Progress on this domain is going well. Only worth blogging because the best result is a single and fairly popular keyword - "Percale". This keywords on the first page and in second position below the Wikipedia URL. I'm very happy with the fact Marks & Spencer's are below. Lets see if we can get the top position and knock ALL the competition out of the water!

Do you go for cheap web design?

As a company based in Manchester we have found there are hundreds of web design agency. So which one do you choose? Like so many people deciding on price tends to be at the forefront of any purchase of services or goods. Price is a problem when buying a website, with so many cheap web design companies in Manchester you wonder why they are so cheap and whether they have the quality to go with it. This brings me to the point of ‘You pay for what you get’. Paying for what you get seems to be the case with lower end and newer web design agencies; cheap tends to be rushed and not clearly thought about. Our advice is to shop around and especially take a closer look at their portfolio and ring those listed in there.

On occasions cheap can mean that the cost is spread out, this is a good approach – especially in light of the current climate – and can help your budget by stopping you from spending a vast amount of money up front. This can perhaps leave you with money to spend on marketing. We offer this kind of service and have found more and more businesses are choosing this route and why not – it’s a great way of testing the water with an online presence and it’s not going to make the business bankrupt! You can be up and running within say a week and while the sites being built you can do some homework on SEO techniques and learn how to use Google Adwords. Google Adwords can get you a spot on the advertisers section of google on a particular keyword – bear in mind that this can be expensive so choose your keywords wisely. Our advice would be to use niche keywords, they have a lower cost per click and are better targeted.

Cheap web design is a good option if you are careful and choose a reputable company who’s been around and takes their sector seriously. It’s a great way to get your business noticed when paired with a good marketing strategy. In fact this is the key point – it’s all very well having a pretty website with all the bells and whistles but if no one can see it what’s the point? So, if you go for a cheap web design company make sure you check their background, ring a few of their clients and asses how you will market the site. A good reputable web design agency will always help and direct you with online marketing strategies.

Sharing these days is a big thing on the web. Goolgles new + project seems to be mix up of many other social tools out there. People are saying this service will overtake Facebook as the king of social networking and that 2012 will see the change in social media dynamics.

Google Safe Browsing is a place to check if a website is hosting malware.....Type in this URL http://google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site= followed by the site you want to check, such as google.com or an IP address. It will let you know if it has hosted malware in the past 90 days.

Source: The Growth of Social Media: An Infographic

There are rumours that Facebook will launch a music service next month. Spotify, MOG and Rdio are also rumoured to be involved. The idea is that Face book will not directly host the music but rather use a platform for media content - similar to the applications and games platforms they presently use.

We have also heard that Facebook intend to stream movies, this is unlikely but the f8 developer conference on the 22nd Sept will enlighten us.

Amazon are set to unveil the launch of their newly designed website. The design has been especially adapted to appeal to tablet and PC owners. Not hugely exciting news but will be interesting to see what they've done - I imagine it was a daunting task.

Adobe have introduced the beta version of Adobe Muse – a way to build websites easily. You can design and publish your site - all to the latest web standards – with little effort.

We are going to give this a go, at least to see how it works. Personally I think this software works best for smaller portfolio type sites and maybe a bit too simple for the professional designer and a little difficult for the amateur wanting to get more features out of the box without having to learn too much.

"Apple is using iCloud to retain its dominance in the Smartphone and tablet markets amid fresh competition from devices powered by Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Android software. The new service may improve how users can access content across different Apple devices, keeping customers from defecting to rivals" said Frank Gillett, with Forrester Research Inc. Excerpt taken from http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-06-06/apple-s-jobs-to-unveil-icloud-storage-service-to-deflect-google-s-android.html

Apple’s new iCloud service will initially be free although after a while a charge will be introduced. I've heard this could be upto and around £15 per month. I like the idea but I'm not sure I really need it...I'm happy to pay for my music, but I quite like the old school way - adding it to my collection at home!

I wonder if you can transfer from Amazon or Microsoft’s cloud service if you want to switch - would they allow you to transfer your 1tb music collection over to Icloud? More to the point - how do you transfer 1tb worth of data between servers without connections loss, corrupt files and within a decent amount of time...not really up for spending a few days for my music collection to transfer across! Hmmm, this means I need to be very sure which cloud service I go for as I may be permanently stuck with one of them!!

Quick note: I may be a little suspicious but the worlds big record labels who will be involved are very keen to stop piracy (naturally), does this mean the iCloud will be fully  secure and perhaps do away with piracy....I doubt it but It'll be interesting to find out. I think the amount of involvement by the music industry will be a good clue.