Mark Mankarious

One of the really interesting things about having both brands and agencies using Macaroni Software is being to able to compare the levels of activity for both. What we're seeing so far is agencies use it to deliver the same amount of work in a fraction of the time that they were before. Brands though are not limiting themselves. They are doing huge amounts of updates - sometimes more than 1k per week in terms of mapping keywords, on-page optimisation, creating new pages and content and building internal links. The results, unsurprisingly, are much, much better. Our goal now is to encourage agencies to not just do the work they were doing for their retainer in an hour each month, but do double or triple in 2-3 hours.

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We’re geeking out at this!! 🤓 Big props to the web dev team Nespresso UK … Look the the glass when adding more coffee pod cups to the cart 👌🏼👌🏼👏🏻👏🏻 Mike Fort I challenge you to create this in Webflow 🤣 #webdev #websitedevelopment #webflow #webdevelopment

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💙 First impressions count... It takes about 50 milliseconds (that’s 0.05 seconds) for your website visitors to form an opinion about your website that whether they'll stay and take action or leave and move on... It's a pretty shocking stat but when you realise there are 1.13 billion websites out there in the world, so making yours stand out is a must! Here are 5 ways you can do that... 1. Showcase your brand Your website is the perfect place to reflect exactly who you are and what you do and all your USPs, unlike social media with its limitations. Make sure your branding is on point and stands out above the rest so that your website does too. 2. Enhance the user experience Make sure your website visitors aren't put off by dodgy user experience. Make sure to test your website on all screen sizes to make sure buttons work, forms click through and everything functions as it should do. You definitely don't want people leaving your site if they get frustrated because they couldn't do something. 3. Make sure it follows a strategy Rather than just designing pretty websites, I create website for my clients with a strategy and content first approach. This means I consider the goals of the site first, as well as your message and design the site around this rather than simply slotting text into boxes or templating. This means your site has more chance of standing out in the crowd and guiding your website visitors towards your goals. 4. Keep it up to date You'll be surprised how many websites out there aren't kept up to date. It can be off putting seeing business websites with out of date information on their website and it can deter people from enquiring with you or buying from you. Make sure if you have timely information on your site to have a strategy in place to make sure it's kept up to date. 5. It's not about you. It's all about them! Instead of making your website all about you, it's important that your ideal clients and website visitors see themselves as the hero in your story. That means use website copy that captivates them and makes them feel seen and inclusive imagery that makes them feel part of your online space. Does your website do these things? #brandingdesign #brandingdesigner #brandstrategy ---------------------- I'm Katie, a brand strategist, taking female business owners on a journey of (re)discovery of their brand identity foundations and helping them fall back in love with their business and grow their confidence. Creating stand out brands that go way beyond the pretty that you'll want to shout from the rooftops about 💙

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Bit of an agency rant. Look away now. Can agencies please stop trying to frighten clients with spurious claims about their website being set up badly by gaslighting them with technical language to scare them to death? It took me two seconds to reply to my client's fears generated by this approach as the points they made were utter crap and easily dispelled. I get that a cold approach to a client is tricky, but try better services, new insight, or inventive marketing strategy rather than making stuff up which is total nonsense. End of rant.

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There are so many tools available for digital PRs that deciding which ones to invest in can seem like a bit of a minefield! 🤔 Luckily, our #DigitalPR Director, Amy Irvine has done the hard work for you and listed the 60 tools and websites (paid & free) that we use at Digitaloft. They are categorised as follows: 💡 Ideation 🔢 Data Collection 🔗 Outreach 📊 Reporting 💌 Newsletters Check them out here: https://loom.ly/ptVbggE What would you add to the list? 🤷‍♂️

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https://lnkd.in/emhQYK6q What will be the Most Important Skill in an AI World? As AI continues to revolutionise industries and take over more day-to-day tasks, one question looms large: What’s the most important skill to develop in an AI world? The answer, surprisingly, is a very human one: creativity.

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NEW PRODUCT ANNOUNCEMENT Getting stuff done and done at pace, is now how we are all judged Great research solves problems for clients and saves them making expensive mistakes But sometimes clients think they're under too much time pressure to be able to do any research, let alone great research That's why we've developed Quick QualTM ...great qual research turned around in less than 7 days, usually for less than £7k We've used it to resolve internal conflicts around copy, address niggling doubts about packaging and get an audience POV on a soon to run campaign Quick QualTM ...is a real game changer - DM us if you think you need affordable, razor sharp insight, double quick  Reply  Forward Attendee panel closed LI - piece  LI piece - July '24 

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2 years ago I got some investment offers from angels both on and then subsequently off the telly 🐉   I decided to keep 100% equity and crack on bootstrapping, I still have no idea if that was the right move lol, I’ll report back in 2034. A few days ago I posted a video to instagram in a bikini with a snorkel on (there’s 21K of us on there now having a nice time and sharing ice cream recommendations should you be interested…) and got the below comment asking what my investors thought of my instagram “nonsense”. The commenter absolutely wasn’t wrong, my content is all indeed nonsense that’s designed to make people smile and discuss issues in a somewhat weird/uplifting way, but it made me reflect on all the articles I’ve ever read shaming women in either business or in politics, for having some kind of life outside of work. Be that dug out pictures of them in swimwear or a photo taken of them on a night out having a mojito, always alongside some kind of lazy, patronising headline that’s meant to invalidate their capability of succeeding into whatever professional position they’re in. Because of the clothes they chose to wear on a beach on a day off. Or the sugary, minty goodness they chose to consume at Val from Finances leaving do.    When a woman’s business fails or she steps away from a leadership role, there will never be a title highlighting the success she did achieve or referring to her as a trailblazer, but instead some patronising headline, usually linked to the fact she had a child 15,000 years ago, which has no relevance whatsoever to the outcome of what’s happened.   I’ve run out of steam here and there are 900 paragraphs I could write on this but my message here is to any other women on here let’s please just all continue doing whatever we want outside of work and having a lovely time doing so, safe in the knowledge that is does not invalidate our capability to perform in our job roles, run our businesses or close an investment round. If you spent your weekend on a photoshoot for a new toe-kini business, that’s wonderful and I hope you had a lovely time. If you spent the weekend reading leadership articles and meditating, that’s wonderful and I hope you had a lovely time. If you hiked to the Grand Canyon in lingerie as part of a mass twerking exhibition, that’s wonderful and I hope you had a lovely time. Whilst also wearing a lot of suncream. I hope you’re also having a wonderful week nailing your job, business or whatever professional goals you’re gunning for this week whilst enjoying as much nonsense at the weekend that you wish to do so

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I did an agency retrospective today and wanted to share my answers: 1. **If you could go back in time with the knowledge and experience you have now, what would you do differently to help ensure you didn’t have to close Mawla’s doors?** 1. **Niche** 2. Focus on recurring revenue 3. Productize service 4. Sell a service in high demand 5. Sell a service with high value 3. **At what point were you able to hire a engineering manager or strategist to help scale you out of every day involvement in projects?** 1. I began only working with seniors and agencies with tech leads or eng management 2. I then decided to hire a lead eng after 3-4 years 4. **What was the most effective channel when it came to lead generation?** 1. Local agencies 2. Word of mouth 3. LinkedIn content 4. Conferences 5. **4a Was cold email outreach effective for higher price point projects?** 1. Not at all 6. **What were your learnings and take aways from trying to Productize a headless CMS template** 1. Rebuilding WordPress is hard and expensive 2. Selling code isn't a good business model 3. Selling to SaaS or agencies wasn't a good model. 4. The model wouldn't scale as sanity, storybloks etc continued to evolve. We wouldn't be able to implement all their features 5. Especially if they diverge with websites 7. **Why did you choose to Niche down on Sanity instead of giving your customers what many of them wanted (webflow, WP, Hubpost)?** 1. I wanted something I would white label and productize 2. Wanted the performance 3. Wanted the better CMS user experience 4. I thought the quality would speak for itself 5. However the implementation, support costs and lack of ecosystem of plugins doesn't live up 6. It works better for large companies managing tons of products and stock not marketing 8. **If you could have a job you’re stoked on making $200 - $300k versus running an agency bringing that same income for yourself, what would you choose?** 1. Working for myself all day 9. **Looking back, what would you say were the biggest successes and failures in your journey with Mawla?** 1. **Successes** 1. Brought a brand from 0 - 1 2. Shipped 50+ sites and apps 3. Made millions in revenue over the years 4. Hired and worked with some of the smartest people I've ever met 5. Became a peer to executives and C-suite clients id never have had access to before 6. Took risks and pivoted the business 3 times 2. **Failures** 1. Bad hires 2. Bad client fits 3. Not having hard conversations earlier 4. Not doing better market discovery and research 5. Falling into sunk cost fallacy traps 6. Not budgeting more rigidly 7. Not productizing our flow earlier 8. Not adding notion or similar wiki style operations earlier 9. Speculated on some bad business ideas

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Another example of UK gov AI innovation - recognising that it's an excellent addition to any customer service environment (increases productivity, as measured by issues resolved per hour, by 14% on average, including a 34% improvement for novice and low-skilled workers - source: https://lnkd.in/ebnBjeub) Citizens Advice and the gov's Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (i.AI) have collaborated to develop Caddy - an augmented AI powered chatbot that will support Citizens Advice's advisors, making it easier for their staff and volunteers to quickly find and share information with the people who come to the charity for help. Why wouldn't you want to connect all of your customer service agents with all of your company info!? Read more: https://lnkd.in/eYqSCxfc

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DAY 7/26: How much can you earn selling websites as a graphic designer? Meet Rob. I’ve known Rob for 20 years. We met when I was a freelance graphic designer and he was an employed designer. We’ve recently been back in touch with each other and I was telling Rob about Swwwift. Rob freelances mainly for agencies and was looking for other ways to complement his agency work as it is sometimes up and down. I mentioned selling websites to him. At first he was quite adamant that he sticks with what knows… But then I showed him this graphic…. Now he’s been inspired and is intrigued… That’s right! Selling just 10 websites at £150 per month can net you an extra £1,150 per month or £13,800 per year and that’s just coming in every month/year. How can I charge £150 per month I hear you say?… Well…there’s several ways you can make this work… here’s just a few; • Finding the right clients • Creating a value-based proposition  • Demonstrating the ROI on £150p/m • Upselling plans for hosting, asset creation and more...  • Charging less upfront If this has left you wanting to know more… Join the waitlist list. The deets are below. **** Join my growing community of UK-based Graphic Designers talking about design, work and other stuff  —> https://lnkd.in/esCxTGVD Join the Swwwift launch waitlist —> https://swwwift.io My name is Ryan Grist, a former freelance graphic designer with 24 years of self-employment experience. I transitioned to website sales in 2009 and grew a web agency with an employed team plus freelancers. Today, I am on a mission to help as many Graphic Designers as possible sell WordPress websites confidently and grow an income using Swwwift. (Launching June 2024). What’s coming in June: **Swwwift Academy** Free courses, guides and templates to support graphic designers making the switch to selling sites to clients **Swwwift Platform**  An automated, built-for-you and ready-in-minutes WordPress website platform **Swwwift human unlimited support** The support is completely aimed towards graphic designers. We know what you need. **Swwwift Nest Community**  Join a fast-growing community for UK-based graphic designers only. ***** #graphicdesign #freelancedesigner #freelancegraphicdesigner  #Swwwift #SwwwiftAcademy

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Power-up your next launch with our tips for developer vs. marketing department harmony. ❤️ Our Matt did a talk on this at the Ukie Hub Crawl in Leeds a little while ago, and this is a super condensed version of the points he made around how marketing and dev teams can do their best work together. 💪 If you’d like to know more, just get in touch! ☎ #gaming #gamesindustry #gamedev #marketing

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Analysing Shopify Plans for UK Businesses 🇬🇧 Introduction I have conversations with businesses of all shapes and sizes regarding Shopify's pricing structure. To shorten the plan selection process, I will answer some of the frequent questions I get. Before we get into it, here is a quick summary of the current UK Shopify plan fees: Basic Shopify: £25/month (£19/month if billed annually)(Rolling) Shopify: £65/month (£49/month if billed annually)(Rolling) Advanced Shopify: £344/month (£259/month if billed annually)(Rolling) Shopify Plus: Starting at £1,600 per month (Anual Contracted) Q&A: Key Information on Shopify Plans Q: When is the Basic Shopify plan most applicable?: Basic Shopify is most applicable if you only require one staff account. Q: Which Shopify plan is ideal for brands with specific shipping requirements?: Advanced Shopify is usually the go-to plan for brands with specific shipping requirements when integrating with carriers. Q: Should hosting and security be a consideration when selecting a Shopify plan?: No, hosting and security are included in each Shopify plan, so this should not be a consideration in the plan selection process. Q: How generous are the inventory locations across Shopify plans?: Inventory locations are plentiful across all plans and should be sufficient for most businesses. Q: Are free trials available for Shopify plans?: Free trials are offered for the first month on most plans. Q: Do Shopify Plus plans offer any discounts?: Shopify Plus plans generally offer a tiered discount based on the contract duration you sign up for. Q: How can I maximise transaction fee savings with Shopify plans?: Transaction fee savings are notable in the advanced/plus plans. To maximise transaction fee savings, the sweet spot to join Advanced tends to be around £300K, and for Plus, around £2 million in revenue. Q: Are website domains included in Shopify plans? A: Unlike other platforms, website domains are not included in Shopify plans. Consulting with a Shopify agency is generally advised when deciding on the right plan; including an agency in the Plus plan selection process is even more critical. The Shopify Plus sales team will run a total cost of ownership exercise before drafting a contract for you; an agency will then roadmap out the use of Plus tools to maximise plan ROI. Have I missed something? Comment away... #ecommerce #shopify #ukbusiness #onlinestore #businessgrowth #shopifyplus #ecommerceplatform #shopifystore #smallbusiness #startup

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Podcasts are brilliant - you can repurpose one episode into 5-10 different bits of content - we love helping purpose-led businesses and leaders make the most of the content they create.

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"We've spent a lot of money on our new e-commerce and it's converting less than the old one." Now what? I've had way too many clients ask me to fix this sort of situation AFTER they’ve gone through massive and expensive UI/UX redesigns, so if this happened to you: I'm sorry. When you're investing, it's always with the expectation of good ROI, not to look at a shiny new toy that isn't doing anything for business. But I have good news: it's fixable! Sometimes it's even EASILY fixable! Ideally, these steps should be done BEFORE making significant changes in the UI/UX of your e-commerce website, but they can definitely be employed to troubleshoot and fix a broken user journey. 1. Analyze data ↘ You can't fix anything if you don't know what is wrong with it, which is why you have to start from the beginning and identify where exactly the user journey breaks down. Comparing current metrics with the performance of the old version is also very helpful, as it can act as a sort of rudimentary A/B test (there are many variables at play, so thread carefully). There are plenty of possible fail points, and each has its own solutions, whether they are technical, psychological, or a mix of the two. 2. Re-design ↘ Once you've identified the issues, it's time to re-design the specific portion that is keeping your website from performing the way it should. The scope of the re-design depends vastly on the findings of the analysis (a broken button is very easily fixable, for example, whereas a structural problem does require more effort). 3. Test ↘ Test for different variables and MAKE SURE you’re measuring what you WANT to be measuring. As I’ve often mentioned, correlation is not causation and it is important to set up your conversion events properly to obtain reliable metrics. 4. Deploy ↘ Once you’ve found the best-performing version, you can finally go ahead and push to prod. Need help fixing your user journey? Drop me a DM! --- 🇸🇪 Hi! I'm Maria, a Gothenburg-based digital strategist and growth hacker. Follow me for tips and advice on how to bring your brand online and live to tell the tale!

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Good news for marketers…. Your video strategy doesn’t need to be complicated 🙌 Over the last 12-18 months we’ve used this simple content structure for a tone of clients …..because it works. (And not just SaaS clients either) A simple plan like the below image gives you so much more than some great videos - you develop assets that can be used across multiple channels and at different stages of the buyer journey. Send me a DM for a deeper dive on how to put this plan into action!

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SEO or PPC? 🤔 At Cornerstone, we know both play crucial roles in digital strategy. SEO has helped boost long term organic visibility, revenue growth and reputation, while PPC has delivered short term immediate traffic and conversions for our clients. See how we're utilising both - https://lnkd.in/dxhJjJN #DigitalMarketing #SEOvsPPC #CornerstoneInsights

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