Web Academy Online Marketing: Spike Photography

Nottingham based commercial business photography specialists Spike Photography take around 30,000 pictures a year in the East Midlands, but MD Paul 'Spike' Reddington took some time from his busy schedule and thoroughly enjoyed the three day Web Academy.

Spike created his own web site himself using Microsoft FrontPage back in 1999. Last year he realised that there was a need to update his site and also he had the idea to launch a stock photo e-commerce site.

With help from the DTI and Business Link, consultancy from Hallam Communications, plus attending the 'First Steps' workshops, Spike set on Tim Ryan of Nottingham based Volute to design the sites. Although the design is a significant investment, the Web Academy got Spike to realise that there's more to a site than just great photographs and swish graphics. The words count too, particularly where 'spiders' are concerned.

Spike learnt all about optimising the site for search engines, leaving little trails of 'spider food' for them to nibble, thus ensuring hits a plenty for his site Paid for advertising (pay per click) was an eye-opener too, as Spike realised that 'insider knowledge learnt at the Web Acadamy meant that not only would he only pay for visitors actually accessing the site, but there were little-known ways to make every ad penny count.

Although the course was fun, Spike realises that the hard work begins now, as he will write the copy for the site with Web Academy tips in mind - thus ensuring as many clicks on his site as clicks from his camera!

Spike Photography, Nottingham