All too often businesses get their new websites designed and then forget about them and expect them to do the rest. Business people sometimes assume that if a website doesn’t take off, that the web designer hasn’t done his job correctly, that may be true in some cases, but for a website to really excel it needs to be treated like a high maintenance girlfriend. Here is my list of the top 5 things you can do to set your website on fire and make it really take off. Read the rest of this entry »
For several years I have experimented with various web publishing platforms to varying degrees of satisfaction. The ultimate, in my opinion, has to have several important elements. Read the rest of this entry »
Who was it that said “if you build it they will come” because it’s not true online. How many websites have failed because the person assumed that visitors would just magically appear, I met with a business person recently who had spent many thousands of dollars on an eCommerce website that had, over the course of many months, sold nothing at all. Building a website without search engine optimization is like putting a retail store at the end of a dark alley and then Read the rest of this entry »
The task of keeping a website’s content fresh and up-to-date can be a daunting one, yet it’s of utmost importance to the success of that website. Adding a Content Management System (CMS) to your website makes updating content a snap, but until recently these were very expensive to implement. The cost of implementing a CMS is much lower today than it was a few years ago for a couple of reason Read the rest of this entry »
I’ll let you in on a little secret of web design, search engine optimization does not necessarily produce a successful website, better expressed as SEO ≠ $. While it’s true that search engine optimization (SEO) is very important to a website’s success it is by no means the only element of it’s success.
The goals of individual websites may differ quite a bit, for one the goal may be to get a visitor to buy a product, while another may be to get a visitor to call, or fill out a form to request further information. Whatever the end goal is, reaching that objective is called a conversion Read the rest of this entry »
It is often said that a year in real time equals anywhere from 4 to 12 years in “web time”, meaning that time moves much faster online than off. It is true that the content of your website can become outdated before you’re done writing it. It is always surprising how many businesses are content to put their web site online and then just forget about it, as if the site could take care of itself from there on out. Although keeping a website current does not need to be a daily or even a weekly activity, it is very importance to its success.
Many people are unhappy with their websites because they have had so little return on their investment, no wonder so many businesses invest as little as possible in their web sites. The problem is not the limited profitability of the internet, the problem is incompetent or disreputable web designers, either do-it-yourself web designers, the high school kid down the street, graphic artists who have a limited understanding of technology or fly-by-night web design firms who could care less how successful your website is after they develop it. The internet is complicated and to achieve a truly successful, profitable website requires someone with a comprehensive understanding of web business and promotion.
The web offers infinite possibilities for expanding and marketing your business, yet it is often viewed as having two possibilities, e-commerce and as a brochure, probably because these are the most common, but they are not even scratching the surface of what is possible. Let’s face it, there are quite possibly millions of sites out there offering the same or similar services as your business, how will you stand out from the crowd? The successful web site need not be extravagant, you just need to spend some time thinking about what your clients needs are, and how you can meet those needs online. Often the failure to provide useful web services is caused by a poor understanding of the potential of the web and what others are doing with it.
