Recent Developments for the Summer

Once again, the UK will be soon drenched in wall-to-wall sunshine (Well we hope so anyways)! So, as the summer is just around the corner, we thought it would be good to keep busy by continuing to tweak our directory with adding more text.

This will give our existing, paying customers more exposure. So you will see that when you click on this page here : https://www.great-days-out.co.uk/south-west-england/gloucestershire/, and then click onto one of the advertising links, for example, 'Cattle Country', you will see a box appear in the middle of your screen with the same logo but with additional text.

Have a look at the snapshot below. This is how it will look when you carry out the procedure above.

We are hoping that this will also help with our Google listing and website ranking, as we have taken a bit of a 'hit' from the latest Google algorithm and have been doing all that we can to correct it!

Stavordale

We would like to introduce to you all one of our most recent clients... Stavordale!

Over the last few weeks, we have been busy completing their new website and have had hours of conversations with the man behind the project - Mike Moran. We can now say that his website is now finished, so we thought to show you what we have done, but first, let us use an excerpt in his owns words...

Stavordale was established by Mike Moran, and is set amongst the back drop of the Stavordale Estate and Alfred'sTower between Bruton and Wincanton in Somerset.

The business was started in early 2016, and we have been amazed at how it's taken off. Offering Field Trial Training Days for groups and individuals, using our Simulated Driven Days in Somerset and Wiltshire, further afield we have offered Gundog Training Holidays in Exmoor, Somerset  and Carmarthenshire. In 2017 further holiday venues have been made available in different locations and we have added to the Field Trial Training days some Gundog Workshops suitable for the puppy through to the older more experienced dog and handler.

Not forgetting the launch of Stavordale RAW, a dog food as nature intended it, providing a fresh meat diet for your dog. With all the ingredients sourced locally, supplemented by vegetables and special blends of herbs providing the vitamins and minerals to keep your dog in top form. 

There's clearly a market for what we do, and we're delighted by the reception we've had. So to all our customers and team, thank you.

Mike

We wish his new venture every success!

Partnering with Greenfields Garden Services

As we have stated in a previous blog, for several years now we have been working closely with Chris Snell (The Managing Director) from Greenfields Garden Services and have been very proactive in providing them a bespoke service. Some of you who reside in Gloucestershire and beyond may have seen their vans and workmen out and about.

Over the last few years, we have created a number of quality websites for them. Our latest one which is hot off the press, is Playground Equipment Supplies! If you visit the Greenfields website and click the Links webpage, you will see a number of websites. We are very grateful that we can partner with a local business and we look forward to continuing working with them for many years to come!

Here are just some of the many products below that Greenfields have on offer...

Great Days Out - Great Innovations

As the title of our latest Blog title suggests - once again we have been looking at ways to improve the usability and appearance of the Great Days Out directory!

You will see that instead of the current 103 x 103 advertising logo's that we have been using up until now, we have increased the sizes of the individual logo's. We believe this gives our directory a more aesthetically pleasing appearance to our users. We will be slowly rolling these out across all of the UK counties, but it will take a bit of time as there are dozens of pages to update! To have a look at just one of the new webpages, go here : Great Days Out in Gloucestershire.

We have been also letting our paying clients know of the new look and so far we have had only positive responses!

You will see that we are not just updating our existing clients' advertising links, but also the Counties banners at the bottom of our webpages.

We hope you will be enjoying our updates and our constant quest to improve our website!

Great Days Out has a new Theme!

Following on from our previous blog, we have continued with revamping the Great Days Out directory by completely re-installing a new theme to our website! This was something Tim took upon himself with his own initiative and boy have we seen the difference!

There have been considerable improvements with the functions and layout of the website. You will see that the Home page has had a tweaks. The Great Days Out Blog has now been also relaunched as the previous version was simply not good enough and was never initiated. This will now give us the opportunity to further promote our clients, as well as hopefully helping us acquire a better Google ranking.

It has been an already productive January! We will continue to do what we can to increase traffic to the directory as well as developing our other existing projects.

A little Tweak here and there

Research on how people use the internet confirms that more and more of us are using our iPhones and tablets to go online. In order to make our Great Days Out directory more easier on the eye for the user, we were able to alter the size of the county logo's as well as the category logo's, thanks to Tim's tweaking! To give you an idea of the alterations, you will see 2 pictures below. One is before the change and the other after...

Before the changes...

After the changes

You will see that the main webpage is more filled out. It only took a few minutes to do strangely enough, but it does make a difference!

Of course there are always things we can do to improve our user's experience of the website and we will continue to do so.

A Quoakle Christmas Update

This will probably be our last Blog of 2016, so we wanted to let you all know what has been happening.

The development of the Quoakle directory has had some delays due to Tim Coysh's other commitments, i.e, a new job which he started a few months ago, but he has been able to do some occasional work revamping the website. We still hope at some point in 2017 that the new and improved directory will be relaunched. We will keep you posted as to when that will be.

Tim Davis, of TCD Web Design, is still helping out with websites and has learnt a lot about coding and design. He still hopes to fly out to Australia in April of next year and will be out there for approximately 6 months.

Sean Cresswell is still doing what he can to help continually promote the Great Days Out directory via all the relevant Social Media networks and to contact the myriad of businesses in the UK which is on the database. It has been encouraging to see the majority of businesses keen to renew with us during this past year.

Nigel Steele is still masterfully juggling all the paper work in the office! He was able to recently affirm our commitment to providing our highly valued clients Greenfields Garden Services with an improved package. This means we will be able to continue to provide them with a top quality service and look after 20 websites and online promotions, as well as their Social Media needs. We look forward to a longstanding partnership with them.

And finally, Christmas is swiftly approaching as well as the New Year, and many will be going out buying the Christmas Turkey with all the trimmings! It is a lovely time of year when family and friends get together. We would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a Very Merry Christmas and a blessed and prosperous New Year!

Eat Unique in the UK

Over the last couple of weeks we have been busy creating a new website where all of our Local Restaurant websites are promoted on one page!

For awhile we had them all displayed here : http://www.great-restaurants.co.uk/ and we will continue to do so as it falls nicely under our 'Great' website ethos, but we wanted to update it with a better, more modern looking website. So, we can now officially introduce you all to our latest project - Eat Unique!

Our concept has not changed. All we want to do is to help promote and celebrate independent restaurants in the South West and Central England. In the future there will be scope to expand this list but for now we are happy to kick this website off as it is. Go Eat Unique in the UK!

Recent work on Instagram

The Great Days Out team have been busy with our Instagram account, and have taken the bull by the horns so to say, with promoting our clients.

We had a skype call with a guy called Steven the other week, who works for a company called iMarvel and we were able to pick his brains about how best to use some of the various social media outlets out there on the internet. #Hashtags were mentioned, amongst other means and ways to acquire followers and 'likes' and since then we have started to implement some of his ideas.

With this in mind, we then launched a few of our Restaurant websites on Instagram too! Our first account was Gloucester Restaurants, but since then we have set up : Cheltenham Restaurants, Hereford Restaurants, Swindon Restaurants, Oxford Restaurants, Bristol Restaurants and Bath Restaurants.

We have been expanding our vision of Restaurants in the UK! We will give you an update in our next blog. Stay tuned.

Below is a snapshot of the Great Days Out Instagram Home page...

Great Days Out is getting Greater - Update

This is just another quick update regarding what we have been doing on the Great Days Out directory!

We have been continually creating new topic pages on our directory. It is ongoing work and does take time, but we can let you know that we have set up the following topics :

• http://www.great-days-out.co.uk/parks-gardens/
• http://www.great-days-out.co.uk/transport-trips-tours/
• http://www.great-days-out.co.uk/adventure-activities/
• http://www.great-days-out.co.uk/water-activities/
• http://www.great-days-out.co.uk/sport-leisure/
• http://www.great-days-out.co.uk/arts-and-crafts/

This means that there will be 12 Topic webpages which will cover the 12 Regions of the UK! 

These latest URL's are still in the incubation period but will be unleashed on the unsuspecting Internet world very soon! Our hope is that we will see an increase in visitors to the directory as well as increasing our Google rating. This will also give existing clients the opportunity to have more advertising links on the website. All in all, a benefit to all concerned!

Below is a snapshot of the new #Arts and #Crafts webpage.

Great Days Out is getting greater

As promised form our previous blog, we have been continuing creating more webpages and content and wanted to let you all know what has been happening! We stated that we had just launched Animal and Wildlife Parks in the beginning of the month, well we have launched several other topics since then!

May we introduce the new editions, Family Attractions, Historic Houses and Castles, Museums and Galleries, Outdoor Activities, and Play Centres. This has been an exciting development as it will increase the number of webpages on our directory and give us scope to deliver an even better service to our existing and new customers! There will be even more topics arriving on the directory. We will keep you all posted as these developments take place.

Below is a snapshot of the Historic Houses and Castles webpage. More to follow...

Exciting News from Great Days Out and other stuff

Over the last couple of weeks the brains behind Great Days Out have been busy looking at ways to improve the use-ability of the directory. It was felt that we needed more content but also more webpages.

You will be seeing some changes on the website, where we will be launching various topics on the directory. This will give visitors a more robust experience. We have already set up 'Animals and Wildlife Parks' and from there, we will be rolling out more topics - from 'Great Outdoors' to 'Historic Buildings'! It's quite exciting to see the website expand in size and content.

A few months ago we mentioned about changes to our Quoakle website too. Due to the size of the website, this will be taking a lot longer then expected. Added to this, Tim Coysh had started a new job in the beginning of the summer, so delays were inevitable. Regardless we will try to keep you all up-to-date on all of our latest news.

Finally, it looks like Tim Davis won't be going to Australia until April of next year. Fortunately for us, he will be around until then which we are truly grateful for! His assistance in these various projects have been invaluable. He will be missed when he goes to Oz.

See some of the new icons for our Great Days Out directory below...

Introducing...

TCD Web Design was created by Timothy Davis in September, 2015. Timothy has been working alongside the Quoakle team for a number of months now. He has been a valuable asset to our team as he has been on hand to help us revamp and create websites for our ever expanding clientèle!


The goal of his company is to provide its customers with beautiful, simple to use websites at an affordable price.

TCD Web Design is closely linked with Churcham Website Design and Quoakle, two parts of a creative media team based in Gloucestershire.

Greenfields Garden Services Ltd

For a number of years now, Nigel Steele and the Quoakle team have been working with Chris Snell, the owner of Greenfields Garden Services Ltd.

As his business was located just down the road, it was thought that we could help him with advertising his business. Since then, the Quoakle team have helped Chris create several websites as well as promoting his various businesses through Twitter, LinkedIn and other social media networks.

• www.greenfieldsltd.co.uk
• www.outdoor-classrooms.co.uk
• www.play-and-learn.co.uk
• www.play-area-repairs.co.uk
• www.greenfieldscatalogue.co.uk
• www.wooden-garden-gazebos.co.uk
• www.school-playground-markings.co.uk
• www.play-area-designs.co.uk

It has been a very fruitful partnership and we look forward to helping them get the most out of what the internet has to offer. In fact, we are currently revamping some of their websites as we speak as well as setting up yet another website!

More Great Days Out Banners!

We have been busy updating our banners for Great Days Out! As always, Stephen Holdstock has been busy in helping us to produce more eye catching ones. We decided that we needed to look at ways in how to better promote our services across social media. On our request, Stephen knocked up a few alternatives which are displayed below. We think these are great!

You may have noticed that each one of the banners above are slightly different to each other. The first one is our standard banner. The next one is the banner for Animals, then Family attractions, Historic buildings, Indoor leisure, and finally Outdoor adventure. Already we have started to place some of them on some of our Twitter and Facebook accounts!

Work on the new Quoakle website continues

Just to let you all know from a previous entry in our blog that the work on the new Quoakle website continues unabated! Tim Coysh had recently started a new job so he has been extremely busy learning the ropes, but he is hoping to find time to complete his mission! It will still take a few more weeks to finalize everything as there is a lot for him to do. However we are looking forward to seeing the final product once it is finished and we will be keeping you all up-to-date when it will be finally unleashed onto the world!

Quoakle launches "How to " series of screencasts

The Quoakle team is committed to keeping its reputation as possibly the easiest directory to use on the web.

Not only are we continuing to enhance the simple navigation, but we are also looking for fresh ways to communicate with our users.  We want to make sure they have found the best way to use Quoakle's innovative graphical directory for their particular personal requirements.

So, here is the first in the "How To " series launched this weekend.

Quoakle's Simple Navigation Gets Even Better!

Quoakle's reputation as the innovative, graphical website directory, providing quick links to local websites, continues to grow.


The simple page layout and easy-to-use navigation with attractive colour-themed buttons has few rivals for user-friendliness and yet the Quoakle team continues to look for ways to improve user experience.

For Quoakle, navigation is a high priority - helping our users go from page to page quickly and easily, so they and you can find what you're looking for with the minimum of effort and in as intuitive way as possible.

At the bottom of each "logo page", you will have noticed links to other topics in that county, and also users have been able to move for example from our 'Days Out' page in one county over to another 'Days Out' page in a different county using the simple dropdown menus.

The latest development is the attractive, new home button in the top right-hand corner of each topic logo page. 

The new home page button helps to make it clearer particularly to new users how to get to the Quoakle home page. The majority of first time users of Quoakle arrive on a topic logo page from a Google organic listing due to Quoakle's growing success in optimising the website for literally thousands of keyword phrases.

Quoakle Home Page Gets a New Look!

Last August, the Quoakle team began taking major steps towards the aim "to spread right across every county in the United Kingdom". The first phase saw the launch of 14 new counties, from Cornwall in the south-west to Cheshire in the north-west. The first topic within these counties was Days Out and Leisure which is beginning to feature highly on Google across England and Wales. Quoakle users are now able to flick from county to county looking for great places to visit, days out and family activities, and finding hundreds of websites with just a couple of clicks.

In the last few months, Sean Cresswell, responsible for Client Development, has been expanding the whole directory across England and Wales so that there are now pages for all 14 topics across all 64 counties. The only region not covered currently is Greater London which awaits careful strategic planning.

For Quoakle, the original graphical directory, navigation is very important indeed. Fulfilling the strapline - " a quick link to local websites" - means helping Quoakle users go from page to page quickly and easily, so they and you can find what you're looking for without getting lost or wasting time in the wrong part of the website. Development has been under way for some time to improve user experience on the home page as well as on the classic Quoakle "Logo Pages". The first phase to be launched was the new home page which users were able to navigate through for the first time over the weekend of 8th-9th April 2012.

Visitors to the Quoakle home page looking for a UK Web Directory of local businesses, will find on the page some simple instructions:

Select your region, then county, and view local businesses by topic

and will then find clickable regions on the UK map.

Users looking for businesses in Gloucestershire will need to:

Select the region South West by clicking on that part of the UK map. A box will then appear to the left of the screen listing the various counties in the South West region in alphabetical order.

Gloucestershire is listed 5th on the list. By clicking the link on the word Gloucestershire, users are taken directly to the home page for the Gloucestershire Directory.

The same simple process works for all 64 counties across the 9 active regions of the UK.

The Quoakle team remain committed to keeping Quoakle's graphical directory true to the meta description seen on the Google's listings ... " an amazingly simple search solution"

Enjoy the latest bit of simplicity at www.quoakle.com !

Quoakle launches 14 new counties!

A year ago, on the 'Introducing Quoakle Video', director Nigel Steele said "Our aim is to spread right across every county in the United Kingdom".

Last week the team made major steps in that direction with the launch of 14 new counties, from Cornwall in the south-west to Cheshire in the north-west. The first topic within these counties is Days Out and Leisure. Having observed Quoakle's rise to number one on Google for the search term "days out in Gloucestershire", Nigel took the decision to push ahead with this major expansion of Quoakle's Days Out and Leisure Directory. Soon users will be able to flick from county to county looking for great places to visit and family activities and finding hundreds of websites with just one click.

Nigel is pictured above next to the newly launched Days Out in Cheshire page. The expansion into Cheshire was something which gave him particular pleasure, having been born in the Cheshire market town of Nantwich.