Biker News - Regularly updated

Welcome to our News section, where articles are listed below and if relevant within the categories on the right, just to make it easier for you to find what you wish to read...

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Category: THE BIKER GUIDE®

  2. Motorcyclists can provide the tourist industry with a lucrative summer... whatever the weather!

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    A survey carried out for the Motorcycle industry* researched the impact of bikers on the tourist industry and found that Motorcycle-related tourism spending in the UK is over £565 million each year, supporting over 13, 000 tourism jobs.

    In recent years the most significant growth in motorcyclists has been in female riders and with this the rise in longer stays under bricks & mortar such as B&B's, hotels, cottages, etc, rather than just for one night... Many riders know there is nothing worse than arriving somewhere after a long ride, unpacking, showering, eating, drinking, sleeping and then up the next day to pack up and move on. With this there is a significant rise in finding a great Biker Friendly place to stay as a base for a few days and then to go out each day to tour and explore the area.

    Hoteliers, cafes, pubs, event organisers and other tourist related organisations could be getting more money from the biker pound, by choosing the correct medium to promote themselves within, especially as many Bikers travel in the UK for their holidays, along with overseas motorcycling tourists spending over £17 million on trips here.

    The traditional stereotype of bikers being free-spirited, leather clad hooligan is thing of the past, according to research** the profile of the ‘average biker’ in 21st Century Britain, a seemingly upstanding, 40+-something middle-class citizen who is a married, professional, family man, who almost certainly owns a car. Challenging the old perceptions of bikers even further, only 7% sport either long hair or a pony tail. This is probably because nearly 60% of those surveyed hold down a professional senior/management job, taking home an average wage 25% higher than the national average.

    By simply advertising your business as 'Biker friendly' here on THE BIKER GUIDE is letting this niche audience know that you welcome them, which many times is enough in itself... by also offering drying facilities, garaged and/or secure parking is a bonus and not a necessary, for you to capitalise on this growing market.

    Other interesting facts:

    More than half of all motorcyclists are over 40, with the vast majority of motorcycle tourists being in this age category.

    “The lack of interest in the motorcycle tourism sector may be due to a perceived image of rebellious youthful bikers which is at odds with their current demographic," (Dr Cater, lecturer at Aberystwyth University).

    * by GHK on behalf of the MCI
    ** by Bennetts

  3. Bennetts reveal Britain’s ‘average biker’

    Posted on

    Typical motorcyclist is middle-class, rides to work and prefers a Honda!

     
    The traditional stereotype of bikers being free-spirited, leather clad hooligan is thing of the past, according to research by Bennetts. The UK’s number one for bike insurance* has revealed the profile of the ‘average biker’ in 21st Century Britain, a seemingly upstanding, 40-something middle-class citizen who is a married, professional, family man.
     
    The study reveals the average motorcyclist in the UK is a world away from common perceptions, with him being a six-foot tall, brown haired biker who almost certainly owns a car and rides no more than twice a week. Although seemingly conventional, the average biker does seem to have a wild side too, with 50% of the British bikers questioned having a tattoo and a third sporting a beard.
     
    Challenging the old perceptions of bikers even further, only 7% sport either long hair or a pony tail. This is probably because nearly 60% of those surveyed hold down a professional senior/management job, taking home an average wage of £30,000 a year, up 25% on the national average (£24,000)**
     
    Despite an immediate association with Harley Davidson’s and other such loud bikes, the average biker actually prefers to ride on a Honda and manages just 7,500 miles a year, with 80% of bikers surveyed owning a car as well as a motorbike. Biking seems to still be very much associated with a mid-life crisis as the average biker has only been riding for two years, despite his age.
     
    Questionnaire Results

    Name: Ben
    Sex: Male (96.8%)
    Age: 41- 50 (31.6%)
    Hair Colour: Brown (66.2%)
    Glasses: No (62.3%)
    Additional features: Tattoos (53.3%) and Beard (32.6%)
    Height: 6ft (33.3%)
    Occupation: Professional (29.0%)
    Motorbike: Honda (30.1%)
    How often do you ride: Twice a week (42.8%)
    Do you use the bike to commute to work: Yes (54.9%)
    Average annual mileage: 5,001 – 10,000 (43.0%)
    Favourite genre of music: Rock/Heavy Metal (48.8%)
    How long have you been riding: 1-3 years (22.9%)
    How many motorbikes have you owned: 6 (47.9%)
    Do you own a car: Yes (80.0%)
    Favourite sport: Superbikes (52.8%)
    Annual income: £20,000 – 39,999 (44.4%)
     
     Average Biker
     
    *Based on brand tracking research in April 2008
    **Based on National Online Statistics (statistics.gov.uk)

  4. Beware of people quoting hits... rather than visitors - Marketing tips from THE BIKER GUIDE

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    What is the difference between hits and visitors?
     
    It is a common mistake and in some cases, one which is used to misguide you into thinking that a website has more actual people looking on the web-site than there actually is.
     
    There is a lot of terminologies that are quoted by the SEO Professional and sales people, trying to get you to place a listing on their website, and some unscrupulous people (and goodness knows, there's plenty of those around!) will be quite happy to take advantage of your ignorance of the terms they are using.
     
    A clever (and dishonest) sales person or SEO specialist will proudly proclaim, "We will get you a thousand hits per day," trusting that you are unaware of what that actually means. A non-savvy website owner will think to himself, "Wow! A thousand visitors per day! That's a lot!"

    But here's the trick. Let's say your home page has a header image, 5 menu images, a couple other pictures somewhere on the page, plus a style sheet that gets called by the page. That works out to a total of 10 hits per page: the page itself, the style sheet, and eight images.

    Now let's suppose that your site is interesting and well designed, so every visitor who comes to it sticks around long enough to read five pages. That's a total of 50 hits per visitor.

    So when the SEO company brags that they're going to get your 1000 hits per day, they really mean that they're going to give you 20 visitors per day.

    All of a sudden their promises don't seem so golden, do they?
     
    What is important

    Simple... The number of visitors to the site, and to be pedantic, not just the visitor, but the  unique visitor.
     
    What is a Hit, Visitor and the Unique Visitor?
     
    A "hit" is counted every single time your website sends a page or graphic to a visitor. So, if one visitor looks at your homepage, that counts as one hit. If your homepage links to nine graphics - logos, photographs etc. - that counts as nine more "hits", giving a total of 10 hits overall. If your visitor leaves your site at this point without looking at any more pages, they have still registered 10 "hits" - this means that hits alone don't give you a very clear idea about how popular your website is. 

    A visitor is every time a person (computer terminal) visits your website.
     
    A unique visitor is how many times that person (computer terminal) visits your website.
     
    Counters

    The problem with using counters to track visitors is they are set up to measure page views, not unique visitors. Every time someone views your page, whether it's the first time or the twentieth, that visitor is counted. And if the page times out for some reason and they "Reload," it counts them again. And if someone just wants to have fun with your counter, they can exit and enter the site several times and are counted as a visitor each time... even if they never look at product.

    So if you cannot count hits and you cannot use a counter, how do you track the traffic on your site?
     
    Install visitor tracking code on your website, such as Google Analytics (see link in Resources at the bottom).
     
    A web traffic analysis program will give you vital information about the traffic coming to your site, including where visitors are coming from, including which keywords they used, which search engines, what countries they are situated in, what paths your visitors are taking whilst on the website and which pages are the main exit points of your site... In fact it is full of all sorts of information... and for Google Analytics it is free.
     
    This information is private and only available to you, the account owner. It is best to install the tracking code as soon as possible to start building history. If you are using Google Adwords (you pay to advertise your website) or Google Adsense (you place advertising on your website for profit) then you may already have access to Google Analytics.
     
    How do I find out how many visitors a website gets if I am not the owner?
     
    There are many cases where you may not be the website owner, but want to find out how well another website performs. However, since you do not own the site then you will not be able to see the full-blown traffic stats displayed by Google Analytics. Now it is time to do some investigation...
     
    You may be curious about how much traffic any website generates, or you want to find out how well your competitor's website is performing.

    Alexa is the top web information authority which is also free (see link in Resources at the bottom). Search for a website address and see how a website ranks compared to all other websites in the world. 

    You can search for any website address that you are interested in finding its traffic rank. Alexa also provides other neat graphs and handy info. Although it does not show you the exact number of visitors, you can get a general idea of the website's performance. By comparing the traffic rank of your website to your competitor's website, you can estimate who gets more traffic. For example, YouTube.com ranks higher than Weather.com. Please note, although this is another great tools to use they are sometimes a bit behind with keywords and the amount of links, linked in.
     
    THE BIKER GUIDE summing up...
     
    We hope this article will help understand the difference between hits and visitors and hopefully to help you choose wisely where you place any advertising or your business on the World Wide Web!
     
    If you would like any further advise of hits, visitors and anything else included in this information, do not hesitate to ask.
     
    If you already knew all of the above, please accept our apologies and welcoming you to our world of seo geekness!

    Resources

    THE BIKER GUIDE
     
    Bringing the Biker Community together!
     
    www.thebikerguide.co.uk
     
     PS: Did you know when someone is quoting a site ranking of 1 that is 1 out of 10!

  5. Winners of the competitions we ran @ The Manchester Bike Show 2012 announced

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    The winners of the competitions we ran @ The Manchester Bike Show 2012, were as follows...   For the two night stay for two @ The Royal Agricultural College in the heart of the Cotswolds, the winner was Fiona Jones.   For the sets of tickets to attend Stormin' the Castle 2012, the winners were Sheena Groom, Dave Devlin and Bob Allaway.

    For the set of tickets to attend Rally in a Chalet 2013, the winner was Jennifer Hughes.

    Many thanks to all who entered, all who passed by our stand and well done to the winners...