But not having to commute anymore is only one in a long list of reasons that the move to Webexpectations has been so positive. From day one I was impressed at how dedicated and focused the team is on driving and measuring conversions. Boosting conversion rates is absolutely at the core of the business and this ethic is greatly inherent in the mindset of every employee. It’s also great to be working for one of the few UK agencies to have received quadruple accreditation from Google – a reflection of our ability to provide fully comprehensive, leading solutions for our clients.

Here’s a bit about what I’ve been up to since joining the team:

Onboarding of New Business

Following the acquirement of six new PPC accounts over the last few months, I’ve spent a lot of time getting to know the clients and working with them to identify their advertising goals. In addition, researching, planning and implementing effective campaign strategies to ensure that the end result delivers exactly what the clients set out to do.

We currently manage the PPC activity for 14 clients, the success of which has largely stemmed from these initial but important stages of the onboarding process.

Google Advanced Exam

In November I took and passed Google’s Search Advertising Advanced Exam which covered advanced best practices for managing AdWords campaigns. This happened around the same time that as an agency, we gained accreditation as a Google AdWords Certified Partner which replaced our existing status as an AdWords Qualified Company. The new qualification recognises to an even greater extent than before, the skill and expertise upheld by our team which is demonstrated to clients on a daily basis.

Internal AdWords Training

Here at Webexpectations we harness a culture of knowledge-sharing and cross-learning. So I have been doing my bit by putting on my teacher hat and providing AdWords training for some colleagues, starting with the basics and moving on to more advanced techniques in later sessions.

Large Scale Optimisations

As any PPC practitioner knows, the search landscape is constantly changing due to a number of external influences such as competition, seasonality and consumer demand that are outside of an advertiser’s control. As a result, small and regular campaign optimisations in an effort to remain competitive are sometimes not enough so more drastic action is needed such as a campaign restructure. This is something I’ve rolled out for several clients over the past few months.

Testing

Mobile, location extensions, product extensions, sitelinks, Google Remarketing, Google Display Advertising, AdWords Campaign Experiments (ACE), broad-match modifier, enhanced CPC, Display Campaign Optimiser, click to call tracking, Facebook, YouTube – you name it, we’ve tested/are testing it.

Watch this space for future blogs case-studying successful tests in more detail!

Plus they help customers save money on their gas and electricity – all-round their just thoroughly nice people!

The launch sees a complete overhaul of the site’s design and backend with a new corporate CMS that allows Ebico’s marketing team to easily manage and update content.

“We used Joomla as a framework for the back-end as it offers a flexible platform for site management and for controlling their online gas and energy application system.  Customers can easily apply online and the back-end automatically manages the processing of the orders through to the back-office systems.”

Kit Kitson lead developer on the Ebico project

Visit www.ebico.org.uk to see the new site in action.

Russell Sutton
MD of Webexpectations

We’d like to thank everyone who donated and participated towards our total of £481.31, with a special thank you going out to Alberto Culver, Mizuno Golf, Pukka Herbs, Radisson Edwardian and Tottenham Hotspur for their prize donations.

To learn more or to see the pictures of this years winners visit www.brick.org.uk/brickawards

The site had to be delivered in record time for a  campaign that has received nationwide attention including coverage on the BBC News. So far we’ve had thousand’s of people vote on the site for Britain’s best and worst rivers.  To cast your vote visit www.ourrivers.org.uk.

In a moment of reflection we took some time out to figure out what we’ve achieved. Here are some stats:

• Over 7million people a year use the websites we create!
• £25,000,000,000 – is the combined annual turnover of our top 20 clients!
• We’ve worked with some of Europe’s biggest brands – Sony Music, Guinness, Dulux, TNT Post, Mizuno, Tottenham Hotspur, Regus and Confused.com
• We’ve been accredited and vetted by Google as being amongst the best in the UK for delivering websites that increase sales

Obviously we couldn’t have delivered any of this without our fantastic clients or our amazing team of skilled and talented web experts.  Thank you!

Russell Sutton
Managing Director

Webexpectations was asked by the WWF and RSPB to redesign the Our Rivers site to help Poll Britain to find it’s best and worst rivers, and why.

Webexpectations was approached with a very tight deadline and produced a stunning new site (ourrivers.org.uk) to launch in time for the campaign to be launched on a morning BBC programme.

Knowing that there would be a spike in web traffic to the site, Webexpectations, using its flexible hosting infrastructure, setup a temporary high spec server to cope with the increased demand for as long as it persists.

The project delivered a complete overhaul of the site with a new design, CMS and analytics service. As with all design projects we used user centred design techniques to ensure the site was focussed on the needs of the user:

“With an organisation of Interserve’s size there is always a pull to design the site around the needs of the company and not their clients.  We made a big effort with the design and information architecture to make sure we put the user first – simple terminology, intuitive navigation and information architecture and a really powerful site search powered by Google.  It’s these small things that make a big difference, helping users to quickly find the information they are looking for. ”
Amie Kabia, Lead Designer on the project

Interserve’s new site is powered by a new backend CMS that allows site managers to quickly and easily update the site in real-time with the minimum of effort.  As with any company listed on the London Stock Exchange financial information has to be released at precise times to comply with strict corporate governance rules.

To see the new site in action visit www.interserve.com

The Mayfair Hotel is one of London’s landmark hotels, sitting in the heart of London on Stratton Street.  Familiar guests include Elton John, Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, Stella McCartney and Pink.

Thanks to the busy fingers at Webexpectations, the Mayfair Hotel has a new blog as beautiful as the rest of the hotel.  The new blog is built on Wordpress and forms the centrepiece of their new social marketing strategy.

To see the new blog in action take a look.