.: David Andrew Smith Profile and Articles
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1). Marble And Granite – What Produces The Shine?Many people make the assumption that marble, granite and other finely polished natural stones shine because a ‘polish’ has been added to them. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Natural stones are made of crystals. The crystals are made up of different minerals. Each mineral forms a different crystal shape. These different crystals interlock together to make up the stone.
2). Polishing Granite
Of all the natural stones that you can choose for flooring granite is by far the hardest material and the most hardwearing. It is also resistant to staining and acid and alkaline chemicals. This is the reason it is the kitchen worktop of choice and the flooring material of choice.
Despite its hardness it is still capable of being scratched by quartz.
3). Patrick Anderson: Wheelchair Basketball Star
Winning one Paralympic gold medal is challenging enough. Winning two in consecutive Paralympics is even more difficult. But that's exactly what Patri
4). Office Cleaning - Advice For The Cleaning Company
For contract cleaning companies office cleaning is the most competitive market to break into. Some organisations change their cleaners on a regular basis, every year or some even every six months because they cannot find a company that will consistently meet their requirements. What we find is that these companies do not have a clear indication of what is expected from the clean.
5). The Importance Of Content – Adding A Weblog To Your Site
Continuing my theme of how as a small business you can improve your search engine results. In a previous article I extolled the virtues of article writing and in this one I shall consider the practicalities and usefulness of adding a weblog to your site in order to drive more traffic to your web pages.
I am presuming that you have optimised your site, added numerous pages of content and update or add to that content at least on a weekly basis.
6). Natural Stone Tiles – The Confusion Surrounding Sealing
There would seem based my own experience that there is a lot of confusion amongst the general public and some builders as to what sealing natural stone actually means.
When we talk about sealing a surface we normally mean that an impenetrable barrier is painted on or applied in some way. For example tiled floors are often sealed to give them added protection and make them shine.
7). Having Natural Stone Installed In Your Property – The Pitfalls
This last year has seen a large increase in the number of people having natural stone, marble, granite, limestone, sandstone or slate fitted into their homes either as work surfaces or as flooring. No man made product can rival the beauty of well presented natural stone with its myriad of colours and patterns which are unique to your individual stone.
8). Putting Adversity On Ice
It's been just over two years since 36-year-old Scott Brandon became a paraplegic. After going through all the natural adjustments and emotions s
9). Sealing Natural Stone
The sealing of stone is quite different to sealing other floor types. When sealing wooden floors for example a protective coat is added to the outside. When sealing stone the pores in the rock , or the spaces between the crystals that make up the rock are filled with the sealant with no trace of the sealant on the outer surface.
The purpose of this process is to stop liquids seeping into the stone and staining it.
10). Improving Search Engine Rankings – Patience Is The Key
I have written before about the benefit of articles and how they provide one way links back to your website and therefore improve the importance of your website and thus its ranking in the search engine results. The articles you write have the chance of spreading slowly around the web and ending up within ezines or on other websites or blogs. All of which provide links back to your website.
11). The Power Of Internet Marketing
Since instigating proper SEO techniques I have seen my web site visitors increase by over 1500%. My conversion rates have also gone from a meagre 0.5% to a very healthy 8%. How has this been achieved? By following seven simple guidelines which have not only seen my visitor figures sky rocket but also the web sites position in the major search engines has gradually improved until it sits on page one for all the important search categories and many surprising ones also.
12). Obtaining Good Content
Every piece of advice at the moment about improving search engine position especially Google suggests that web sites should be updated regularly with good quality content. The phrase ‘Content is King’ is seen in most articles on the subject now. So what is good content and how do you go about getting it?
You can purchase it, by hiring a copywriter.
13). Commercial Cleaning Companies – A Strategy For The Future
A previous article looked at this in general terms with regard to a start up cleaning company. This article will concentrate on a strategy for an established company to follow if it wants to be even more successful and continue expanding into the future.
The nature of cleaning is changing and the criteria companies use to choose their cleaners is also changing.
14). Writing Articles - Advice For The Do-It-Yourself Webmaster
As an SME it is virtually impossible for us to hire the services of a good SEO company that is going to spend time optimising the site, adding new content and gaining good links for the site, simply because of the cost involved. Other SME’s are I am sure in a similar position. They would all love to have a web site that ranked highly in google and the other search engines and brought in a constant flow of new business.
15). Switching To Day-Time Cleaning
All the talk in the cleaning press at the moment and over the past few months has been about the move to cleaning offices during normal working hours. Machine manufacturers are coming up with quiet vacuum cleaners, scrubber driers and buffing machines all of which supposedly allow you to carry out the cleaning without disturbing the occupants of the premises.
16). So You Want Your Site To Be Number 1
You have products or services you want to sell? You want to use the internet as your main publicity vehicle? So you want a website? You want to sit atop the rankings for the search engines? You want loads of visitors to your site? You want a high conversion rate from visitors to paying customers? We are all in that situation and it is possible to achieve all of these wants by following a few simple rules.
17). Cleaning Tips - Their Usefulness To Website Visitors And The Cleaning Company
If you type into the search engines the phrase "cleaning tips" you get a choice of something like 14,800,000 websites to choose from and many of those websites will redirect you to scores of other websites. There are specific sites that are dedicated to giving hints, advice and tips on a variety of topics with seemingly no vested interest. Many of these tips are useful.
18). Builders Cleans – A Lucrative Market For Commercial Cleaners
With office cleaning becoming an increasingly competitive market for contract cleaning companies they must diversify or move into a niche market if they wish to continue to grow. One niche market that is not so competitive is that of ‘builders clean’. The number of companies that offer a good, high quality service to the construction industry is relatively small.
19). Improving Conversion Rates
You have optimised your website and attracted a large number of inbound links by one means or another. The results of this are that your site now appears on the first page of the top three search engines, Google, MSN and Yahoo, for your chosen keywords or phrases. You have cracked it! Now you are getting hundreds of visitors a day to your website. Unfortunately very few are staying to browse your site and even fewer are purchasing your products or enquiring after the services you offer.
20). Contract Cleaners – Travel To Expand
The vast majority of Contract Cleaning Companies are small ‘one-man band’ outfits that provide basic cleaning to a limited number of clients within a relatively restricted area. This is fine unless you want to make real money and continue growing and expanding. If you restrict yourself to a small locality and operate alone then you have a limited number of potential customers.
21). Do It Yourself Website
If you are just starting out in your new business and you decide that a website could be a valuable addition to this business how do you go about getting one up and running? You have two basic options really. Do it yourself or employ an individual or company to do it for you. Which option you take depends upon your own confidence in acquiring the skills necessary and the amount of funds you can divert to hiring in a company.
22). Managing Staff By Talking To Them
As a cleaning company we place a very high value on our staff, they can make or break your business. They are our greatest asset and also our greatest liability. Consequently maintaining an excellent working environment and keeping staff well motivated is one of our primary goals. The same applies to most businesses although it is especially important in the cleaning industry because of the potentially high turn over of staff that is somewhat traditional in this field.
23). Obtaining Links For Your Website
One of the most difficult tasks, having developed your website is to promote it on the search engines and achieve first page rankings. This is after all where we, as web site owners want to be, especially if you are selling products or promoting your services. Anything after the third page is generally useless for attracting visitors and potential customers.
24). Builder’s Dust – Removing It
Have you ever had renovations or alterations done to your property? Then you are fully aware of the amount of fine dust that is generated and manages to get absolutely everywhere even in places far removed from the actual working area. You then spend hours, days and possibly weeks attempting to remove this dust. Is there a much faster route to dust removal?
There most certainly is and it means following two or three rules if you wish to be successful.
25). Blind Skiers See the Light
About three hours west of Denver lies Snow Mountain Ranch, one of the top cross-country ski centers in the United States. Known as the "Y
26). Big Government Is Bad Government
As we move into the 21st century Western democracies are more and more becoming involved in the trivia of people’s lives. All governments, no matter what their political leaning seem to be under the impression that they know what is best for each and every one of us. Instead of involving themselves in the great issues of the day they are increasingly legislating on details about how we conduct our lives on a daily basis.
27). Content, Links, Relevance And Page Rank
SEO experts are constantly telling us about the importance of good quality content and good quality back links from web sites with relevant content. They also tell us that reciprocal links and page rank are of decreasing importance. They then instruct us as to how to go about getting good links by personally contacting other web sites and proposing a reciprocal link! Confusing! As is much of the advice given to prospective site designers.
28). Strategies For A Successful Cleaning Company
I am presuming you are just starting out in the cleaning business and you want to develop into a successful cleaning company. You have chosen to enter one of the most competitive markets. So how are you going to succeed? How are you going to obtain constant growth. Many cleaning concerns limit themselves to their few customers and do not want to expand and grow, but you are not one of these.
29). How Governments Seek To Get Back Control
So the UK Government has had its way on banning smoking in all enclosed public places and places of work. This ban was carried through on the grounds of ensuring a safe working environment for all employees across the country. This ban applies everywhere except of course the House of Commons itself. One would presume that this is because it is not open to the public and nobody works there! This is just another example of the hypocrisy of our government; ‘Don’t do as I do, do as I say’.
30). Designers And Architects – Are Aesthetics More Important Than Practicalities
As a cleaning company we get called in to carry out builders cleans on new builds and refurbishments. Time and time again what we see is that the designer has had something built, laid or put in place solely on the grounds that it looks good with no regard as to how it will stand up to use or the practicalities of trying to keep it clean and looking good.
31). Link Relevance
We are constantly being told by SEO experts and the Search Engines that the importance of a link is determined by its page rank and relevance to our own web sites. Consequently when developing a linking strategy we should only be concerned with relevant links. That is other web sites which have some connection to our own. For example I run a web site devoted to providing a variety of cleaning services to commercial clients throughout the UK, so a relevant site would be a cleaning machine supplier or a cleaning chemicals supplier.