Architecture

First thing to consider was the site architecture and keyword targets. The pages and navigation needed to be reduced to a manageable quantity with information located where you would expect to find it. Keyword selection and landing page requirements made some of those decisions for me.

-Pages:

(1) Home Page - (keywords: ‘bikes Manchester’, ‘bike shop Manchester’, ‘bike repairs Manchester’).

Include search function to assist navigation, as site is quite large. Feature opening hours, telephone number and social media links.

(2) All Bikes – (‘cycle shop Manchester’ ‘buy bike Manchester’ ‘bikes for sale Manchester’)

Show a full spread of all bikes with images of each arranged in categories. This will help the customer to get a good overview of the options without clicking back and forth. Images to link to individual category pages (optimized) featuring full details on each model:

(3) Mountain Bikes (‘mountain bikes Manc’. ‘all terrain bikes Manc.’) (4)Road Bikes (‘road bikes Manc’, ‘city bikes Manc.’, ‘classic bikes Manc’ ‘racing bikes Manc’) (5)Women Specific (‘womens bikes Manc.’) (6))Childrens Bikes (‘kids bikes Manc.’, ‘childrens bikes Manc.’) (7)Folding & Seperable (‘folding bikes Manc’) (8)Unicycles, Tricycles & Tandems (‘tricycles Manc’ ‘unicycles Manc’, ‘tandems Manc’) (9) Trailer Bikes & Trailers (‘trailer bikes Manc’, ‘bikes trailers Manc’) (10) Single Speed Bikes (‘single speed bikes Manc.’ ‘fixed gear bikes Manc.’) (11) Surley Bikes & Frames (‘surly bikes Manc.’, ‘surley frames Manc.’) (12) Cyclo-Cross Bikes (‘cyclos cross bikes manc.’) (13) Touring Bikes (‘touring bikes Manc’

(14) Accessories (‘Bike Accessories Manc.’ ,‘cylicng accessories Manc.’)

A similar layout featuring images of products. Links to a second level page optimsed for cycling clothing:

(15) Cycling Clothing (‘cycling clothing Manc.’, ‘cycling shoes Manc.’, ‘cycling helmets Manc’)

(16) Bike Repair (‘bike servicing Manc’, ‘bike service Manc’). Details on services and price guide.

(17) Special Offers (‘cheap bikes Manc.’) frequently updated page to include offers. Bikes on offer will also be featured in the right hand column on all pages to draw interest.

(18) Fitting Advice (‘bike fitting Manc.’, ‘bike fitting service Manc.’, ‘bike frame size’) – these keywords don’t have large search volume but as it is a large part of the companies USP it is worth featuring a page for those who do search. Guides, tools and video content can add value to the site and may increase organic link traffic.

(19) Ask an Expert – adding to the perceived value of the service offered, this page will feature the FAQ section as well as the staff information and an online query form.

(20) Community Page – to feature the blog as well as twitter feed, and flickr link. Also to feature the outgoing links to other blogs and communities and resources.

(21) Find us – map, contact details and quick contact form.

A diagram showing site structure:

The red arrow indicates which pages the homepage links to within the content. Normally you wouldn’t link to secondary pages (most important keywords would be on top level) however given the good SERPS and high internal page PR they already have I think it is more important here to have the most usable content and most logical site structure.

A moodboard and a rough mockup for my homepage.

Initial design and logo sketches for the site – trying to pay a little more attention to the visual impact before the fold this time.

Considering the size of this site, I thought it would be a good idea to try the post-it technique to help with making navigation easiest. The smaller green post its indicate which keyword/s would be best optimised on each page.

Glad we don’t have to make all the pages for this one!

Internal

- Generally the keywords with the highest search volume should be optimised on the homepage (which carries the highest authority). However, as the company name contains the word ‘bicycle’ keywords including this are doing well and therefore need less attention. Focus should be placed on the top keywords and those with scope for a good improvement in traffic.

- Other effective keywords should also be considered – for example ‘buy bike Manchester’ has a small search volume, but would be used by those ready to buy immediately. Other specific products that bring the company a large profit margin might also be worthwhile.

- Likewise, those searching for specific bike types are more likely to convert. Therefore it is worth improving the position on these keywords, as well as ensuring that they are connected with an appropriate landing page with an informative and enticing meta description.

- Alexa indicates queries people use and click on site with are ‘what size bike’ and ‘frame size’ – although people using these phrases are not necessarily looking to buy, making more of these queries on the website (e.g. bike fitting calculator, bike fitting guide) fits with the USP, and provides added value which will be of interest and may generate more organic backlinks.

-Update site build to current standards and ensure it validates without errors.

-Images to be save with keyword rich file names where possible.

-Footer links to be added for each page to assist search engines in crawling the site.

-File names to include keywords within reason (to preserve the page rank and existing links, 301 redirects could be used).

-The homepage currently shows under two addresses – http://www.bicycledoctor.co.uk/ and http://www.bicycledoctor.co.uk/index.html. Search engines could view this as two separate pages. Remove /index.html file name and ensure links are pointed to correct page.

-Page titles include keywords in order of priority and to be unique throughout site. Quantity reduced to those specific keywords targeted for each page (roughly about 3). Page titles no longer than 70 characters.

-Minimum of 250 words per optimised page with keywords used for heading tags (max of 7 words) and integrated (but not spammed) throughout content.

-Alt text, title tags and image files to include keywords if relevant.

-Keyword meta tags for each page– not relevant in terms of rankings but potentially useful to anyone working on the site in future. Currently keywords listed make little sense e.g. ‘women’ and ‘touring’ make little sense on their own.

-Unique and enticing meta description tag for each page between 100 & 150 characters. The current ones do not get across the range of goods and services offered or the USP.

-Amend all dead links.

-Internal links through site using every keyword and particularly focusing on those with priority – use of keywords in anchor text to be restricted to one page in order that search engines will home in on the page designated.

-Google Analytics to be set up for the site to collect more thorough and accurate data.

-Sitemap page with filename ‘sitemap’ to assist search engine robots.

-XML sitemap submitted through Webmaster tools to assist in quick indexing – priority tags used to indicate greater importance to optimised pages.

External

-The vast majority of backlinks have the company name as anchor text– greater benefit could be achieved by requesting these are altered to covert a range of keywords.

- There are a large number of links to other sites – many of these could be changed to ‘no follow’ links in order to stop the sites page rank ‘leaking’ to these sites.

- Link building and social bookmarking campaign.

Current SERPS and Statistics

- The website has a high PR for a local business of 4. This has also filtered down through the site to give a strong PR3 to internal pages. Positions for the major keywords are high considering the lack of keyword targeting.

- I would speculate the major reason for this is the age of the domain name and the time the site has been live (13 years, 3 months).

- They have external backlinks from 136 domains (according to Open Site Explorer), some with high PR.

- According to Alexa, the main demographic for this site is males between the ages 35-44.

- Alexa estimates users spend around 2 minutes on the site – which is a good quantity of time, so presumably people are finding content of interest (although they may also be spending some time trying to find info on a cluttered site as well!)

- Compete.com estimates the number of unique visitors to the site over the last month is 1153.  Again I would say this is a reasonable amount for a local business, however only a small quantity will actually turn into a paying customer and each actual purchase would not bring a huge amount of profit to the business, therefore there is definite room for improvement.

Keyword Review

I would suggest targeting the Manchester area rather than national area as the company focuses on in-shop adjustments and does not offer delivery of most products to a wider area.

Whilst some potential Manchester customers may make non-regional specific searches, the competition on these phrases is very steep from both UK wide retailers and ecommerce sites. The resources required to achieve a good position with these phrases is therefore unlikely to bring a good return on investment in time or money.

To assist in selecting keywords that will be most beneficial, the Google AdWords tool has been used.

As searches for small regional areas are commonly too small to list, searching for the same term in London can help with decisions on which keywords to prioritise.

Google has been targeted over other search engines as it has approximately a 65% share of the search market.

A little round up of final changes made to my small business website, and some lessons learned:

• David mentioned adding a drop shadow to the bottom of the awning bottom of the branding div – although I had tried hard and failed to add a drop shadow to the rest of the site using CSS3 (Firefox rendered it with a thin grey line at the top of each div, which could not be covered – bad Firefox!) I didn’t actually try just adding one in Photoshop, which was a lot easier than I thought using the ‘layer style’ function I never knew I had (good Photoshop!)

• I also changed my font from Helvetica to Verdana to make it easier to read on a screen.

• I used the image replacement technique so the com pany name and tagline are still within the mark-up.

• I added a sprite to the navigation to indicate where you are on the site at any given time.

• I changed the html on the box order page so it was more semantically accurate using dl, dt and dd rather than ul, and li.

• I changed the headings font and colour to create more visual interest and allow them to be larger whilst remaining distinguished from the navigation.

• I changed the doc type on the page with the map to transitional so it would validate – Gary and Jim’s efforts to validate in strict still seem a bit beyond me at the moment!

• I gathered form people’s comments the site was lacking a bit visually in terms of what you can see above the fold – I therefore moved some images around so they could be seem immediately. Although I did think about what information should go above the fold, because I designed each page in full in Photoshop, I don’t think I thought through enough the fact that they would never be viewed in full online. Definitely something to change for the future.

-Theme & USP: To draw people back to the highstreet this business would need to compete with large supermarkets. Therefore I think it is important to emphasise the independent expertise of the owners as well as the community aspect.

Local, seasonal eating as part of a holistic lifestyle has a market so I will push this too.

-Pages:

Home – The intent of this page is to make it clear what the site is for and to try to drive people to order veg boxes online or to sign up to a newsletter.  Prominent phone number featured for those who would rather resolve queries by calling. It also includes a description of where information can be found across the rest of the site, an appealing image of the shop and its produce, and a link to a news article to give the impression of action on the site and events happening at the shop.

Products – An informative page to provide details on what is supplied along with further mention of ordering boxes. A recipe link intends to show the passion of the business for its product and get people involved and using the site more, and therefore the business more.

Philosophy – Details on where the stock is sourced from and what the business stands for. Important to appeal to the market that will be enticed by what this shop offers over supermarkets. Inclusion of a staff photo to make it more personal. Mentions the expertise and friendliness of staff to encourage people to visit.

Community – A page dedicated to enticing people to sign up to a newsletter, Facebook and Twitter. Also providing further evidence of community spirit and reasons for people to return to the site with seasonal tips, local news and recipes.

Find us – map, address, contact details and opening times.

Forms - Form for quick contact to make it as quick and easy as possible for people to start a process of interaction. Form to take orders for veg boxes. Form to sign up to newsletter.

News Articles and recipes – updating of site content so that it feels relevant along with attempts to draw people back to the site, and get them involved in events or suggesting recipes.

-Tagline: “rooted in Hastings” brings together the location and community aspect, along with the product being sold and the family business element. The design of the logo is also linked with this concept.

 -Typography: I’ve chosen a decorative, but handwritten font for the logo and navigation for friendly, personal feel. I used Helvetica for the main content as it is quite text heavy and needs to be readable at a small size. It also has a sophisticated, neutral yet friendly feel to it.

-Shapes: are rounded and decorative to add to friendly feel.

-Content: Written in first person to add to personal feel.

-Colour Scheme: I tried to use neutral tones on the site so that the colours of produce in images would be brought out.

I originally wanted to use the traditional red and green as they are so easily associated with a greengrocer but to update them by using a more subtle hue, to make it a little more modern and sophisticated.  These would serve to highlight links and important features and be compliments of one another.

I also wanted to make use of traditional stripes, updated to add to the modern but retro feel.

I don’t think this is quite there in the design at present, so hopefully I will improve this before the completion of the project. Other elements of the design will need refining also.