Industry News | In Practice | The Bigger Picture | Digital Marketing | Your Business | Latest Research

Latest Articles

Anticipation for new Xbox builds – sparking more social media buzz than Galaxy S4 and Facebook ‘phone’ combined

The new Xbox gaming console, which will be unveiled today, has produced 66,000 more online conversations than the Samsung Galaxy S4 and the Facebook phone operating system combined, in the month leading up to its launch, according to global social media monitoring software provider Synthesio. By Catriona Oldershaw.

more

Five Internet mega-trends

Bradley Howard, Head of Digital Media at Endava, highlights five major Internet trends that digital marketers can’t ignore.

more

PR industry “growing up” on thorny issue of measurement

Despite the wealth of data capture tools at its disposal for both online and offline coverage, the PR industry still views a lack of standards as the biggest problem with measurement, according to a new survey. New Media Knowledge caught up with a leading UK practitioner to understand why. By Chris Lee.

more

Related Articles

Wasted Government Websites & Search

Filed under: All Articles > In Practice
By: NMK Created on: December 20th, 2005
Bookmark this article with: Delicious Digg StumbleUpon

The paltry trickle of traffic on many UK government sites is partly down to lack of search engine marketing, says Warren Cowen of Greenlight...

Liberal Democrat MP for Brent East, Sarah Teather, heavily criticised the Government's web presence in The Guardian on the 8th December, describing it as 'an embarrassment'...

[Register and post your own comments on this article below...]


Her criticism hinges on the increasing number of government websites with a tiny number of visitors every month. This extreme level of low-traffic was explored in an article in The Guardian entitled The websites nobody wants.

The Guardian's Michael Cross noted that "The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is responsible for 11 websites, including what may be the least-visited on the web. UK World Heritage Sites (www.ukworldheritage.org.uk) managed just 77 unique visitors last year.

Warren Cowen, managing director of Greenlight, suggests the Government should be using SEM as part of its web strategy to make websites more visible on the web and justify their expense.

Warren comments: "The Government has adopted a 'build it and they will come' approach to its websites in an attempt to disseminate information online. However, it appears that some government organisations aren't considering what information people want and how they are actually searching for it. Some of the information government websites is useful and sought after, but not so easily accessible."

Warren believes government organisations should be using expert Search Engine Marketing (SEM) consultants to facilitate the best use of their spend. For example, Greenlight worked with The Energy Saving Trust to review the information that citizens were requesting before building a web strategy that visitors could utilise.

Greenlight is a leading Search Engine Marketing (SEM) consultancy with a proven track record of delivering innovative, targeted and accountable Search Engine Marketing campaigns. The company specialises in improving client positioning and website visibility in the top search engines, as well as driving traffic to its clients' websites.

About Greenlight:
Search Engine Marketing (SEM) consultancy Greenlight launched its specialist training arm, Catalyst on 10 November. The new division's remit is to demystify Search Engine Optimisation and Pay-Per-Click techniques for businesses of all sizes. For more information email greenlight@midnight.co.uk or visit

Comments

You must be logged in to comment.

Log into NMK

Register

Lost Password?

Newsletter


For the latest news from NMK enter your email address and click subscribe: