(Updated 1\/2022)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today we\u2019re talking about designing a new website. For many people, this means hiring an actual web designer<\/a>. Someone that will help them to decide how their website is going to look. They\u2019ll go through the process and create multiple color schemes and layouts. They\u2019ll debate about the right shade of blue, and explore all the different font styles, sizes, and weights that are presented. There will be discussions about whether they need headshots and bios for everyone in the company. And there will certainly be discussions about whether the most important information on the homepage is \u201cabove the fold\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is how it\u2019s done. Right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wrong.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Developing an effective website involves many specific elements that are intimately dictated by the business, their goals, their brand, as well as many external factors such as the industry, their niche, their region, and on and on. How you create a great website also needs to be closely aligned with your overall digital marketing<\/a> strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We have many potential clients that have come to use in the past and they request a design \u201cspec\u201d. It\u2019s been a while since this has happened, but essentially they ask us to prove our \u201cdesign chops\u201d and work through a concept of how their site is going to look before they hire us. For me, this is akin to asking a mechanical engineer to properly design an airplane and deliver a safe and effective prototype before they\u2019re hired to do the job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another way this happens from time to time is that the client sends us an RFP (Request for proposal) that contains some information about their needs and goals. It\u2019s basically what they think<\/em> they want and need, and we just need to put a price to it and a timeline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Responding to an RFP is hard enough. But there is even one more approach, and it\u2019s the most common. Many people try to engage us just by asking \u201chow much is a new website\u201d and \u201chow long will it take\u201d? <\/p>\n\n\n\n Responding to these requests is difficult and it’s always a hurdle to working with a company. People do tend to move on to other companies that are willing to engage in this way and we lose the opportunity to move forward on the project. But we\u2019re \u201cok\u201d with this. why? It\u2019s because when someone asks you how much and how long, the honest truth is that we\u2019re just stabbing in the dark. If we were a mechanical engineer that\u2019s designing a plane, we would have no idea how big of a plane, how fast you need it to go, how high it needs to fly, and how to ultimately make it safe to carry passengers and cargo to their destinations. Does it even carry cargo? Hopefully, you get my point.At best, we\u2019re not going to be able to do the best work possible and deliver what the client really needs. Worst case, the client will be disappointed, confused and many times, angry because we were not aligned with what they expected and were unable to deliver it on a random timeline. At least nobody is going to die if the website is a failure I guess, right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve been doing this for a long time now. I coded and uploaded my first page to the internet in 1996, and there is one thing that I\u2019ve been forced to admit. You can\u2019t build an amazing website without a detailed strategy, a comprehensive plan, and specifically defined goals. ALL of this can\u2019t be guesswork. It\u2019s impossible to estimate properly. Doing so is a recipe for disaster, for both sides, 99% of the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve found that the only possible answer is to actually engage the potential client with a \u201cDiscovery\u201d project. In this project, we\u2019ll do all the necessary work to really understand the needs and goals of the client, and we get paid for our expertise and time. Many times the client isn\u2019t even sure what<\/em> they need and we\u2019re able to use our experience to guide them down the right path. Getting paid for our time ensures that we don’t cut corners and guess. In short, we do it right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They will not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When building a new website, we need to understand how to get people there, and then, what we need them to do when they get there. Ultimately, we need a specific plan around how to get them to do it. We need to understand what it means to turn a visitor, into a customer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And at the end of the day, based on what has to be delivered, we\u2019ll provide a firm timeline that we can commit to and that the client is happy with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All of these things cannot be guessed at or estimated. If we\u2019re unable to uncover and intimately understand all of these requirements, the project is generally destined for mediocrity or even failure. But when we\u2019re allowed to go through the process of discovery to research, plan, strategize and put a plan together, the client can walk away with a nice little bundle of value that they can take to any company to quote. Or they can simply decide to move forward with us on the project and feel good that the project is based on a solid plan that ensures that everyone is on the same page.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So if you\u2019re still with me, let’s take a few minutes and dive specifically into one of the major things that many people tend to skip when they\u2019re developing a new website, and that is the strategy that gets people to the website and turns them into an actual customer. Don\u2019t worry, we\u2019ll talk about design<\/em> soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To simplify it down, here are the 3 main questions you should explore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These questions may be broken up into many secondary questions, studies, and a handful of outcomes. Understanding the industry, niche and competition are important. We also want to understand the target audience. For example, it might be the actual business owner that you want to sell to. Maybe it\u2019s a manager or supervisor that makes the decision? Is the business local, national or worldwide? There are many more questions that help you to uncover your target audience. This is called your buyer persona. It\u2019s your ideal customer, and this is just one of the things we need to explore and understand from the beginning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once the first question is answered, you have to ask yourself how they\u2019ll find your website? Remember, the last thing you want to do is say \u201cif we build it, they will come.\u201d These days, the internet is vast, the competition is great, and if your master plan is to just build a new website and “put it out there”, you\u2019re bound to be disappointed. You should ask yourself from the beginning, what is your strategy to position yourself in front of as many potential customers as possible? What is your available budget? What does your budget need<\/em> to be to actually compete? Will you be making an ongoing investment in SEO to rank organically in the search engines? For what keywords? Will you use paid advertising campaigns? Again, do you have a realistic budget for this? Will it be niche advertising on industry sites? How does email marketing figure in? How does social media<\/a> figure in? Does it figure in at all for your type of business? There are many questions to be answered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Next, after you successfully drive traffic, what happens when they get to your site? How does your website convert visitors to clients or customers? Do you want them to call? Email? Subscribe in some way? What can you do on the site to convince them to connect with you or engage? Do you have any incentives? How can you remove hurdles and make it super easy? What if it takes a while to gain someone\u2019s trust because what you sell isn’t a small investment? How do you connect with them to start this process and continually engage and educate them? These are the things that will turn a passive web presence into a living, breathing, revenue-producing component of your business. While the design is important at many levels, a successful website starts with strategy and the strategy drives the design. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At the end of the day, I\u2019m hoping that you can see why asking a professional to \u201cguess\u201d at a cost and a timeline is a recipe for failure. There is so much important work to be done upfront to make a new website successful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, what do I know about being an \u201cexpert\u201d in your industry. Sometimes, nothing… and that’s “ok”.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Are we experts? Yes, in marketing most types of business online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many times I get this question “what do you know about my product, services, industry or niche?” We face this question from potential clients when they ask us if we\u2019ve done work within their industry. While direct work within a particular industry can be helpful, we find that an objective approach to a website and strategy serves our clients well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Honestly, every business is different in subtle ways. It might be the way you want to position your company in the market or a certain set of values that you want to communicate. You might focus on a specific service or have a certain strength that your competition does not. You might even be JUST like your competition in every way, but the way to succeed is doing everything you can to differentiate yourself and stand out as the right choice among many.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This, is where an outsider can be an asset.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our job is to find relevant, targeted visitors and convert them into paying customers and clients. We can do that successfully in ANY industry with the correct research and a unique strategy. Our job is to help you to be found and stand out. Not to prescribe a cookie-cutter approach that everyone else is using. We are not experts in any particular industry except for marketing, and THAT’S why a unique strategy will make you successful on the web and make your website work for your unique business. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I do just want to take a moment here… it may sound like I\u2019m trying to sell<\/em> you on working with me and my company. That is not my goal here. What I\u2019m trying to do is sell<\/em> you on the simple idea that a great website is much more than the look-and-feel, and colors that you choose. It’s about having the right team of people come together to create something great that works FOR you while you sleep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trying to seek out a company with experience in your industry is going to be tough, so what you should be doing is trying to find a company that wants to talk about developing a unique strategy WITH YOU and learning how to best connect with the right target audience..<\/p>\n\n\n\n In my experience, a company that \u201cspecializes\u201d in developing a website within a certain industry doesn\u2019t mean much more than they\u2019ve found a niche that they can exploit in many cookie-cutter ways. Give them a try and I\u2019ll bet that they start talking about their \u201cproducts\u201d, \u201cthe template\u201d, \u201cthe tools you have to update your site\u201d, \u201cwhat package size you\u2019re purchasing\u201d and \u201cyour contract length\u201d before they start talking about a unique strategy that actually creates lasting revenue for your business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lastly, familiarity can actually breed a skewed perspective\u2026 or more to the point, familiarity breeds jargon. In the world of search marketing, it\u2019s imperative to let the audience drive the language. Too often our clients are very entrenched in their industry\u2014so much so, that the resulting language is far different from that of the actual customer that\u2019s searching for what they do online. This may seem counterintuitive, but this is a common reason why many companies find their websites of little use to anyone outside of their company. That\u2019s where an outside marketing partner can actually help because they’re able to step outside of the industry and look in to see how they can help you reach your ideal customers in real, tangible, measurable ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So we\u2019ve talked a lot about strategy and planning and goals, and all the rest. But let’s briefly go back to the beginning where things usually begin, and that is, you want to design<\/em> a new website, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Design is critically important to the success of your site. This is often referred to as UX and UI design, that is, user experience and user interface design. Both disciplines work together and are guided by your strategy and goals. Essentially we want to create an enjoyable, seamless, successful experience for visitors that interact with all aspects of your business online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Everything we do on a site; from the graphics, to the structure and navigation, the words that we use, the position of text and elements on the page, the color selection, the fonts and the subtle voice of the messaging is based on the initial project goals, conversations with our clients and the research that we conduct during the initial phase of web development<\/a>. All of this will drive your design and help to answer the three questions that we mentioned previously and speak to your target audience \u2014 your ideal client.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The research and strategy guides the design of the information architecture. How do people know at a glance what you do, what services you offer and and what exactly do you call them? How do you make it easy for them to find what they need? What links to what, what is top-level, what is sub-navigation, what is the primary site conversion path, what areas are both hierarchically and contextually linked, etc. This research even dictates what shows up on the home page and how we guide people through your site and tell your unique story throughout.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSo what\u2019s the answer? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Developing a website marketing strategy<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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How does strategy affect the look-and-feel, and the success of the website?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n