Search Engine Optimisation
The Company was formed as a vehicle through which two directors could provide their expertise in Search Engine Optimisation (“SEO”) for advertorial content across a network of regional and national publishers.
SEO is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a web search engine. In general, higher ranked on the search results page, and more frequently a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine’s users, and these visitors can then be converted into customers. SEO targets different kinds of search, including image search, local search, video search, academic search, news search and industry-specific vertical search engines. The Company mainly used Google search engine for SEO.
Due to the nature of the work, it was not deemed necessary to secure office premises and the Company utilised one of the director’s home address for trading, which kept expenses to a minimum.
By using the Director’s expertise and knowledge together with excellent services, the Company built a good reputation. The majority of the Company’s work was sourced through word of mouth and recommendation.
As the company grew, the Company employed its first sales member and expanded its operation, by taking an office in Ruislip, Middlesex. As a consequence, the Company hired more staff and the turnover grew and the Company established a good trading record with many satisfied customers.
However, as is the nature of SEO, Google changed the algorithm to exclude use of advertorial contents as a way of improving SEO.
Furthermore, Google started to penalise websites or web pages who failed to comply with SEO regulations. As a result, many of the publications ranking dropped to zero and the Company’s turnover dropped by 95% causing trading difficulties.
In order to improve the cash flow, the Company had to make all their staff redundant and the Company moved its trading activity back to the director’s home address.
In order to support the cash flow and continue trading, the director introduced funds into the business as and when required.
The Company continued efforts to recoup client confidence. However, with no work forthcoming and all revenues having been eroded, the Company was not in a position to trade and ceased trading.
With no funds available to discharge the outstanding liabilities, and conscious of his duties as a Director, AABRS advised that the company should be placed into creditors’ voluntary liquidation.