrate the websites over. Once we are confident that the new name servers have propagated (see http://dnswatch.info to check) we can then begin the migration.
Beyond this, if you have any A, TXT, MX records or other that are configured on your old server, then make sure these are migrated too.
Transfer Data
Getting all of your data, files, databases, settings and more from your old web server over to your new website can be a challenge. Thankfully for us, we use a leading web server management system, cPanel which comes with a handy little transfer tool. This allows the old and new servers to talk to each other and automatically migrate everything over. This setup does require that you have SSH Root access to both servers, which you may or may not have depending on the old technology you are using.
If you are migrating between different web server control panels then this is going to be a much more manual process and often requires a detailed checklist to make sure you have transferred everything correctly and it has been implemented correctly on your new system.
It is important to reiterate this, but make sure you have transferred absolutely everything on your web server. To give you an idea this could include; files, redirects, email forwarders, distribution groups, emails, databases, FTP accounts, user logins, server logs (if needed) and more. Depending on how much of the functionality you use on your old and new webserver will depend on the areas that you need to check over. Always by over cautious to make sure you have checked everything since if you miss anything then you are unlikely to be able to recover this once you have cancelled the subscription on your old web server.
Website Migration
Once you have successfully migrated all of your data, it’s time to start migrating your websites to run from the new server and get rid of the old server. To start things off, start with a non-descript website if possible to make sure that the process has worked for your individual settings. The details above are specific to what we did and may or may not work for you. The final step is to switch your name servers so your domain names will be looking at your new web server instead of your old one.
Once you have updated the name servers for the test domain, then you can check that everything is working correctly before migrating the remaining domains on the system. This process will allow you to migrate your web servers seamlessly with zero downtime. This is a little more challenging for large scale ecommerce websites due to data continuity related to transactional data, but this is a little outside the scope of this blog post as this again depends on the technology being used related to the ecommerce setup.
Nuances
A few other points to note about web server migration is that you can trip up if you are migrating to servers with different versions of software running (PHP for example), different file systems, different operating systems, different access rights and more. When upgrading your web server, you are likely moving away from technology that isn’t suitable for your needs anymore or is limiting in some way. This causes a few problems naturally which may need to be overcome. You may also have some specific technology, non-standard and inaccessible server settings configured on your old server which can easily be missed during the migration. To avoid tripping up on some of these issues, it is always recommended to speak with your current web host to understand the full technical setup and software that is installed to make sure you have everything installed on the new server that is needed to support the websites and web applications that you are running.
Summary
The information outlined worked for us. It may not work for you. Understand the technology you are working with, in terms of what you are moving from and what you are moving to. If you are in any doubt, get in touch and we can help you with this process. Working with industry leading web hosting solutions means that we have a lot of experience working with great solutions, and also very poor solutions that people are migrating away from.
by Michael Cropper | Mar 24, 2015 | Developer |
We recently migrated over to a UK leading web hosting infrastructure which involved migrating a large number of websites from one web server to another, and we did this with zero downtime. Which meant that the business websites involved never suffered from lost traffic, sales or enquiries. This is not as straight forward as it sounds on the face of things and requires planning and careful implementation to ensure all data, databases, files, settings, configurations and more are transferred with ease. As this is a common problem for people I thought it would be good to document the steps we took which served us well. Depending on the server technology you are moving from and to will depend on how simple (or difficult) this will be for you to implement. These guidelines are generic so you should be able to take what you need from these and see how this fits in with your technology.
DNS Records
Depending on where your DNS records are setup, if you are using your current DNS records, if you are using new DNS records or something else – will fully depend on if this is relevant for you.
If your current name servers are set to your old hosting provider such as ns1.your-web-host.com and ns2.your-web-host.com then this makes life a little simpler for you. When the time is right, you can simply point your domain names at the new web server by changing the name servers to ns1.your-new-web-host.com and ns2.your-new-web-host.com. That said, many people prefer branded name servers, such as the ones we run for ns3.contradodigital.com and ns4.contradodigital.com. This causes a few more challenges when migrating branded name servers.
If you are wanting to migrate branded name servers then you need to set up an interim stage. For us, our old branded name servers were set up as ns1.contradodigital.com and ns2.contradodigital.com which pointed to the old DNS server (a specific IP address) which then handled the traffic to websites with these name servers and pointed this traffic to the correct web server. If we were to simply migrate the DNS server IP address for ns1.contradodigital.com and ns2.contradodigital.com over to the new DNS server, this would take time to propagate, up to 48 hours which could cause inconsistent behaviour for users accessing websites listed.
Instead, by setting up new name servers which point to the new DNS server we can have ns3.contradodigital.com and ns4.contradodigital.com which can then propagate throughout the Domain Name System until we are ready to officially migrate the websites over. Once we are confident that the new name servers have propagated (see http://dnswatch.info to check) we can then begin the migration.
Beyond this, if you have any A, TXT, MX records or other that are configured on your old server, then make sure these are migrated too.
Transfer Data
Getting all of your data, files, databases, settings and more from your old web server over to your new website can be a challenge. Thankfully for us, we use a leading web server management system, cPanel which comes with a handy little transfer tool. This allows the old and new servers to talk to each other and automatically migrate everything over. This setup does require that you have SSH Root access to both servers, which you may or may not have depending on the old technology you are using.
If you are migrating between different web server control panels then this is going to be a much more manual process and often requires a detailed checklist to make sure you have transferred everything correctly and it has been implemented correctly on your new system.
It is important to reiterate this, but make sure you have transferred absolutely everything on your web server. To give you an idea this could include; files, redirects, email forwarders, distribution groups, emails, databases, FTP accounts, user logins, server logs (if needed) and more. Depending on how much of the functionality you use on your old and new webserver will depend on the areas that you need to check over. Always by over cautious to make sure you have checked everything since if you miss anything then you are unlikely to be able to recover this once you have cancelled the subscription on your old web server.
Website Migration
Once you have successfully migrated all of your data, it’s time to start migrating your websites to run from the new server and get rid of the old server. To start things off, start with a non-descript website if possible to make sure that the process has worked for your individual settings. The details above are specific to what we did and may or may not work for you. The final step is to switch your name servers so your domain names will be looking at your new web server instead of your old one.
Once you have updated the name servers for the test domain, then you can check that everything is working correctly before migrating the remaining domains on the system. This process will allow you to migrate your web servers seamlessly with zero downtime. This is a little more challenging for large scale ecommerce websites due to data continuity related to transactional data, but this is a little outside the scope of this blog post as this again depends on the technology being used related to the ecommerce setup.
Nuances
A few other points to note about web server migration is that you can trip up if you are migrating to servers with different versions of software running (PHP for example), different file systems, different operating systems, different access rights and more. When upgrading your web server, you are likely moving away from technology that isn’t suitable for your needs anymore or is limiting in some way. This causes a few problems naturally which may need to be overcome. You may also have some specific technology, non-standard and inaccessible server settings configured on your old server which can easily be missed during the migration. To avoid tripping up on some of these issues, it is always recommended to speak with your current web host to understand the full technical setup and software that is installed to make sure you have everything installed on the new server that is needed to support the websites and web applications that you are running.
Summary
The information outlined worked for us. It may not work for you. Understand the technology you are working with, in terms of what you are moving from and what you are moving to. If you are in any doubt, get in touch and we can help you with this process. Working with industry leading web hosting solutions means that we have a lot of experience working with great solutions, and also very poor solutions that people are migrating away from.
by Michael Cropper | Mar 23, 2015 | SEO |
Deadline: 21st April 2015
What: Google will prioritise websites accessible on mobile devices in the search results and demote websites that aren’t
Source: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/finding-more-mobile-friendly-search.html
We are not far off now when it comes to a significant changes that is coming up on Google. Over recent years we have been recommending responsive websites which are accessible on all devices (mobile, tablet and desktop) which is why all our websites are responsive and built with a mobile first approach to suit the needs of the ‘always-on’ customer. While current website design clients have had mobile websites delivered, there are many websites and business owners who simply aren’t ready for this change and could face penalties from Google by not keeping up with the market.
As of 21st April 2015, Google will be increasing the importance of mobile friendly websites when ranking websites in the search results. This is a global change and Google is stating that this is going to have a significant impact in the search results. Is your website ready for this change? If you are unsure, then the first thing you need to do is visit these pages;
Once you have tested several pages on your website, then you will have a better idea about how mobile friendly your website actually is. Unless you have recently implemented a responsive website, then the likely chances are that you aren’t ready and you need to look at reskinning your website so that it is responsive. Depending on the technology you are using will depend on how easy or difficult this process actually is.
There are many differences when it comes to mobile websites and many nuances related to search engine optimisation which can impact the success (or failure) rate of the project. Simply having a website that works on multiple devices often isn’t enough and can actually harm the traffic to your website if you get this wrong.
You will be glad to know that we have been through this process many times before so understand the pitfalls, technical challenges and important areas to focus on. If you are serious about your business online, then it is essential that your website is updated before this time to avoid losing traffic and ultimately sales through your website.
Would you like to find out more about how this change impacts your website? Then get in touch and we will happily review your website to see what changes need to be made before this deadline. Make sure your website is suitable for the current and future needs of your customers to avoid losing sales.
