Silveraven Services
web solutions for small business

Got a website that isn't really working?
There are many reasons why this might be:
• few people are finding your site
• it was never properly promoted to search engines & directories
• it may look nice but the site could be more user-friendly
• the text is factual but not enticing enough to make many sales
• the website is not part of an overall marketing strategy

Any of those points ring a bell? Maybe you're one of the many, many people who have had a nice site built, but by the sort of web designer who pays little or no attention to the above considerations?
Well, all is not lost because it may be possible to breathe new life into your site by addressing the concerns listed above.

And in a nutshell that's the sort of thing Silveraven Services can offer. And we specialise in offering it to smaller businesses, groups or individuals who cannot afford the full-time, high-end marketing and SEO (search engine optimisation) services on offer to the 'bigger players'.

I rarely promise miracles, but so many small business websites are failing for very basic reasons, many of which can be addressed quite quickly and cheaply.

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website logistics
website marketing
copy writing
search engine optimisation
website promotion
pay-per-click management

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Silveraven Services
Clive Buckland-Bork
1 Longwood Cottage
Fore St
Buckfastleigh
Devon TQ11 0BS
UK
Tel: 044 (0)1364 643929
clive@silveraven.com

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This site is still under construction!
I'm just too busy working on other people's sites – maybe one day it'll get finished...

Where do we start?
Firstly I need to take a look at your website and check how it's performing in Google, etc. If I feel I can help you then next I'll probably need to ask a fair few questions about your business, and your hopes for your website.
My next stage is usually to carry out some market research, and thereby produce an in-depth report outlining the perceived problems, along with my proposed solutions. Every business is different, and therefore the amount of work involved, and hence the cost, to produce such a report varies from case to case.

Who implements the changes?
After that you may decide to go it alone and implement my recommended changes and strategies yourself. That's fair enough; I'm aware that budgets may be tight and I will always endeavour to tailor my recommendations accordingly. Some changes will require access to your website's files, in which case I am happy to work in tandem with your webmaster if need be.
If however you decide that you would like me to implement some or all of the recommendations then I shall be happy to itemise likely costs beforehand.

Recommended designers
Sometimes the report's findings suggest that the website needs something of an overhaul in its structure and/or design. If your original web designer is no longer available then I am happy to recommend two colleagues with whom I regularly work as they are well versed in adapting sites for marketing and SEO purposes that I regularly suggest.

- Paul 'Sudhi' Guess His site is even more of a mess than mine – which shows he's even more in demand! Don't be put off by his site, check out what he's made for his clients (see the WildQuest site below).

What next?
If you're interested in making your website work better, and feel Silveraven Services may be able to help, then please email clive@silveraven.com with a brief outline of your business as well as your website address.

Recent Projects:

Silveraven sites
These sites were designed and constructed by me. Therefore they are pretty simple and straightforward, and functional. No Flash graphics, no clever 'techie' stuff! The source code would probably cause shivers up the spine of any purist web developers, but the search engines don't seem to mind – which often isn't the case with those Flash sites with clever 'techie' stuff!)

Sacred journeys, pilgrimages & retreats - www.spiritualholidays.com
This alternative holiday website has recently benefited from a re-structuring of the navigation, making it easy to get to any page of the site with just one click - important now it's been proved that the average web surfer only clicks three times per site... The text could still be improved considerably but the client now has a new 'journeys of a lifetime' site to focus on...!

Reiki Jin Kei Do & Buddho Enersense - www.circleoflight.co.uk
This site is an example of how easy it is to get high rankings in the Engines for searches in such a niche area as 'Jin Kei Do' – keywording alone can do the trick. However, to get results for 'Reiki' in general is a lot harder. In this case it will be more cost-effective to supplement with Google's PPC (pay-per-click) services than embark on a link-building campaign.

Dart Villas Organic Vegetarian B&B Guesthouse - www.dartvillasbb.co.uk
For this site, emphasis was put on effective, enticing copy, as well as keywording to maximise potential 'natural' search results, backed up by a cost-effective Google AdWords pay-per-click campaign, which brings in a considerable percentage of overall business.

Mapleton House B&B - www.mapleton-house.co.uk
This is a quick, functional one page site for a B&B in Ashburton, Devon.

Sandra Smith, singing teacher and choir coach - www.singingandbreathing.co.uk
Sandra Smith's work covers all aspects of singing training, from private classes for individuals to coaching choirs and running workshops for the corporate sector. Also Breathing Easy courses for people from all works of life to learn about 'fight or flight' bad breathing habits and how to eleviate stress.

Marriage advice online seminars - www.surrenderedwifeseminars.com
Sarah offers marriage advice online as a Certifed trainer in Laura Doyle's Surrendered Wife programme.

LandEcol Husbandry - www.husbandry.co.uk
This is a project under development that I am very happy to be part of as it deals with the issue of how to employ practical techniques for sustainable rural and urban development using the ancient and traditional principles of land husbandry. Also this site is probably the cheapest place in the UK to buy a wind turbine that is actually worthwhile having!

New age music reviews - www.newmusicreviews.co.uk
For some time now I've been writing music reviews for Kindred Spirit magazine under the name of Kinski. On this site I archive the reviews and sample tracks previously featured on the KS site which serves the new age, mind body spirit market here in the UK.

Original paintings for sale - www.kinski.co.uk
To make a change from creating music, I started oil painting a couple of years ago. Here's another of my own sites created to display my artwork to potential exhibitors mainly.

Collaborative work
These websites have been developed and designed by Paul 'Sudhi' Guess of Endless Designs. My contribution has been to advise on the sites' logistics, navigation, marketing strategies, SEO and/or copy writing, etc.

Swim with dolphins holiday retreats in the Bahamas - www.wildquest.com
After a logistical re-structuring of this dolphin swim website's navigation, and extensive re-writing of the text to make these fabulous holidays even more enticing, the new site designed by Sudhi is already out-performing the old incarnation in terms of returning visitors and converting sales. Further promotion to niche directories, and the addition of more information areas to the site (and the natural inbound links that this should bring as a consequence), should bring about definite improvements in natural search engine results, thus enabling WildQuest to reduce their PPC budget.

Also see: www.emeraldharp.com

Friends' sites
The following are websites that have hopefully benefitted a little from my help and advice here and there, though include no direct input in terms of design, copywriting or SEO, etc. They are included here largely because I like them (either the sites or the friends, or both!).

CD cover artwork design services – www.joyartdesign.com
Joyaa, from the Blue in Green Recording Studios in Devon, offers design services specifically to meet the needs of musicians, i.e., CD cover and insert design, posters, leaflets, etc. Also various DVD skills.

Opus+ music composition software – www.opusplus.org
Opus+ is a collaborative research project which offers free music composition software written in the Java programming language. Opus+ helps people to create interesting musical compositions using novel techniques derived from artificial intelligence. The user is presented with an easy-to-use graphical interface showing an abstract view of the composition through which the user can 'influence' the composition process. The program generates a PDF file containing the musical score, and a MIDI file containing a synthesized rendition.
webmaster resources
(Okay, I admit it, most of these are affiliate links, so I do make a very modest cut if you decide to go ahead and heed these recommendations.
There may be better services on offer out there, but I've used the following on many occasions and I find them to do very much 'what it says on the tin'.)

Banner 10000006
VerticalResponse offer a good value online bulk emailing service. Unlike some other auto-responder type services, Vertical Response go to great lengths to keep their servers off any blacklists. Therefore if you use them to create and email your mailing lists, the emails are more likely to get through! A BIG advantage! Also they charge per email sent rather than by monthly fee, which can suit small businesses better.

$0 Web Hosting
Doteasy have got to be one of the best value web-hosts out there. A little over a tenner a year to register a .co.uk domain - with free webspace and 10 email addresses thrown in! Plus a ever-growing range of features. Plus the option to upgrade your webspace as your business grows.
Note: Because they are based in Canada, .com, .net and .org addresses hosted by Doteasy don't show well in Google UK searches. However, .co.uk and .org.uk domains are fine because Google recognises that the site is relevant to UK searches because of the .uk suffix.


Most offers of website promotion services shouldn't be touched with a barge-pole, but Robert at SelfPromotion.com is an honest sort of chap who won't pull the wool over your eyes to make a fast buck. In fact he works on a donations-only basis. Now that automated submissions are largely a thing of the past (as they can do more harm that good), Robert keeps paring down what he can offer in that way, but this is an information-rich site - well worth a small donation just to get access to his huge list of niche directories and engines and his recommendations thereof.


WordTracker was every SEO's favourite tool to help find those secret keyword combinations that would boost your site's rankings above your competitors'. Trouble is, everyone's using WordTracker now, plus the engines are so interested in keywords as they were in the past. However, this is still a useful resource to check out what's what. To use the service for a day costs peanuts!


Amazon needs no introduction for most people, but if you've not got wise to their MarketPlace yet then you should check it out. There is now nearly always someone selling the same item via Amazon for even cheaper than Amazon themselves! Click on the Amazon.co.uk banner above to take a look now.

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Silveraven Services, 1 Longwood Cottage, Fore St, Buckfastleigh, Devon TQ11 0BS, UK
Tel: 044 (0)1364 643929 Email: clive@silveraven.com