Learning the Drums

James — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 14:59:34 +0000

I’ve always been interested in music and felt that I would someday be able to play an instrument to some degree. I had some guitar lessons around the age of 14 but always felt frustrated in getting it right and practice felt like a chore. As these things are generally about the quality and quantity of practice, I didn’t get very far although have gone back to the guitar now and again to mess around and whilst have a little bit of skill, I certainly couldn’t play in a band or in front of anyone and have them enjoy what they were listening to!

I’ve always wanted to have a go at drumming and recently started with some lessons with Gregory Hills to get the desire to try drumming out of my system and to find out if I enjoyed it. You never know if you could be amazing (or at least enjoy it) at something without trying, right!? Having lessons has been great fun and the nature of drumming seems to be a different experience for me as it feels much easier to ‘get into’ than guitar playing as its easier to create a fun beat to play and doing so is a great feeling!

I’ve been enjoying it so much and the desire to practice away from lessons led me to buying an electronic drum kit. I used the Art Council’s Take It Away scheme which meant I only had to pay a deposit and the rest is monthly 0% payments. I got the Alesis DM6 which was £369 and, for the novice drummer, seems to have everything I need and is a relatively cheap way to have something to practice on.

I’ve been looking for songs to learn and have learnt a few already (all be it my simple versions of them!) such as In The Air Tonight, Clocks, Honky Tonk Women, Supersonic and a couple of others. I’m planning on making some YouTube videos soon with me playing so that’s something for everyone to look forward to!

Learning an instrument lets you listen to familiar songs in a slightly different way as it means you’re concentrating on a particular instrument within it. Its always great to listen and watch how others play and breakdown how they do it to try and replicate they’re playing.

I’ve been looking around at other people’s videos and here are some drummers I’ve been impressed by:

Tipple.101 – Tuesday 20th April, 7pm to 10pm, George Vaults, Rochester

James — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 10:03:30 +0000

In February, Carl Jeffrey organised Tipple.101 as a reponse to people saying that they couldn’t make Monday mornings for tuttle.101. I think we should do this again so am arranging a tipple.101 get together next Tuesday 20th April at George Vaults in Rochester.

If you have a blog, Twitter account or any other web presence and think people who read it will be interested in a get together of creative and interesting people to talk about inspiring things, please tell them!

Also, if you are planning on attending, it would be great if you could post a comment on this blog so we have an idea on the numbers who will be attending.

Thanks and am looking forward to it!!

My Skip Hire Prices Website is on Page One of Google

James — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 08:58:35 +0000

The Skip Hire Prices website I’ve recently been working on yesterday went to page one of Google yesterday for the keyword “skip hire prices”. It is currently at the bottom of page one and after I write this blog post it could drop back to page two! However, I thought it was worth mentioning as not only is it a good example of a website getting to page one for a niche keyword quite quickly but also demonstrated the effect of being on page one of Google instead of page two as the traffic from Google increased by 300%!

New Websites Rising up the Rankings

James — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 23:08:46 +0000

My new website, skip hire prices, went onto page 2 for the keyword “skip hire prices” after 7 days and is slowly moving up this page as I get the chance to perform more link building to it over time. It’ll be interesting to watch how this performs and how certain methods I use to obtain links to this site affect its positioning in the search engines.

A couple of weeks ago I also started another website which is targeting the keyword “ladies golf clothes“. This website is moving up the search engine rankings a bit more slowly but moved from page 22 to page 16 yesterday so, again, it will be interesting to note how this continues to perform in the search engines.

I have some other website projects that I’m working on (one being based around cheap candles and another on 40th birthday ideas) and will provide more updates on these when there is something to report!

What do You Struggle With When It Comes to SEO?

James — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 15:39:45 +0000

I’ve been thinking about the various elements that most people consider to be involved in search engine optimisation (keyword research, optimising the various elements on a page, building links to a page, etc) and was wondering what other people consider to be the most difficult part of the process for them.

I personally find that people don’t know the intricacies of keyword research as it seems difficult for many people to really understand what heir target market will type into the search engines. I find that many people who don’t think about what their target market will type in generally think that the keywords which are quite generic and generate the most traffic are often not the most suitable. Of course this depends on the client and their business but for many small businesses fitting a niche is usually the best route as, when people reach a website from a relatively specific keyword then they are more likely to find a website useful, whether that’s buying a product on your website or getting in touch regarding a service that you are offering.

What do you find difficult? Keyword researching? Optimising a web page for keywords? Getting a website higher in the search engines for the right keywords?

Latest Tuttle.101 Was Great Fun

James — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 12:49:29 +0000

I just wanted thanks to everyone that helped get the word out about the latest Tuttle.101 which took place last Monday (29th March). I had a great time and met some excellent, new people. I hope that I’ll get to chat to everyone at the next Tuttle.101 and that word will spread and we’ll get even more new faces!

Thanks, in particular, to @natashasexton for her post at Creative Boom and @rochesterpeople for their post on their website.

If anyone has a photo from this week’s Tuttle.101 and would be happy for me to use it on this blog post, feel free to contact me!

Who is up for another one? Anyone can arrange it (doesn’t have to be in the morning) as it belongs to the community!

Optimise Your Webpage in 60 Seconds

James — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 19:14:30 +0000

I thought that some of you might want some information on how to optimise a web page for the search engines. Here is a 60 second guide on how to optimise a page:

1. Choose a keyword(s) to optimise a page for.
2. Put keyword(s) in the title tag on the page.
3. Include the keyword(s) in the URL.
4. Include the keyword(s) in the meta description.
5. Include the keyword(s) in the meta keywords.
6. Put the keyword within an h1 tag on the page.
7. Put the keyword(s) within the text on the page. The density of the keyword(s) on the page should be between 2% and 5%. Write about the topic of the page naturally and this will take care of itself though.

BAM!! You’ve optimised your web page for keywords.

Tuttle.101, 29th March, 09:30, The George Vaults, Rochester

James — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 10:50:13 +0000

The next Tuttle.101 (otherwise known as Social Media Café Medway) has been booked for next Monday 29th March at 09:30 in the upstairs room at The George Vaults Bar (35 High Street, Rochester – click for map).

For those that haven’t been before, Tuttle.101 isn’t about traditional business networking but meeting other inspirational people as amazing things are usually produced out of get togethers like this!

If you are looking to get there next Monday, it would be great if you could leave a comment on this blog post. Thanks!

£3 donation per head for tea/coffee would be much appreciated

Looking forward to seeing everyone there.

URL of Skip Hire Prices Purchased

James — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 23:37:42 +0000

As a follow-up to my recent “I’ll be Making More Websites to Generate Income” blog post, I have recently purchased and setup the website Skip Hire Prices. I’ll be building some basic links into this and will see how it gets on. I have also bought other domain names and she let you know how these get on later down the line!

What do you think? Are you working on anything similar to this type of website?

Do You Know What a First Position in Google is Worth?

James — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 01:49:53 +0000

In a fascinating insight into the differences in the number of clicks the sites in the various positions on page one of a Google search get, apparently position one gets an average of 42.13% of clicks whilst position two 11.90% of clicks. You can find out more on this excellent article on “What is a #1 Google Ranking Worth?” over at SEO Book.

Whilst I think that article is not the newest and things such as local search results, real time results and more will affect positions within Google, I thought it was worth highlighting as many people probably aren’t aware of the dominance that position one in Google has. It also highlights that its not just about achieving a page one ranking for your targeted keyword(s) but about getting as high up on page one as possible. So you need to carefully analyse how high up on page one your website can get when choosing keywords to target.