TheSeed Newsletter - December 07

January 2008 Newsletter

Welcome to the January issue of TheSeed's newsletter.

We hope that you have had a great start to 2008 and are bursting with ideas for your business.

In this issue we will be looking at how to write your marketing material so that it really hits your target audience and makes a difference to your business. We have also launched our new Pay-Per-Click service and will be talking about this in more detail.

Also, in our Top Tips section we are running a special offer for all our existing customers which entitles you to free credit in your account!

TheSeed.com Team

Top Tips

As we have started a brand New Year, we are looking to offer our existing customers a great deal to get the year off to a great start!

TheSeed.com is running a special offer which gives customers an extra £50 of FREE credit, if your account is topped up with £250 by the end of 1st February 2008.

With the first month out of the way, businesses are really getting back into the swing of things and we expect February to be a very exciting month with the amount of leads we hope to receive.

With this in mind, this special offer is perfect and the £50 of free leads you will receive will really help you make the most of the enquiries that come in and could make a real difference to your business.

Leads this month

Below is a selection of sample leads generated over the last month. These example leads should give you a taste of the type of leads you will receive if signed-up to TheSeed.com.

Document Scanning
Wednesday 30th of January 2008 14:29
Would like a number of documents scanned to PDF

Additional notes from TheSeed.com:
Telephoned by Kim on 2008-01-30 at 14:30
I talked to Ross and he is looking to have this under way ASAP before they move offices, hopefully completed by the end of March 2008.

He has emailed over a detailed breakdown of his requirements, the details of which are as follows;

The company website is www.?#%!.co.uk and so far he has had one other quotation however has not specified much detail from this quotation. There is an allocated budget for this project of approx £10,000.
He would prefer email contact but can be contacted by phone on 01226 ?#% ?#% (Direct line) if he is not available please leave a message with contact details.
The quote he has is based on 275,000 individual documents. This is made up of the following: AP - 87300 individual invoices, but each invoice could have more than one document. Each invoice is indexed with a six figure number.
HR - 1500 individual employee files. Each file contains up to 100 sheets.
Taking an average of 50 documents per file this equates to around 75,000 documents. Each file needs to be indexed with an employee number and possibly their name.
Audit - approximately 100,000 banking and petty cash slips. These are currently bundled in a to-from date and store order and would ideally need to be indexed in the same way. He would like them scanned to disc, probably as a PDF, and each one indexed.

Ecommerce Development
Thursday 3rd of January 2008 13:59
I am in process of a new website development, would like quotations for my website development, please call me or email me so I can send the website description document to yourself. Regards Shaz.

Additional notes from TheSeed.com:
Telephoned by Kim on 2008-01-03 at 15:40.
I talked to Shazad and he told me that he is currently running his other business while working on plans for the following business.
Starting in February he would like to launch an internet business, of which he has emailed a brief of his plans attached below. He is looking to set up very large websites in the housing and car markets.
He would like to feature car dealerships, private sellers, and have something similar to http://autotrader.co.uk/. He would also like this format to apply to the housing market involving private landlords and estate agents. This is also something that is going to be on a national level.
He has not had any other quotes and has allocated around £30,000 - £40,000 for this website alone and then the same amount of money to the promotion of the website, all of which the funding has been approved for.
He is the best person to talk to and can be contacted on 07983 ?#% ?#% at any time. He is looking for the launch of this website to be around June.

HR Services / HR Outsourcing
Thursday 10th of January 2008 09:57
Standardisation of HR policies following merger

Additional notes from TheSeed.com:
Telephoned by Kim on 2008-01-10 at 10:14..
I talked to Susan and she told me that she looking to have this service under way within the first quarter of this year.
She has had one quote for a three year contract, of which they will do the work, constantly update the policies and represent them at tribunals if necessary; however she is looking to see what can be offered as an alternative. No more information regarding the cost of the quote has been supplied.
She has not allocated a budget for this project as of yet.
She is the best person to talk to and can be contacted on the number provided at any time.
Susan is looking for quotes for the standardisation of all the policies following a merger with another sector.

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		The Seed News
	New Launch! We are delighted to announce that we have now fully launched our new Pay-Per-Click (PPC) service. We have been trialing the service for the last few months to ensure that it really works hard for you and that you can feel the difference it will bring to your business. The service is available via the new Pay-Per-Click section of our website and can be used to promote Websites which cover any topic, thus allowing us to expand our offering beyond the 27 Categories that we generate leads for. The World Wide Web is an amazing tool for finding businesses and services but how do people pick your company from the millions of others out there? With the combined working of TheSeed.com's leads and our PPC activity, it really increases your company's exposure to potential clients. Some of the benefits of using our PPC services are as follows: Increase the volume of traffic to your website from users who are looking for your services Affordable compliment to other PPC search engines Works alongside TheSeed.com Pay-Per-Lead activity by raising awareness of your business You can tailor your PPC campaign so that the traffic you receive to your website is looking for a particular service you are keen to promote or that you would like to increase interest in It is not exclusive to certain areas of business, you can use PPC to advertise anything Utilizing both TheSeed PPC & PPL will help to maximize the online presence of your business, ensuring that you appear on the radar of potential clients searching for the services you offer.
		How to write marketing material that will really make a difference...
	With 2008 now in full flow, what is the best way for you to contact all of your customers, existing or potential? In whatever way you prefer to send out information, you need to make sure that it is hitting all the right notes to ensure that you aren't just throwing your money away and whatever you are sending is getting people's attention. Whether it is an E-Zine, newsletter or website copy, the wording needs to be right and up-to-date. There is nothing worse than looking on someone's website to see that the news hasn't been updated since 2001. Especially with your website being your showcase through TheSeed.com. Although you may be confident to speak about your business, news and services to potential clients, sometimes when it comes to writing it down, you have no idea where to start and before you know it, because the prospect seems too painful you move onto the next task. Below are some top tips on how to make sure that you do write/update your marketing material and little ways to make it easier - but powerful. Planning Before you sit down and put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) you need to think about a few things: Who is my target audience? How would I converse with them? What outcome would I like from them once they have read it? Does it need to include a call to action? What benefit is my audience going to have from receiving this information? Where is the information going to appear? Once you have this information clear in your head then it's time to get started. Content Now we know our audience, what are we actually going to tell them? It needs to be something informative and relevant, if not, it will just get deleted or chucked into the bin which is just a waste of money from your point of view. Know your target audience and fit your copy around them - if you offer many different services, it may be worth your while instead of having a brochure about all of them, splitting them into sections so people only receive information about what they are interested in. With regard to your website - ensure that your content is up-to-date and informative. First impressions really count and if someone clicks onto your site and sees pages and pages of copy – more often than not, they won't be bothered to scroll through it all to find the one bit of information they are after. Sometimes it is really hard to write something that people actually want to read, in our own businesses we are so wrapped up in what we want to say, we don't stop to think about the way we write it and how people would actually like to read it. Take a back seat and think about your information from a customers point of view. Editing With any copy that we write it is vital that it is checked before you issue it. There is nothing worse than receiving information and there being a glaringly obvious spelling mistake, or, receiving something and not actually being able to understand it for all of the jargon contained. The time you spend editing your copy can make a difference between something that hits the point and your piece of marketing material being discarded. Read the following pointers and once you have followed these – your copy is ready to go... Delete all jargon, waffle and clichés Check your spelling and ensure there are no errors Ensure that what you have written is concise and informative for the reader Read your copy out loud, if any parts of it don't flow properly, go back to it and make amends Always ensure that you print your copy out before you proof read it, it is easy to miss things when you are looking at it on screen Include a call to action so that you know what response rate you are getting Split your copy up with sub-headings if it looks too lengthy Writing marketing material is tricky, time-consuming and can be very frustrating, but once you have it right, it really works hard for your business. Start today by ensuring that your profile on TheSeed.com is up-to-date, the content is right and it will really attract your target audience?