A Google search for phrase “Property in Cyprus” at this time yields 2,000,000 hits. A few months ago, it was 1,600,000. Thus, we deduce (unsurprisingly) property in Cyprus is currently booming, as is demand for property websites. As a webmaster working in Cyprus – this makes me happy.

Clients who commission websites do so in order to be found, with increasingly elusive “No 1 on Google” as their Holy Grail. So how do we go about making them happy too?

A Little Background.

Google are responsible for about 40% of searches conducted on line and so are good to have on board with any web-based project. They offer pay per click (sponsored) results and free (organic) results. Without analyzing way in which Google operates – as far as we can know – and relative merits of organic verses sponsored results, suffice it for now to say that Google is highly volatile in terms of what sites rank highest in their index regardless of how much you may pay.

Some argue that search engine mega-giant is as reliable as English weather and as fickle as a leaf in wind but this is obviously anecdotal rather than evidence based.

Exaggeration aside, point at issue here is that we cannot control performance of Google and thus how can we risk our business by depending on it?

Available Options

So how do we get client number 200,000,001 found despite odds?

I would argue that searches fall into three categories.

1. The “pure search” This is when individual searcher types keywords or phrases into search engine of their choice or into a range of utilities that search a number of engines at same time. This will return varying numbers of results of which research suggests searcher will read first page or two.

Sherlock Holmes once told Watson that problem with circumstantial evidence was that it could point uncompromisingly in one direction, but when you shifted your viewpoint slightly it pointed equally uncompromisingly in another.

Website design appears to share this shifting of purpose in many cases, as well-intentioned webmaster is pointing industriously in one direction but Joe Public is equally driven for seemingly mysterious purposes to look in quite another.

To me, key to site design is always to look at goal of site – actual goal - and then your steps towards realizing that goal in eyes of your target audience, bringing client’s needs and Joe Public’s together to be answered in a single product.

By actual goal I mean response your client specifically requires from site - and this needs more thought than many people imagine.

For example, I have designed a number of sites for clients selling real estate in Cyprus. Clearly, you may well say, goal is to sell houses, right?

I would argue no, it is not - unless it is an on-line estate agent who plans to sell houses to platinum Visa holders. The real goal for site is to capture an e-mail address from interested parties – goal of site's owner is to sell houses.

Thus, whole emphasis of site shifts to selling idea of living in Cyprus – and how this particular individual (the client) is best one to help you achieve property ownership in Cyprus in order for us to capture that all important e-mail.

Who is buying?