Maryan is Digital Glue’s new apprentice and is being mentored by Digital Glue’s website developer Ben Goodman to help develop skills in website design. As part of Maryan’s apprentice she will be learning how to build a website from scratch from coding to design right through to delivery. You can find out more about Maryan here. According to the Internet World Usage and Population Statistics there are over 4 billion internet users worldwide, this is more than half of the entire world’s population. From a business perspective this means there’s a lot of potential customers for you to target. Websites are an extremely vital tool when it comes to growing your business and connecting with your audience. However, before you start the process you need to make sure that you plan your strategy and think about who your website is for and how they are going to use it, this will help you get more from your website. In this blog I will outline the top five things you will need to consider when building a new website. 1. Domain name Establishing what your domain name will be is one of the first things to do when building a new website. Make sure you pick a name that is short, easy to remember and pronounce, and is related to your brand. You want people to find your website, not get lost somewhere on the internet trying to find something relevant. 2. Sitemaps There are two main types of sitemaps, they each serve different purposes but both are equally as important when building a new website. The two types of sitemaps are: Visual Sitemap Visual sitemaps provide a detailed diagram of all the pages within a website. This diagram is usually given to clients in order for them to get a better idea about what the user journey will be like when they visit the website and what information will be presented. XML file An XML file is added into the code of the website and is only seen by search engines. This file contains information about the pages on the website with a small description about what’s in them. When a specific keyword is searched for, search engine crawlers will look through the XML file and scan it to see if any of the information on the site matches up with the search term and brings it up as a result if it does. 3. Design When you’re starting the designing process the key points you need to consider are: Business and website goals Once you know what your business goals are, you can start creating a design that will help you achieve those goals. For example, if your business wants more people to sign up the monthly newsletter you would need to come with a solution on how you will present in order to get more sign ups. Create wireframes Wireframes show what the general layout of the page will look like whilst also taking into consideration the user

Digital Glue has taken on its first ever apprentice in conjunction with specialist creative, digital and marketing apprenticeship provider, Creative Alliance. Maryan Mohammed has been recruited as a Junior Content Producer and will be working towards a Level 3 qualification over the next 12 – 18 months. She will be mentored and trained by Digital Glue’s website developer, Ben Goodman. This apprenticeship will provide Maryan the skills and knowledge in coding, designing and building of websites. She will be completing training throughout her apprenticeship as well as working on live projects for clients to build upon her skills. Founded in 2013, Digital Glue was initially a one-man operation with Javan Bramhall delivering marketing strategies and solutions to clients from his home. In six years, the business has grown significantly, from one member of staff to now 14 and has increased its revenue 10 times over. Over the past two years the company has been on a recruitment drive, adding six new members to the team and are currently recruiting for two new full time roles. The success of the company is reflected in the level of growth, which has created the opportunity to take on an apprentice and recruit more local talent. Javan Bramhall, Managing Director at Digital Glue, said: “We are delighted to have taken on Maryan as our first apprentice. We’ve very passionate about creating opportunities for young people across the city where they get a chance to not only learn, but get real hands-on experience working in an agency environment. I am certain Maryan will be great addition to our team at Digital Glue”. Every year, Digital Glue offer internships to students at The University of Birmingham and Birmingham City University. The company has also offered work experience placements for Birmingham-based schools. Each student gets to experience every aspect of the business so that they are in a position to choose an area that interests them and deliver a piece of work to a client.  The apprenticeship is an exciting opportunity for Digital Glue to continue to support upcoming talent in the local area by providing an opportunity to work in a creative industry and helping young people to develop new skills.

When it comes to choosing a digital marketing agency to help you create a digital marketing strategy, there are an overwhelming amount of options out there. It can be difficult to know how to spot someone you can trust that will deliver on what they say they’re going to deliver. A good place to start is to search for their client reviews, case studies and recommendations, but you can go one step further, if you are especially interested in running Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns on Google, you can search Google’s official register to find companies registered as ‘Google Partners’.  What is a Google Partner?  A Google Partner is an organisation that has successfully completed exams for Google Ads qualifications, the organisation must also be able to demonstrate that they are up to date with the latest trends and developments in the industry. Google Partner organisations are required to complete training and take an exam to be certified in various types of advertising available on Google, and also have a monthly spend of $10.000 at least, over the past 90 days. How to find a Google Partner  Once an agency has met the criteria set out by Google, they will receive a Google Partner badge. The badge has three small dots on the upper left corner that you can click on to see exactly what type of Google advertising that the company specialises in. Interested to see what Digital Glue specialise in? Click on our Google Partner badge below. What are the benefits of working with a Google Partner? 1. They already have the experience   In order to be eligible for the Google Partner status, you must spend a minimum of $10.000 per month. That isn’t a small investment so it demonstrates that other clients are confident in that agency’s performance and ability to deliver because they are investing in regular PPC campaigns with an agency. From that level of training and experience, Google Partners will know Google Ads far better than an agency without it and they will be able to produce a campaign that’s tried and tested to get the best results for your campaign.  2. Google Partners are up to date with product and market developments  The digital marketing industry is constantly evolving. New tech and trends come our way almost every day, when you are working with a Google Partner, agencies are required to complete training in order to stay up to date with the latest trends. If a company doesn’t complete the training updates to evidence consistent learning, they will no longer be registered as a Google Partner. 3. They communicate directly to Google  Google Partners have access to a Google Account Manager that can be reached directly to help with any issues or concerns, for example, if you have an error on one of your ads, it can be resolved very quickly. This makes a Premier Partner a great option for your business. 4. Partners provide excellent service and results-focused  Google Partners have to

On a bright and early morning, people from local businesses across Birmingham joined us at The Bond in Digbeth for latest SL/CED seminar ‘How to build a brand and protect it’ on Thursday 12th September. Our SL/CED events are a series of marketing seminars designed to give marketing advice in small, easy-to-digest chunks. They also offer a great opportunity to meet and network with likeminded professionals. We’ve previously ran events on crisis communications, marketing messages, lead generation, social media and websites, but this time we wanted to focus on branding. In this seminar, we wanted to explore how entrepreneurs, startups and scaleup businesses can take their business, product or idea to the next level and build a brand. We were joined by Nick Palmer and Anne Long from patent and trade mark attorney firm, Forresters to discuss how to protect IP, from the brand assets including company name, logo design, to the tech you’ve or design you’ve created for your products or services. Digital Glue’s Creative Director, Ben King explored what defines a brand, why it’s important to build a brand, and what makes a good brand. Patent Attorney, Nick Palmer, provided insight on what defines a brand from a legal perspective and what you need to do before you create a brand, how to avoid disputes from competitors in the future, and the different ways you can protect that brand. If you couldn’t make the seminar, here are a few of our key takeaways: 1. A brand is not a logo. A brand is not an identity. A brand is not a product. A brand is a way for people to identify with your organisation – it’s that gut feeling people have about a product, service or organisation. A brand offers a variety of opportunities to influence a person’s feeling about the organisation itself. It has multiple touch points for customers to interact with and a brand will be established from how customers respond to those touch points. 2. “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it” Simon Sinek – The Golden Circle  A brand purpose is a way of telling your customers what tension you can resolve in their working or personal life. It’s the reason you do what you do, and why you do it. Having a clearly defined brand purpose is what will connect you to the people most important to you – your ideal customers. 3. Building a brand helps you generate more leads and make a bigger profit When done right, building a brand can help forge stronger relationships with customers and lead to repeat purchases. Building a brand helps you generate more leads for your business, it helps to get your name out there to your ideal customers. It can help you create a community of brand enthusiasts – think brand ambassadors and influencers. Having a third-party voice promoting your company is a very powerful tool for your business. Building a brand can also help justify a price premium.