I was just sitting here on a Friday afternoon, pottering away on a new website build we're about to launch for a client, when it occurred to me that it's been twelve years since I last worked a 9-5 office job for 'the man'.

Back then (we're talking 2005) I was working in North Sydney and making money for someone else. Now if I make a quid, I know it's going into my bank account (well, my company's bank account) and not into the bank account of some faceless corporation that doesn't care one iota about foot-soldiers such as me.

Running a small business is no picnic, and as any small business owner or entrepreneur will tell you, it has as many downs as it has ups. But if you can make a go of it, and if you're lucky enough to bring in enough coin to keep the wolf from the door, then the upsides are spectacular.

And I'm not just talking about the money, because as a small business owner there are bills a-plenty to eat into that! I'm talking about the intangibles. The work your own hours. Take a day off when you feel the need to. Have a nap in the middle of the day if the mood strikes (fat chance, Logan!). Take an early mark to beat the rush at the gym on a Friday night. All that kind of thing. It's the freedom more than anything, that appeals to willow-the-wisps like me. That and the fact that you don't have a douche-bag of a micro-managing boss standing over your shoulder telling you what to do. Even though you know more than they do and could do their job with one arm tied behind your back! How do you put a price on things like that? I'm not sure you can. But the work-life balancing act is so much easier when you're the guy steering the boat. Full steam ahead or temporary solace in a safe-harbour, it's completely up to you. And gosh that's a nice feeling.

Of course there are bills to be paid, client deliverables to be delivered, deadlines to be met. It's still a job at the end of the day, even when you're the boss! And with it comes a type of pressure people who work for someone else, will never understand. So don't think for a second being an entrepreneur is all beer o'clock and afternoon siestas. Because that couldn't be further from the truth. It's more, 'Oh crap another bill!', 'Weekends, what the hell are they?', and 'You want it WHEN?'. That and a hundred other demands on our time is the reality for most of us who run their own business. But would we trade it for being an 'employee' again? Not a chance. Because once you get off the hamster wheel it's very, very, VERY hard to get back on.

Let those spreading 'Fake News' and disseminating poor content, beware: Google's new Search Quality Raters Guidelines have you in their sights!

Google's Search Quality Raters Guidelines are going to impact millions of Internet users (and more importantly, abusers) in the months and years to come. So if you're not across these new guidelines, or else make a living out of corrupting the system for your own ends, be afraid. Be very afraid.

To find out what these Search Quality Raters Guidelines mean to your business, read on. Because the changes to online content will be, *insert dodgy Trump impression here*: "Huuuuuuuuuuuuge!".

Let's start with the obvious question: 'What are Quality Raters, exactly?'. Quality Raters are a Google Army of over 10,000 (and growing) independent contractors whose job it is to check that the facts they read on websites are accurate, and that the content and the website that content is on, is reputable. They check the credibility of websites, report images that are illegal or offensive, and help push the best pages to the top of Google's search results.

They are also tasked with getting rid of false, offensive, or generally hateful information that has been showing up all too frequently in Google searches of late, by using humans to supplement super-smart machine-learning algorithms like Panda, in order to stem the tide of dross that is forever pouring into the internet.

Good luck with putting that particular genie back in the bottle I hear you cry!

But what exactly are Google's Search Quality Raters targeting? To find out the answer to this, I invite you to read Google's 157 page Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines document. A document that covers everything from understanding YMYL pages ('Your Money or Your Life'), to learning how to spot EAT pages ('High Level of Expertise / Authoritativeness / Trustworthiness'), and everything in-between.

But if reading 157 pages of techno-babble sounds a little too much like hard work, then allow me to give you the crib notes, so you can get a handle on the topic without devoting three days of your life to the task!

'Fake News!' can be viewed as the dissemination of misleading and falsified information presented as fact. Whether this involves using a website to exaggerate the truth, or else completely make things up, this is a tactic that simply isn't going to fly in Google anymore. The irony of course in all the 'Fake News!' brouhaha, is that Trump, the king of 'Fake News!', was the very person to coin the phrase. Thus to a very real degree, allowing him to own it.

Do you remember the end of the Curtis Hanson, '8 Mile' film, when Eminem is in a rap-battle against that guy who hates him? And how Eminem - going first - uses all the negative stuff that he knows his opponent will say about him. But says it first? Thus getting ahead of the 'information' and self-deprecating to a point where he OWNS his faults, his flaws, and by so doing takes the power away from his opponent who can no longer use the self same 'facts' as weapons. Well that's exactly what Trump's done. By coining the phrase, 'Fake News!' and using it against real news outlets like CNN, BBC NEWS, et al, he has been able to blatantly lie about just about everything, while instantly shielding himself from the inevitable criticisms from those very organisations who actually care about pesky little things like facts, because he has a ready-made response that says that anyone who disagrees with him, or questions what he says, is simply spreading 'Fake News!'. 

The tactic is breathtakingly Machiavellian. And if it weren't so insidious, so downright evil, then one might actually admire the audacity and scope of it. But given it's coming out of Trump's warped and twisted psyche, 'admiration' is not a word that'll spring to mind in anyone with an IQ in triple digits... 

With its newly hired army of fact-checkers, Google is now going to be working to combat the spread of 'Fake News!' (because Trump is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to lies being disseminated as facts on the internet). So when 'Fake News!' sites are spotted by the Quality Raters, they will now be pushed down in the search results, thus preventing them from organically being found. And (hopefully) preventing them from 'going viral'.

Google Search Raters Guidelines state that any websites that mimic other, more prominent sites, specially news sites, are going to be hit big by these new guidelines. For example, any sites that are designed to look and function like news sites but actually contain false or misleading information will be going down hard. These kinds of sites typically exist to misinform readers and spread false information / propaganda etc, for the gain or benefit of some other person or organisation.

We now live in a post Trump world. And like it or not, while he still has his finger on the launch codes and the Twitter Feeds (God help me, I don't know which is more dangerous), then we are all of us at the mercy of 'Fake News'. So hats-off to Google for trying to eradicate the disease at its source.

Of course Google are not the only boffins trying to eradicate the 'Fake News' epidemic. Two professors (technology professor Dongwon Lee and communications professor S. Shyam Sundar) from Penn State university recently received a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to develop technology that will enable digital devices to weed out fake news. So expect other left-leaning, politically savy tech minded people to join in the battle over the coming months.www.seonorthsydney.com.au/blog/conversion-rate-optimisation-cro-how-to-make-your-website-traffic-convert-into-leads

Any overtly racist or hateful content will now, thanks to Google's Quality Raters, be given a lower spot in the search results, and in many cases, will be removed from the search results completely. Pages that promote hate speech or actions against specific groups of people are now able to be tagged with an "Upsetting-Offensive" flag.

Of course this has the potential to get into very murky waters, as the internet was founded on freedom of speech and the spreading of ideas. And when one organisation (no matter how noble their intent) starts being the judge, jury and executioner of what should, and should not be shared on the internet, then we're suddenly a lot closer to 1984 than 2017. Censorship being one of the most insidious of all the evils. 

That said, if a website is promoting hate speech against the gay and lesbian community, or a particular religion or ethnic minority, or engaging in internet bullying, or attempting to re-write history by saying that the Holocaust never happened because 'Hitler was right', etc...then is the internet really losing anything when said content is buried on page 968 of a particular Google search? I suspect not.

But again, censorship is as censorship does. And it's a slippery slope when an all-powerful organisation starts to make judgement calls on content, just because said organisation deems it to be against guidelines it internally came up with, and which may or may not (depending on the individual reader's moral compass or beliefs) be 'offensive'.  And just because you and I, and most of the people we know, disagree with what is being written, we should never disagree with the author's unalienable right to write it.

One of the biggest problems plaguing the web right now is clickbait. To understand why clickbait is so bad, you must first understand what it is:

Clickbait articles usually feature shocking or catchy headlines designed to make people click on the article so they will be redirected to an external website which exists purely to make revenue off paid advertisements. The problem with this method is that the actual pages the reader goes to when they click on the click bait stories, contain nothing of substance. In many cases they may not even answer the question posed by the catchy headline at all. They exist purely to drive the reader to an external website and make the reader click through dozens of pages in order to see so called 'facts', one 'fact' at a time. The model being that each page a 'fact' or 'story' appears on, is surrounded by paid adverts. And the website owner receives revenue every time a sucker clicks on an advert. And sometimes they even get paid per 'impression' rather than 'per click'. So the website owner makes money even if the readers ignore the ads because the advert has been 'served' and therefore seen by the reader. Ker-ching, Ker-ching.

Google wants the web to be full of brilliantly written, well researched, knowledgeable information that answers a reader's search query. However, because so many people click on those misleading titles, those posts are rapidly moving up the search results and gaining traction because of an increased Click Through Rate. So they get to rank well, even though they do not deserve to. Googles Quality Raters are aiming to help combat this.

E-A-T stands for “Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness” and it’s the yardstick Google’s Quality Raters use to help Google rank pages. 

According to their guidelines (Section 4, Part 1), this is what constitutes 'High-Quality' pages:

1. Enough Main Content (MC): content should be ample enough to satisfy the needs of a user for a page’s unique topic and purpose (broad topics require more information than narrow topics, for example).
2. The page and its associated content is expert, authoritative, and trustworthy for the topic they discuss.
3. The website has a positive reputation for its page topics.
4. The website features enough auxiliary information, for example, “About us,” “Contact,” or “Customer Service” information.
5. The website features supplementary content (SC) that enhances the user’s enjoyment and experience of a web page.
6. The page is designed in a functional fashion that allows users to easily locate the information they want.
7. The website is maintained and edited regularly and frequently.

Attempting to get your head around what EAT actually means is tricky, as ultimately what Google is talking about brings to mind the old 'chicken and egg' question (ie: which comes first?). To be trusted by Google on a particular topic, you need to be an expert on the topic (what you say), and brilliantly express that knowledge (how you say it) both vertically and horizontally on your website. This then leads to a 'Positive Reputation' for the new content as the pages then get trusted by Google, because Panda loves it and because human beings respond to the pages by staying on them a long time, by interacting with them, and by going to other similar / related (Supplementary Content) pages on the website. 

But you can't get that 'Positive Reputation' if nobody finds the articles you've authored because they're buried on page 129 of Google, now can you? And therein lies the conundrum for Small Business Owners and Entrepreneurs everywhere. Because you can't have an egg without a chicken. But you can't have a chicken without an egg...

You also can't fake the 'Expert' part. Because you either know what you're talking about or you don't. Plus the level of craft involved in how that knowledge is expressed on the page (the quality of the actual writing) is now of paramount importance. And with Panda being the most important algorithm out there, the days of you outsourcing your content writing to India to somebody named 'Frank' (real name 'Gupta') are gone. Because when it comes to content (like everything else in life): YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.
​
The takeaway in all this is that when it comes to EAT:

1. You need to be an expert in what you're writing about.
   
2. You need to be (or hire) a professional writer to express that knowledge on the page (because Panda can tell how well written the content is, and knows the difference between 'University Level Writing', 'High School Level Writing', 'Primary School Level Writing' and 'Donald Trump Level Writing').
3. You need to garner a 'Positive Reputation' on the web, via quality on-page analytic data and via links from reputable, industry related websites that Google already trusts.

There are websites and there are websites. Some sell widgets. They may be good widgets, they may be bad widgets. But one thing is for sure, 'believing' the information expressed on a particular web page about the widgets will not effect your health or your state of mind. Nor will it impact your happiness or income (unless you're stupid enough to spend your life-savings on buying a gazillion widgets I mean!). In other words, visiting a widgets' website is unlikely to impact Your Money or Your Life.

However if you read a site that tells you that taking X cures Y (when it doesn't). Or you read a 'Fake News' site that tells you that X happened and Y was responsible (when it didn't, and they weren't), then those things can impact Your Money and Your Life.

Google offers the following categories as examples of YMYL pages:

1. Any page with the potential to be dangerous or detrimental if it possessed low levels of EAT.
2. Shopping or financial transaction pages.
3. Pages that offer medical information about specific diseases or conditions or mental health.
4. Pages that offer financial information, for example, investment or tax information.
5. Pages that offer legal information about topics like child support, divorce, creating a will, becoming a citizen, etc.
6. News articles or public/official information pages.
7. Disaster response services.
8. Web pages which are important for maintaining an informed citizenry, including information about local/state/national government processes, people, and laws.
9. News about important topics such as international events, business, politics, science, and technology. 
10. Government programs and social services.

The YMYL bottom line being that if your website is making bold claims, make them quantifiable and accurate claims. And if you website is stating facts, let those facts be, you know...factual.

With the release of these new Quality Rater guidelines, it's obvious that Google is pushing more and more for websites to have well written, high quality, accurate content. But how do you as a Small Business Owner or Entrepreneur know if your website content is good enough? What exactly qualifies as low quality content anyway?

Good question! For a more in-depth answer to this, read the definitive Panda article. But so far as Google's human Quality Raters are concerned, think of it like this:

• Your website content needs to be ORIGINAL. Not unique - nothing's unique on the world wide web - but ORIGINAL all the same. Have something to say that isn't just, 'We're great, buy our stuff!', because that's exactly what your competitors are saying on their site about themselves.
• Your website content needs to be FACTUALLY CORRECT. Because if what you're saying is incorrect, or -worse - deliberately misleading...then your website will get nuked by Google big time.
• Your website needs to be well designed. Because, while the Quality Raters aren't too fussed about how your website looks (functional wins over pretty in their eyes) functional and pretty wins over everything. So if your website is poorly presented, has a messy or cluttered design, or is hard to navigate, etc, your Google rankings will take a hit.
• Your website content needs to be PROFESSIONALLY WRITTEN, because the Panda algorithm can tell great copy from good copy, and good copy from bad. And just because you can string a few words together in an email yourself, or just because you wrote a few papers whilst at uni, DOES NOT MAKE YOU A PROFESSIONAL COPYWRITER. Any more than having a driver's licence makes you a formula one driver. So if you care about ranking your website: CARE ABOUT THE COPY YOU PUT ON IT.

At the end of the day, if people do not have a good experience using Google, they will stop using Google's services altogether. So search quality is everything to Google, which is why they have to continue to release new algorithmic updates to combat the surge of low-quality content. And why now, for the first time ever, they've hired an army of HUMAN BEINGS to supplement the algorithms.

Essentially, when you click through to a website, Google wants whatever you find on that website to match your search expectations. This isn't rocket science, people!

Ready to conquer the first page in the SERPS? Then call SEO North Sydney. We are here to assist with your all your small business's online marketing needs, including SEO, Web Design, Pay Per Click Advertising and Content Marketing.

So I'm looking into extending my SEO company's reach, using non-traditional channels, when I come across an article on the always erudite website: Forbes.com. An article from a (US) SEO company that is obviously using the platform to pimp their SEO-ride. So I get to thinking...how do I get articles on Forbes? My writing ability and SEO knowledge married with the reach of Forbes? That's got to be a union made in Heaven!

Then I see the pricing structure...

I just had a phone call from the daughter of a good mate of mine, Steve Congerton, saying that he had passed away, on August 2nd. They didn't have my number for some reason, and so in the chaos of the funeral arrangements I wasn't informed, and so didn't get to go to the funeral to pay my respects. Which I would've very much liked to have done. But the family just received the Christmas card Kristi and I sent to Congo and his family, so his daughter Amy instantly called me to tell me the belated news that he had passed away.

Congo (as he was affectionately known by everyone who knew him) was one of the good guys. Okay, sure, he was a Sp*rs fan, so he wasn't perfect. And as a London ‘geeza’, when he spoke he sounded like he was auditioning for a remake of Minder. But his football allegiances and cockney patter aside, he was an absolute gent. A salesman born, rather than forged, Congo was - as I've often described him - the GREATEST SALESMAN I HAVE EVER MET. And I'm not saying this because he's passed away. I'm not saying it just to speak well about the dead. I'm saying this from a position of strength and knowledge. If selling was cricket, Congo would be remembered as Don Bradman. HE WAS THAT GOOD.

And you have to remember that I am demonstrably a damn fine salesman myself so I know of what I speak. And no, that's not ego talking either, that's just the cold hard facts of my CV staring back at me. I've sold most everything at one time or another, and have managed sales teams of up to 200 people. But if Congo was a Don Bradman, then at best I'm a David Gower or Ian Botham. Sure I'm talented and a potential match winner (on my day). But Gower and Botham didn't possess a fraction of the innate ability of the Don when all’s said and done. And so I'm here to tell you that despite everything I know, everything I've done, everything I've sold, down through the years: I am not worthy of lacing up Congo's shoes.

Congo and I met in 1999 when I was hired by AiC Worldwide as National Events Manager to run a huge technology trade show at Darling Harbour. Part of my remit being that I had to sell sponsorship and exhibition stands for half the show. Congo was responsible for sponsorship and exhibition stand sales for the other half. Now this was a HUGE show remember. The biggest Broadcast and Digital Media trade show Australia had ever had. The sort of show with north of 100,000 people coming through the gates during the 3 days the event was on, and national TV and radio coverage. So this event was a big deal for everyone involved.

Congo was the greatest Salesman AiC Worldwide (later, Terrapin) had on their books (quite probably the greatest salesman they had ever had on their books), and I came in and outsold him that year, winning 'Salesman of the Year' in the process.

Now let me reiterate that, as good as I am at sales, I AM NOT WORTHY OF LACING UP CONGO'S SHOES. When it comes to this sort of thing, I am like the perfect storm. High intensity, maximum damage. And then I get bored and move on to destinations unknown. I happened onto this Broadcast and Digital Media World event at the right time in history (when the dot com boom was a-booming), and the market was ready for it (digital television was officially launched in Australia at the show by Senator Alston for example, and I also did the first ever live streaming of an Australian event at this show, which was the prelude to me launching IndieFilmWeb.com). So let’s just say the stars aligned, and I was motivated by cashing some big a*sed commission cheques to beat Congo at what he did best: selling.

When I told his daughter, Amy, this story on the phone today, she laughed and said, 'Oh, dad would've hated you for that! He didn’t let anyone beat him!'. But I said, 'No, actually, he didn't. He RESPECTED me for it’. To the point he hired me as National Advertising Manager for Australia's largest Government magazine (Government News) when he was publisher, several years later. And to the point that we talked many times over the years about forming a company together (which regrettably never happened.)

But me outselling Congo was a one-off, make no mistake about that. Had I stayed at AiC Worldwide (I left to launch IndieFilmWeb.com just after the show), and had Congo and I gone head-to-head on another 10 shows. Another 100 shows. Chances are Congo would've soundly kicked my a*se on all of them, with daylight coming in second.

But sales isn't a sport. And so nobody remembers the great ones when they go. But Congo, me ol' mucka, I'll always remember you. I remember you co-founded Euromoney. I remember you co-founded Business Review Weekly with Robert Gottliebsen (who attended Congo’s funeral). I remember you as a mentor in person, and a force of nature while on the phone. God threw away the mould when he made you, mate. And the world is a much sadder place without you in it.

Congo was a man who owned every room he ever walked into. Who could speak underwater with a mouth full of marbles. Who could sell ice to an Eskimo. And like many a great salesman, he was a guy with a heart of gold. There are many anecdotes about Congo I could pen here, but I’ll end on this one, because it’s forever in front of me:
​
Congo was working as publisher on Government News when he hired me to come in and work under him as National Advertising Manager. Trouble was, four months after I started, the parent company who owned Government News, was sold to the Intermedia Group, and we all, from the CEO to the cleaners (Congo included) lost our jobs.

Congo was naturally mortified that this had happened, as I’d left a good paying job to come work there. But sometimes sh*t just happens, so you have to roll with the punches. Anyway, on our last day of work at Government News, while all the computers, and chairs and servers and printers et al were being packed up, to be shipped to the new owners head office in Surry Hills (we were in Frenchs Forrest), Congo walked in holding a big, expensive framed print that had hung in the CEO’s office, and that I had often commented on (I’m a big fan of lighthouses, and there was something about the print that spoke to me).

“Here,” he said with a wicked grin on his cherub like face.  “Go put this in your car.”

“But…” stammered I, “Hasn’t everything been itemised and catalogued already by the new owners?’

To which Congo just winked at me and shrugged. “Guess it must’ve got lost in transit…”
​
And to this day, that print is proudly positioned above my couch in my home. Which is just another reason why I’m not forgetting you anytime soon, Congo.

​Rest In Peace, mate. God knows you of all people have earned it.

If you own, operate or market a business website, you're no doubt well aware of the fact that the conversion rate is a very important parameter governing how profitable your website actually is. Traffic is all well and good, but if nobody buys the widgets you're selling, or picks up the phone as a result of what they've read, then what's the point? You're running a business after all, not a lending library. 

As I always say about my own business: I'd rather have 10 people come to my website and 9 sign up, than 10,000 people coming to my website and only 8 sign up!

Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) is a method of increasing the percentage of visitors reaching a website who either buy something from the site or take some other action that is considered to be beneficial to the site owner. Just like Search Engine Optimisation may be thought of as part art and part science, so to with Conversion Rate Optimisation. Which, when done well, will significantly improve a website's turnover.

While the benefits of CRO should be fairly obvious to any entrepreneur or small business owner, let me quantify them in more detail to help put things in the correct perspective.
 
Generally speaking, the cost of operating a website should remain more or less constant regardless of the conversion rate it achieves. So far as traffic is concerned, a website is likely to receive:

1. organic traffic (via Google, Bing, etc).
2. paid traffic (by way of PPC and / or other forms of paid advertising).
3. referred traffic (via other websites that link to yours).
4. social traffic (via FB, Twitter, Instagram, etc).
   
5. a combination of all of the above.

Traffic that is referred from another website can be free (someone links from their website to yours because they like your content) or it can come at a price (paid advertising on someone else's site that incorrectly comes into your Google analytics as referred traffic, even though it's technically paid traffic). ​

Traffic generated via paid advertising obviously costs money (because you're paying per click or impression) and getting organic search traffic in any volume requires an over-arching SEO strategy driving it (which naturally costs money too, as you need to hire a SEO Company to get the first page results you require).

So for this example, let's assume that a website selling products online spends $1,000 per month on paid advertising and $1,000 per month on SEO services. And let's further imagine (for easy math) that it averages about 1,000 unique visitors per day. Next, let us assume that the average transaction value for the website is $50. And finally, let's say that it has a conversion rate of 1% (i.e. one out of every 100 visitors buys from the site).
 
Given the above scenario, the site would average 10 sales per day. And with the average transaction value of $50, it would gross $500 per day or $15,000 per month in sales (on a 30 day month). Now let's see what would happen if the conversion rate of the site gets increased from 1% to 1.5%. When this happens the gross monthly income generated by the website would jump from $15,000 to $22,500 straight away, with the exact same operating cost of $2,000. So that's a $7,500 per month or a $90,000 per year increase in annual turnover - WITHOUT GETTING A SINGLE ADDITIONAL PERSON TO YOUR SITE PER MONTH.

Persuasive and professional copywriting is a panacea for increasing your conversion optimisation, and has been tested and proven time and again to significantly increase conversions. If your website copy connects with your target audience and offers them a solution to their needs, more of them will convert.

Although more and more internet users are growing comfortable using their credit card online, the security of such information still continues to remain a strong deterrent for a significant percentage of internet users when it comes to online shopping. Assuring website visitors that it is safe to buy via your website by converting it from HTTP to HTTTS is not only a ranking factor in Google, it is a great way of assuring your clients that any financial and personal information they provide via your website is 100% secure. Which has a positive impact on your website's conversion rates.

​No matter how trustworthy a site has been designed to be, there will still be a percentage of visitors (especially older visitors) who just won't put in their card or bank information online. People as the old saying goes, like buying from people. So put a human back in the loop by providing an option (like 'live chat' for example), as this is a great way to increase conversion rates. A live chat service on a site will often help walk people through to the checkout and thus boost the site's conversion rate.

People are busy and easily distracted, and a slow loading website or web page is often the hidden factor that's killing your site's SEO. Google recommends that each page load in less than 2 seconds. So test your site's load speed, and if it isn't up to snuff, you can expect to lose people across your entire website. From the home page to the checkout the rule of thumb is: the longer the page takes to load, the less people remain on that page.

If your website is outdated or difficult to navigate, or if the UX (User Experience) is frustrating because the visitor just can't find what they're looking for, then you need to bite the bullet and get yourself a new website designed. Because a professionally designed small business website does wonders to your conversion rates.  Think of it like two sales guys walk into your store, and one is clean shaven and dressed in a $10,000 Tom Ford Suit, and one has a five o'clock shadow and wears ripped shorts and a sweaty singlet. Which do you think you're most likely to buy from?

As that time honoured old saying goes: 'You only get one chance to make a first impression'. What impression is YOUR website giving your brand?

It's 5.30 am and I am awake. My eyelids heavy, my heart likewise. Beyond my window the rain is relentless, the sky an insipid grey, the light wan, the tone depressive. There is no wind today. Just the rain and the biting cold. Beyond my home, the trees bear witness to the endless clockwork of time that stretches out before them. Willow Bottlebrush and Banksia, Paperbark and Oak, they are all of them statues on a Caravaggio canvas of earth and bark.

Against this backdrop, a discordant child's voice - like a memory rising from the depths of my mind - murmours, 'Oranges and lemons says the bells of St. Clement's. You owe me five farthings, say the bells of St. Martin's. When will you pay me, say the bells of Old Bailey. When I grow rich, say the bells of Shoreditch. When will that be, say the bells of Stepney. I do not know, says the great bell of Bow. Here comes a candle to light you to bed. And here comes a chopper to chop off your head!'

It's a young girl's voice, best I can make out, maybe 7 or 8; her lament at once shrill, breathy, harshly off-key. I drag myself out of bed and walk outside to the balcony to see where the voice is coming from, but find nothing save the trees and the rain. As I stand there, the macabre nursery rhyme grows fainter, as if the girl is moving away from me, retreating backwards in time. And I am suddenly reminded of an old Black & White horror film I saw growing up in the UK, many moons ago. The only detail of which I remember being that of a family - circa 1946 perhaps - pulling into the long curved driveway of a stately English country manor, the rain falling heavily about them. This is their new home, one presumes, and as they alight from their sleek black Austin 16, they are greeted by a servant of the house standing in the driveway who proffers an apologetic smile and a black umbrella. Together they move towards the expansive front door of the manor house, while the camera cranes up and away to reveal several ghostly children, all aged ten or under, sitting high in the branches of the trees; their tattered clothes centuries out of date, their mouths moving in unison to the tune of a long forgotten nursery rhyme.

The son and daughter of the new lord of the manor, both under ten themselves, hear the nursery rhyme and turn and stare behind them, their eyes wide, the hackles rising on the backs of their necks. But there is nothing to be seen, save the rain, and the trees that bear witness to the endless clockwork of time that stretches out before them.

"Here comes a candle to light you to bed. And here comes a chopper to chop off your head.''

​Copyright 2016 - Brian M Logan

Click here to read more CREATIVE WRITING EXAMPLES.

SEO North Sydney are extremely happy to launch a new web design in Melbourne, Victoria, for shippingcontainersmelbourne.com.au, a local container company that specialises in the sales and hire of shipping containers across Victoria. A clean, measured design was the order of the day for this web build, blending the client's light blue logo with a lot of white space in order to offer visitors an effortless experience where website navigation and usability are prioritised above the more flashy websites favoured by some of their competitors.

​SEO North Sydney built the website, wrote all copy therein, and were hire to run the client's local Melbourne SEO campaign.

SEO North Sydney are proud to announce the launch of a new website in Brisbane for shippingcontainersbrisbane.com.au, a respected local Brisbane shipping container company! A slick and stylish design, utilising a dark colour pallet to emphasise their stylish branding, this new website delivers on both functionality and style.

​SEO North Sydney not only designed the site, but were hired to write every single word of copy on the site and run the client's on-going local Brisbane SEO campaign.

Four out of every five calls SEO North Sydney receive are from small business owners who dwell on the subject of keywords because they’ve been ‘shaped’ by previous SEO companies to ask questions that the SEO companies know how to answer. But much like Pavlov’s dog continues to salivate, even though no food is on offer, so too SEO companies continue to sound the ‘Keywords’ bell, while offering little in the way of demonstrable returns on investment for the privilege. ​