graham charlton

Graham Charlton

About Graham Charlton

Graham Charlton is editor in chief at Salecycle.

What makes a travel website usable on mobile?

According to recent research, travel is the second poorest performing sector for mobile user experience. 

According to iProspect estimates, the travel industry is missing out on £900 million a year in potential revenue due to this poor mobile performance.

SaleCycle has recently conducted some research on increasing online travel bookings, looking at mobile optimisation. All but one of the top 50 travel sites were ‘mobile-friendly’ i.e. they were tailored in some way to a small screen, but good mobile UX goes deeper than that. 

Republishing older blog content: does it work?

I recently read a post on Hubspot, looking at the tactic of reusing older blog content to attract extra traffic and links. 

In a nutshell, older posts are updated and republished as new. This means they benefit from promotion on Twitter, in emails, and the attention that comes with being the latest post on the site. 

I’d come across this idea before but had dismissed it. However, while I have a couple of reservations about the tactic, I was interested enough to experiment so we’ve been trying this tactic over the last month. 

algo updates panda

A year in Google algorithm updates

Google algorithm updates are a fact of life for brands and search specialists. 

With so many Google updates over the course of a year, we have a periodic collective outburst of stress around these changes. 

However, the effects of these changes are generally much more subtle and are not the cataclysmic events some fear. 

How ecommerce sites can use microcopy

Microcopy is often overlooked, but it can have an important impact on the user experience. 

In an ecommerce context, microcopy is those little pieces of text which explain what to write in a form field, or the wording of a call to action. 

Here are some examples of how it can be used…

Amazon muscles in on supermarkets’ search rankings

A recent study found that Tesco was the most visible supermarket website in mobile searches on Google UK. 

This may come as no surprise, since Tesco dominates the grocery market in general. What is surprising though, is how much Amazon has muscled in on this market. 

How hotel websites can improve the booking experience

Though 72% of people would book directly with hotel sites if the price is right, the user experience on offer is variable.

A new report from Triptease looks at user preferences when booking hotels online, and contains some useful tips. 

Here’s a selection from the report, and some I’ve added…