Gone dead - again

[Gavin A]

we've had 1 job this week, got 1 next week, with another couple looking like confirming, and a few big jobs hopefully on the horizon.

probably is, we need to be doing 10+ a month.

 

[Gavin A]

Dansk is SEO not working for you ??? how many hits does seo get you ,,, it must be doing somthing or else you would not do it

fwiw, we've had a 25% increase in appearances in searches, and a 50% increase in click throughs to the website over the last month.

It's definitely worth the SEO work IMO, though it does take time.

I'm thinking about scrapping the already relatively low adwords stuff we do as we're now mostly showing up in the top few terms for most of the search terms for the geographic areas we're paying for.

 

[SolarCity]

We're still struggling. Got a few big ones lingering but very little else. Going for a survey this morning in Bedfordshire but it is a real struggle.

Most frustrating is that we have lost a job to a local firm that knows **** all about installing PV - and we were cheaper. Last year we lost a flat roof job to them as they promised they could install a larger system than ours, even though I proved that a bigger system would not work with my 3D model. When they turned up for the install, it turned out that the surveyor got his orientation wrong and had designed the system back to front. They simply turned the panels around and left it - all on one single MPPT.

Predictably, its performance was terrible. The customer brought me in to offer some advice which I have done on several occassions. The customer was passing on information that the firm was telling them - flat out lies or incompetence. Very annoying. They're simply a firm of salespeople with a technical advisor on board - I know them because I had a meeting with them before they even got into PV.

We've did a 2000 leaflet drop last week and didn't get a single phone call. Worried about spending too much on any more leaflets as we're not getting any in the other way.

 

[SRE]

Thanks for sharing, I feel a bit better - I was beginning to think it was me. Lets hope Dansk was right and after Jubilee weekend things will start to move again. The thing that worries me a bit is Jubilee weekend if followed shortly after by Euro 2012, then the Olympics and in the middle of all that are the Greek elections when the economic fun really starts.

Looks like it's going to be a long Summer.

 

[Eco Deal]

good news I seen in paper for us ..... inflation fixed for 5 years so bad for savers !!!!!

- - - Updated - - -

fuel bills raising 7 times faster than incomes

 

[Gavin A]

fwiw, we've got 2 4kW jobs booked in next week, did one this week just gone, one the week before etc. and have a few I'm hoping will be confirming shortly, so fingers crossed things are picking up.

it'll be only just in time if it does mind, as we must be one of the only companies around who actually took an extra installation team member on in March, instead of laying people off like most seem to have been doing.

interestingly, we've also not had to cut our prices for any of the jobs we've got, and they've gone for the slightly higher priced options of hyundai black framed, or full black panels, instead of the cheapy mccheap options.

no takers on sanyo / panasonic since the 1st April though, which is a right git coz we've got more than a pallet's worth of them in the warehouse.

 

[Gavin A]

also, after the work we've been doing on our website, we almost beat our record for unique visitors last month after dropping to just over half that level in April, so there obviously is interest out there still.

 

[SolarCity]

I think I need to learn a bit about websites and optimising - it's far more important than I ever imagined it would be.

 

[SRE]

also, after the work we've been doing on our website, we almost beat our record for unique visitors last month after dropping to just over half that level in April, so there obviously is interest out there still.

How many hits are you getting Gavin??

 

[Gavin A]

How many hits are you getting Gavin??

a little over 1400 unique visitors last month, something like 850 in April when we'd dropped right down the google rankings due to being busy installing in feb and march, plus making a bit of an ill advised change to the front page of the site (changed something to flash, and google doesn't read flash stuff).

We peaked around 1450 in January, but that was mostly down to some of our blog postings about the feed in tariff changes getting a load of hits, so not really customers, but it all helps with the rankings.

 

[SRE]

Thanks for the info - I think I've got a bit to go ;-)

We haven't dropped prices either and our mid range sells better than cheapo crappo, but I think you have to have it there as an option. We convert pretty much most of what we get there just isn't much about.