• John Harrison
    434
    The article on Ringing 2030 in this week's RW asked what we would get by typing "learn ringing <location>" so I tried it. As expected our tower website (and the other tower in the town) occupied most of the top slots. The top hit was to the home page (listing the major sections) but a couple below that was a link to our page about learning, wiht the quoted text beginning: 'Learning to ring may take a little longer as you get older ...'
    That seemed a negative way to start the description, and I was surprised that I had done it so I decided to change it. But when I looked at the page, that text wasn't at the start of the page, nor was it at the start of the section on: 'Learning at All Saints'. It was part way through the section on : 'When to learn', whiuch began with: 'There's no time like the present. You can learn to ring at any age ...' It was the second para that said: 'Learning to ring may take a little longer as you get older, but aptitude and attitude can have a bigger effect than just age .. etc.'.
    So why did the search engine pick that out? I assume it's because that sentence because included the almost verbatim search term.
    Anyway I decided to change that sentence to: 't may take a little longer ...'
    I'm sharing this story because it shows how even when you put together quite positive messages, a search engine might selectively quote something you didn't want to be a headline.
  • Phillip George
    90
    On our website we don't mention age, we have an FAQ page which states "....but everyone learns at a different pace and this process can take longer." https://gransdenbells.org/faqs/
  • John Harrison
    434
    On our website we don't mention agPhillip George

    The fact that ringing is an all age activity is one of its attractions so it's definitely worth mentioning. And the way I mentioned it was quite positive taken on context of the preceding and following sentences. The only problem was the search engine pulling it out of context.
  • Peter Sotheran
    131
    According to Google analytics, the biggest draw to our tower website is a page entitled FAMOUS BELLS. More than one-third of visitors to the site have searched for that phrase. The second biggest draw is a page about Big Ben. We only added these pages to the website on a whim, thinking it might be interesting to add a few notes about Big Ben, the Lutine Bell and a few other well known bells but they have proved to be the strongest magnets of all! Check them out at: https://sotherans.wixsite.com/stmarks-bellringers. If you think the idea may help your tower website, feel free to adopt/adapt/improve - and perhaps drop me a note so that I can visit the result.
  • John Harrison
    434
    That's difficult since it refuses to run on my iPad :-(
  • John Harrison
    434
    l
    the biggest draw to our tower website is a page entitled FAMOUS BELLSPeter Sotheran

    Having drawn them to that page do you know how many look at any of the rest of the website - the bits I assume you would like them to look at?
  • Peter Sotheran
    131
    "do you know how many look at any of the rest of the website"

    I cannot recall offhand but since the majority are not local to us and therefore unlikely to take up ringing in our tower, it is of little concern. We are just pleased that they took to trouble to visit our site and have shown an interest in bells and possibly in ringing. The percentage who actually take up ring as a result will be minute but it must be better than no percentage at all. And yes, about 15-20% roam around some of the other pages.
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