In a previous article (7 Keys to Getting the Website You Need), we discussed the value of planning your website before you begin development.

So you've done your planning and chosen your Web Designer. You're all set, right?

Well, maybe not. In this article we'll cover some approaches you can adopt that will help ensure a smooth development and successful implementation.

Use Milestones To Track Progress

For any sizable development, you should ask your Web Designer to provide a set of milestones. For many designers, providing milestones is standard practice.

Use the milestones to track how the development is going. But remember:

• Milestones are just estimates. The schedule can change for a number of valid reasons.
• Some milestones will depend on input from you, so you can affect whether they are met (see below).

Keep Momentum High

If you'd like your website design to move as quickly as possible, then you need to keep up the project momentum.

In most design projects, you'll need to make a number of decision. Respond as quickly as possible. Nothing bogs down a design project faster than a client who takes forever to respond. One good approach is to clearly identify the decision makers in advance, with agree on turnaround times for decisions.

You may also need to provide materials for use on the site (content, images, videos, etc.). If so, make sure you designate who's responsible to provide these and when they will be provided.

Know When You're Going Out of Scope

The scope of a project refers to the set of activities required to complete the project and the deliverables that designer has agreed to provide.

The estimate that you got from the designer assumed a certain project scope. For large project, the designer should have defined the project scope in the Project Proposal.

As the project progresses, you may think of additional items that need to be included. The designer will normally be flexible, but if the change in scope is significant enough it might result in a change in the project schedule and cost.

You need to realize when you're going out of scope and decide whether the additions are worth it.

Don't Be a "Back Seat Driver"

You're hiring the designer for their expertise. Let them do what they're good at.

You may think that you know just what the site should look like. This is seldom actually the case. There are a host of factors that go into a good website design, and the designer knows what they are.

That's not to say that your input will be ignored. A good designer will take your preferences into account.

But remember that many of the world's worst websites were developed by their owners, and look just the way they intended.

Pay On Time

This not only good ethics and a good business practice, but has important practical implications.

The initial website design is seldom the last thing that you'll want your designer to do. There will be updates, enhancements and other modifications.

If your designer knows that getting paid is a long, drawn-out process, they're not going to be anxious to take on follow-up projects.

Summary

To a great extent, a successful website design project depends on the same kinds of factors as a successful project of any kind. Have a plan, maintain momentum, avoid scope changes, let your experts do their job and pay them when they're done.

I hope that this has been useful. What do you think?

In a previous article (Hosted vs. Custom eCommerce: Your First Big Decision), I discussed factors to take into account when deciding whether to have your own eCommerce host or to use a hosted service.

To recap, if you choose a hosted service then your online store runs on their host. One big advantage is that they take care of the hardware and software. One potential disadvantage is that you're limited to the features they provide.

This article provides some additional factors you should consider if you decide to use such a hosted service.

Evaluate Reference Sites

The hosted service provider should be able to provide a list of sites that use their service. Make sure that you're looking at real production sites, not just "demo" sites.

Look at the visual design. Do they all look the same? If so, then that provider's software may not allow much customization. Whether that matters or not is, of course, up to you.

Explore the reference sites. Do they provide the kinds of features we've discussed in previous articles? Is the way the software operates sufficient for your needs?

Evaluate Features and Costs

Once you've found a few providers who seem to be able to support suitable online stores, it's time to start digging into their documentation.

• What's included and what's extra-cost? Different services have different philosophies about how to charge for features. Check the list carefully, so you know what it's really going to cost you if you decide to use them.
• What are the setup costs? Do they charge for setup? If so, what is included? If they claim "free setup", make sure you understand whether it covers everything you'll need.
• What marketing features are included? It's quite likely that you'll want to have featured products on your home page. Do they support that? What about sale items, and other promotions like free shipping? Social features such as reviews and "Email this page to a friend" buttons are becoming more and more important.
• How easy are the admin tools to use? Try them out. You're going to be spending a lot of time with the admin interface, so you want to be sure you're going to be able to work with it.
• Can you easily create static pages? Although most of the pages in your online store are going to be product pages of one sort or another, you're almost certainly going to want some other types of content. At a minimum, you'll want an About page and a Contact page. You may want additional pages for shipping policies, return policies, etc.

Evaluate Customer Service

Although you can't get a complete picture of the provider's customer service, you can get an idea.

First you should search online to see what people are saying about them. Evaluate the reviews carefully. For most providers, you'll find both glowing reviews (which might be "sponsored") and very negative views from people who might or might not have a justified complaint. By reading the reviews carefully, you can usually decide for yourself how much stock to put in them.

On good additional step is to call the provider and evaluate who you get. Do they seem professional?

Wrap Up

Although we covered the most critical factors in earlier articles, I hope that this has given you a few more pointers to help you make the best choice for your needs. Let me know your experiences.

You've decided that you need a website or website make-over (if you're in doubt, see Do You Really Need a Website?).

You've also decided that you need a web designer to help you (if you're unsure, see Do You Really Need a Web Designer?).

Maybe it's not clear to you how to go about picking a good web designer.

It's really not all that much different than picking any other contractor. You might not know a lot about the Web, but you know enough to make a good decision.

Let's go through some factors you should consider in making your pick.

Where Do You Find Them?

But before we get to the selection considerations, how do you get a list of candidates?

Some good approaches are:

• Get recommendations. You probably know other business people in your area who've had websites built for them. Ask who they used, and what they thought of them.
• Do a Web Search. Because of the nature of the business, a web designer had better have a good Web presence. Searching for designers in your area should yield quite a few names.
• Contact Your Chamber of Commerce. Your local Chamber of Commerce probably has a list of local web designers who are members.

Types of Web Designers

There are many skills needed to build a good website. Some of the more important are:

• Graphic design: Creating the "look" of your website.
• Website coding: Coding the underpinnings of your website so that it works as desired in all major browsers.
• Web development: Developing any behind-the-scene applications or scripts for special features.
• Internet marketing: Determining how best to market your product through digital media (websites, email, banner ads, etc.).
• Search Engine Marketing (SEM)/Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Maximizing how well your website performs with respect to online search.

Not everyone is expert in every area. Some common "packages" are:

• Website Designer. The generalist. Can design and code a website with reasonable regard for SEO.
• Website developer. Specialist in the development of custom web applications or modifications to standard packages.
• Graphic designer. Specialist in the way that the website looks (photos, drawings, design details. etc.)
• Internet marketing consultant. Expert in marketing products online.
• SEO consultant. Specialist in optimizing how well the website pages place for relevant search engine queries.

Think about which aspects of web design are most important for your business, then talk with prospective designers to see what their strengths and weaknesses are.

If you have a strong need for all of the specialties and have a lot of money to spend on your website, you might consider an agency that can provide multiple specialists.

Factors to Consider

Let's take a look at some of the more important factors that you should take into consideration when making your choice.

Can You Work With Them?

Building a website requires a lot of cooperation between you and your designer. The process is going to be a lot smoother if the two of you get along.

I recommend an in-person interview of anyone that you are considering having develop your website. This should give you an idea of whether the chemistry is there.

Should They Be Local?

Because of the nature of today's interconnected world, your web designer does not necessarily need to be located nearby. They could be hundreds (or thousands) of miles away and still get the job done.

Two aspects to think about when making this decision are:

• Determining the "fit": If the web designer is not local, you will need to determine whether you can work with them via a phone conversion or other means.
• Buying local: You need to decide how important it is to support your local designers. After all, don't you want locals to support you?

How Does Their Portfolio Look?

Take a look at the designer's portfolio (if they don't have one, that's a real danger sign). Actually click through to the sites. As you're doing so, think about the following:

• Do they look good? Not all of the sites will necessarily be to your taste (clients differ), but they should all look professional and well-designed.
• Do they all look the same? If the sites looks similar to one another, the designer may be modifying a "template" rather than designing each from scratch. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but the service should be priced accordingly.
• Do they load quickly? What's the performance of the sites? Sites that a sluggish can drive off prospective visitors and hurt your search engine rankings.
• Do they work with popular browsers? If you have access to multiple browsers, try them out on the sites. You want your site to work well regardless of what browser the visitor is using. Web sites that only work for one browser can be a real problem.

Find Out What Parts They Did Themselves

The fact that the designer has a site in their portfolio doesn't necessarily mean that they did everything. Make sure you know which aspects of the site the designer did themselves, then take that into consideration when evaluating the designer's skills.

Ask What They Know About Internet Marketing and SEO

At a minimum, your site needs to be designed with SEO in mind. Depending on how important search is to your business, Internet Marketing skills may also be important.

Time To Decide

As I said in the introduction, picking a web designer is not really that much different than picking any other consultant. I hope that the pointers I've provided here help you clarify exactly what you need to think about when choosing the designer for your project.

Let me know your experiences, and any other areas that you think are especially important.

In the post "What's Your Mobile Strategy", we went through a high-level overview of why having your website well-adapted for mobile is important.

This message was reinforced by a recent post by Harold Dediu, an analyst who follows the mobile market and keeps track of mobile trends.

In "When will smartphones become phones?", Harold reports that about 30% of US cellphone users (above age of 13) use smartphones, up from 21% at the same time last year.

If this trend continues (and there's no sign that it won't), we will soon find that the majority of our customers are using smartphones.

This adds an exclamation point to our earlier point that you really need to have a sensible strategy for supporting mobile users.

What's your strategy?

Photo via Flickr by James Fee

Sorry for the gap in posts. We've been moving our website from one hosting service to another, and didn't want to change anything while the move was underway.

The move is complete, so look for a new item soon.

It seems that, everywhere you look, you see people on cellphones, iPhones, iPads, Android phones and tablets, Blackberries and so forth.

Does it make you wonder: "Should my business be doing something in mobile"?

Good question. The short answer is: "Yes". But behind that simple answer is a host of complexities.

It will take a series of articles to explore the subject in depth. Let's start by seeing if we can answer the question: "How important is mobile for my business?".

Is It My Imagination, Or Is Mobile Popping Up Everywhere?

It's not your imagination. People have been using cellphones for a very long time, but the market has shifted dramatically.

The introduction of large-screen smartphones like the iPhone and the many Android models have fundamentally changed how people use their mobile devices. Experts who've studied the market say that on any one day 20% of Americans use the mobile web.

The iPad and similar Android-based tablets are taking mobile web access to an entirely new level, essentially providing the capabilities of a laptop PC in mobile form.

Many predict that mobile web access will overtake desktop web access within 5 years. Sooner or later, you're going to have to decide how to deal with it.

Cellphones. iPads. They're a Lot Different

You're right, they are a lot different. But from the standpoint of how to deal with them, we can identify two broad categories—tablets and smartphones.

Although there are still a lot of "feature phones" and "dumb phones", for the most part they are not going to be accessing your website (at least not in the U.S market).

Tablets

Perhaps the easiest category to deal with are tablets like the iPad. These have displays that are similar to low-end PC displays. For example, the iPad screen is 1024x768, while the Motorola Xoom screen is 1280x800.

These devices can handle standard websites, although planning for such devices can improve the user experience significantly.

Clean, uncluttered website design has always been a good idea. These types of devices make that approach even more important. Because the user's "window" is limited, cluttered web pages tend to be confusing and are apt to drive visitors away.

Smartphones

What is a smartphone? There is no standard industry definition. For our purposes, we'll define smartphones as cellphones with reasonable displays and general-purpose web browsers.

From the standpoint of the mobile web, the main difference between smartphones and tablets is the size of the screen. Smartphones screens typically fall in the range of 480x320 to 320x240, although there are outliers at each end of the spectrum.

Smartphones require more web customization than tablets. It's not enough to simply have a clean website design. For smartphones, you need to strip your web pages down to the essentials, both to make them usable in the smaller screen format as well as to minimize download time.

What About My Website?

There are several factors to look at when deciding how mobile will affect you.

What Business Are You In?

Certain types of businesses are likely to see a high volume of mobile users:

• Local businesses. People use their mobile devices to decide which businesses to patronize, for example which restaurant to eat at.
• On-demand services. Mobile devices are the logical choice for spur-of-the-moment activities, such as arranging for taxis.
• Emergency services. In an emergency, a regular telephone is often not available. Emergency services (e.g. towing) will see a high number of mobile visitors.
• Content driven sites. Users are increasingly getting their news and other content online (rather than printed form). As people become accustomed to accessing content throughout the day, doing so while on-the-go is increasingly common.

One area in particular that is projected to be important is online eCommerce. For example, the respected consulting firm Forrester predicts that the mobile eCommerce market will be $11 billion in 2015.

Again, the type of business you're in will determine how important this market is to you. For example, mobile eCommerce will be very important for impulse purchases, such as buying a tune being played in a public place.

Businesses selling larger, higher-priced items might not see a significant increase in mobile visitors, except...

The "Downtime" Factor

Although the type-of-business analysis in the previous section provides a good general guideline, there is one wildcard.

Suppose you're somewhere where you have "downtime" but don't have access to a desktop computer. Maybe you're at the airport, or waiting for your car to be serviced, or standing in line at the DMV.

Increasingly in such situations people will pull out their smartphone and try to get something done. In these situations, the sites they go to may be quite different than in the general mobile web scenarios.

For example, if you're in the market for a new refrigerator, your smartphone would probably not normally be the tool you would use to do your research. But if you're stuck at the airport, you may decide that you might as well use it for that purpose.

What Next?

As I said at the beginning, this article is only scratching the surface. We will have additional articles in the future to elaborate on many of the points summarized here.

You can help guide the direction of our articles. Let us know what areas interest you most.

In our series on eCommerce Demystified, we went through your eCommerce options in detail.

If you read that series, you might be wondering "Where do I start?". I'm glad you asked.

The first major decision you'll need to make is whether you're going to have a hosted store or a custom store.

Hosted? Custom? What Does That Mean?

A hosted online store is a service that you subscribe to for a monthly or annual fee. Your store runs on the service provider's hosts, and your options depend on the features of their software.

You've almost certainly run across hosted stores provided by Google and PayPal. There are other vendors who provide much more sophisticated hosted stores. You've probably purchased products from hosted stores, not realizing that those stores were not custom-made.

A custom online store is one that you have built for you by a web designer. The underlying software is usually based on a standard eCommerce package (for example Magento), but can then be customized to your heart's (and pocketbook's) desire. The store runs on your host or hosting service.

What's the Practical Difference?

The main areas of difference between the two options are:

• Custom eCommerce Features: With a hosted store, you choose from the features offered by your provider. With a custom store, you can have just about any feature you want. Some hosted store providers have lots of features, so this may not be relevant for you. But you need to think very carefully about your needs. If you set up a store with a hosted store vendor and find out later than they're missing a critical feature, then you'll need to start again from scratch.
• Subscription vs. One-Time Costs: If you hire a designer to develop a custom store, most of your costs are up-front (there may be a retainer fee for software updates). With a hosted service, you'll be paying a monthly (or annual) fee for as long as you have your store.
• Ownership: With a custom store, you own the design and data, and can move them wherever you want. For example, if you decide to change hosting services you can take your store with you. With a hosted service, you will probably be able to dump out your accumulated data, but otherwise you'll be starting from zero.

Other Things To Think About

Some important factors can't be as neatly summarized:

• DIY or not?: You'll need to decide whether you want to make the decisions on your own and do the work yourself, or whether you want to get an eCommerce expert to help you.
• Store design: With most hosted services, your store design is based on a standard template. Services differ as to how much customization they allow. Many eCommerce platforms also support templates. In either case, if you want a lot of customization you're going to need a designer. You have to make the tradeoff between design costs and the advantages of a unique design.
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO): For many online stores, doing well in search engine rankings is an important success factor. Hosted services and eCommerce platforms differ widely in the SEO options they offer. Check carefully before deciding.
• Internet marketing: Depending on what you're selling, it may be important to have your products submitted to the product comparison engines like Google Base, Yahoo! Shopping, etc. Some services and eCommerce platforms do this for you; some don't.

Now It's Up To You

There's no single right answer for everyone. You need to think through the advantages and disadvantages of each approach and decide what's best for you.

If you'd like help, contact us for a quote.

Photo Beaulieu_Hants via Flickr

The most effective approach to developing a great online store is to start with a feature-rich, extensible software platform and then add any enhancements you need.

The best platform for custom eCommerce available today is called Magento. Magento is Wine Country Web Design's preferred platform for custom eCommerce installations. I thought that it would be useful to explain exactly why we made that choice.

By the end of this article, you should have a good idea of whether a Magento-based online store is right for you.

Feature-Rich

It helps if your eCommerce platform already has most of the features you need. Magento fits the bill with a strong set of standard features. Here are some of the most important.

Product Catalog Features

The first thing that your visitors are going to want to do is find the product(s) they're looking for.

Magento offers lots of help.

• Flexible product display: Magento handles everything from stores with just a few products to those with tens of thousands. The basic organization is by product category. There can be multiple levels; for example, the top level could be the major categories, with subsequent levels going into more detail.
• Product search: customers can use product search to find a specific product or a set of products matching keywords.
• Faceted navigation: For even finer-grained product selection, Magento provides what is often called "faceted navigation" (see example above right). Customers can specify criteria and see only products that fit those criteria.
• Reviews: Product listings can show how reviewers have rated the product. Customers can read reviews by previous purchasers, as well as submit their own.
• Wishlists: Customers can add products to their wishlist, and then share the wishlist with others.
• Product comparisons: Customers can pick multiple products and have their features and prices show on a comparison grid.
• RSS feeds: Customers who are a little more tech-savvy might appreciate Magento's ability to provide RSS feeds. RSS is the same protocol used by blogs, and allows new information to be "pushed" out to the user rather than forcing the user to come look to see if something has changed. Examples of how RSS can be used in Magento are to get updates on order status (e.g. order has shipped), new products and promotions.

Marketing Features

Of course, as the owner of the store, you'll want to have lots of marketing options.

Magento has you covered there also.

• Custom landing pages: If you prefer, clicking on a category can display a custom landing page instead of a product listing (or along with a product listing). This allows you to fine-tune the marketing message for each product category.
• Coupons: You can create almost any type of promotion that you like (see "Fine-grained promotion management" below) and assign each a coupon code. Customers can then enter these coupons at checkout to take advantage of the promotion. For example, you might offer free shipping on the first order for customers who sign up for your mailing list.
• Upsells: Magento allows you to display "upsells" on the product page. These are items that you suggest your customers buy instead of the product they’re viewing. You might choose these based on your own considerations (for example, higher profit margin) as well as considerations like product quality or popularity.
• Related products: Related products also show up on the product page. They are often accessories purchased in conjunction with the product the customer is viewing. For example, if the customer is looking at a mobile phone, the related products might be a belt-clip, a hands-free earphone, etc.
• Cross-sells: Cross-sells show up when the customer looks at their shopping cart. They are based on the products the customer has in their cart, and give you one final chance to suggest additional purchases.
• Newsletters: Magento has a built-in email newsletter module. Customers can signup for your newsletter via a signup block on your store display. The Magento admin interface lets you manage your mailing list and send emails to them. Customers can manage their subscriptions, including unsubscribing.
• Polls: Similarly, Magento has a built-in module for simple polls. This module lets you create polls, display them on your store and compile the results.

Checkout Features

Checkout is the most critical stage of the online purchase, as it's the stage at which shopping cart abandonment is highest.

Magento has two features that are important for a successful online store:

• One-page and multi-page checkout: People seem to have strong feelings about whether a one-page checkout or multi-page checkout flow is better. I think that a one-page checkout is less cumbersome and increases conversions, but Magento lets you make your own choice.
• Guest checkout: Having to register before checkout scares off some customers. This may not be entirely rational, as they will need to provide most of the same information either way, but for some people registering is a commitment that they're reluctant to make. I think that it's best to allow shoppers to check out as a guest if they want, but again Magento lets you choose whether to allow guest checkout or not.

Admin Features

• Multiple websites and stores: A single Magento installation can support many websites or stores. For example, a business with multiple brands might choose to have a separate website for each brand. Or a business with a very large product catalog might divide up their product categories among several stores to simplify product administration.
• Fine-grained promotion management: Magento lets you define almost any type of promotion you want. Furthermore, it doesn't take a developer to define one. Promotions can be specific to a product (for example, sale prices) as shown below or based on the contents of the buyer's shopping cart (for example, "buy two sweaters, get one free" or "free shipping with $100 purchase").
• Data loading from spreadsheet: For situations where you need to load a lot of information, Magento's ability to load from a spreadsheet is very handy. Examples of typical uses are loading large product catalogs and loading zip-code-specific sales tax rates.
• RSS feeds: Store administrators can also take advantage of Magento's RSS "push" capability. For example, an administrator can use an RSS feed to be notified of new orders.
• Reports: Magento comes with a large number of pre-defined reports covering sales, products, customers, shopping carts (for example, abandoned carts), reviews and what shoppers have searched for.

Platform features

A few of Magento's useful features are visible primarily to those managing the operation of the store(s):

• Support for most common payment methods: Magento comes with built-in support for the most common payment methods used in the U.S. and U.K. These include credit card, check/money order, PayPal, Google Checkout and Authorize.net. In addition, extensions (see below) are readily available for just about any other payment method you might imagine.
• Design flexibility: Magento has a very flexible approach to specifying which features the customer sees, what pages those features appear on and where on the page they are placed. In addition, the look and feel of the site are defined in "themes" that are independent of the Magento software. This means that your designer can easily create or modify the design of your online store.
• SEO built-in: Complete treatment of eCommerce SEO would require a full article (or a book). Let's summarize by saying that Magento gives you a lot of control over the SEO parameters of your store's webpages. For example, you can specify the page "meta" information (title, description, keywords) for each product individually. You can also set up your store to use "Pretty URLs" that are more search-engine-friendly (and people-friendly). For example, instead of having the URL for a page be some meaningless string like:

  www.mystore.com/index.php?store=3&cat=7&subcat=42&id=126

  you could have a human-readable URL like:

  www.mystore.com/electronics/digital-cameras/8-megapixel/canon123

• Google Website Optimizer support: One of the keys to successful online marketing is testing to see which marketing messages, content, images, design, etc., are most effective. The preferred approach is "A/B testing", where you create two version of what you're testing (A and B) and randomly present them to site visitors. Once you have a statistically significant sample, you can get real data about which works better. Magento has built-in support for Google Website Optimizer, one of the most popular tools for A/B testing.

Extensibility

I hope that the previous section has convinced you that Magento has a lot of useful standard features. But no matter how extensive the standard features set, there will always be additional features people wish it had.

Magento has an excellent approach to adding features. The software architecture allows any number of "Extensions". An Extension can add functionality or modify standard functionality in almost any way you can imagine. Furthermore, the Magento software can usually be upgraded without affecting the installed extensions.

Magento has a "marketplace" for Magento Extensions called Magento Connect. Magento Connect has hundreds of free and commercial (not-free) Extensions.

In addition, web developers like Wine Country Web Design can develop custom extensions in cases where no appropriate Extension already exists.

Pricing

Magento has both a "Community Edition", which is free, and several commercial versions. You might think that the Community Edition, being free, would have limited functionality. In fact, all of the functionality I describe above is available in the Community Edition.

The commercial versions do have some additional functionality (primarily suitable for very large retailers), but the biggest difference is support. The company Magento provides no support for the Community Edition; all support needs to come from your developer or the online forum of Magento users and developers.

Common Objections

If you do an online search for Magento, you'll find articles faulting certain aspects of Magento. While Magento isn't perfect, I think it's the best option available right now, so I'll give my perspective on some of the most common objections:

• "Magento's admin interface is complex." It's certainly true that there's a lot to Magento's admin interface. The reason is fairly obvious: Magento has lots of features. The admin interface can be intimidating at first, but it's pretty well laid out and most administrators seem to learn their way around fairly quickly.
• "Magento's software architecture is too complicated." First, this is relevant only for web developers, since the administrators running the store and the customers never see the software architecture. Second, this is simply a matter of opinion. Magento is built using techniques that many developers consider current "best practices" for software architecture. Developers who are not up-to-speed on those techniques can find the learning curve steep.
• "Magento is slow (or requires premium hosting)." It may be true that a dirt-cheap hosting plan, designed to allow people to bring up their personal or home business websites, is not be the best hosting plan for a Magento online store. After all, Magento is a substantial, feature-rich platform, and does take a certain amount of computer power and memory to run. But Magento has a number of features designed to increase performance, and is not slow when properly set up.

Wrap-Up

I hope that you have found this overview of Magento useful.

As I said at the beginning, Magento is the preferred eCommerce platform for Wine Country Web Design. We have experience developing Magento stores and have developed a number of custom Magento Extensions.

Contact Us for your eCommerce needs.

Your website is beautiful. Your products/services are great. Your site has lots of useful information. And yet, no one is reading it. Visitors come to your site and leave almost immediately. What could the problem be?

Probably your content. Maybe you're boring. Maybe you talk too much about yourself. Maybe you aren't very convincing. Maybe your pages are too intimidating.

The good news is that you can quickly fix all that. Let's take a look as some of the key things you should keep in mind when you're creating web content.

Focus On the Customer

Visitors come to your website for a reason. They decide quickly whether you have what they need. If not, they're gone.

Your content needs to be built around what they want. If you're the equivalent of that party bore who only wants to talk about themselves, well...it's a lot easier to get away online.

A good way to plan your content is to come up with "target personas". A target persona is a fairly detailed description of a representative customer. For example:

A small independent contractor looking for a new supplier of widgets. Wants to be kept up-to-date on new widgets and requires fast turn-around on orders. Likes to be treated as a professional and not like a consumer.

Create as many target personas as you need. As you're developing your content, ask yourself "Which persona(s) am I writing this for?" and "Is what I'm saying appropriate for them?".

Be Compelling

When a potential customer lands on your website, you'd like them to take some specific action. Of course, ultimately you'd like them to buy something, but early in the sales cycle simple steps toward purchase can be just as significant (download a product datasheet, ask for a quote, etc.).

They aren't going to take the action you want without a compelling reason. One good approach is:

1. Grab their attention—this is usually done with a good page title.
2. Identify a need—Point out what they need and why it's important. This could be your product/service or simply information. Remember, they want to know "what's in it for me".
3. Solve the need—Show that the benefits your products or services provide satisfy their need.
4. Tell them what to do next—Don't assume that they will automatically know what to do. Have a clear "call to action" that asks them to do what you want.

Make Your Content Snack-sized

People have become used to content that is easily consumable. Faced with big blocks of text, they'll go somewhere else to find what they need.

Web visitors scan first, and only read if they see something that sounds interesting. Make your content scannable.

Break content up into chunks. Give each chunk a meaningful, interesting heading. Headings tell the scanning visitor what your content is about, and encourages them to read further.

Once you have their attention, don't waste it. Long, rambling introductions cause them to lose interest. Get to the point.

Finally, get rid of unnecessary text. Make your case concisely. Your visitors will be more likely to read the whole thing.

Be Believable

You know you're credible, but your visitors may not. You're trying to sell them something. Why should they believe you?

Provide reassurances. Explain why you're experts at what you do. Give reasons why they should trust you.

Don't make unsubstantiated statements. If you say you make "the world's best articulated widgets", then you'd better back that up with facts, reviews, testimonials and other material that substantiates your claim. If you come across as making a slick sales pitch, you'll probably lose the sale.

Edit Carefully

Poorly written content can destroy your credibility in an instant. Proofread what you write thoroughly before publishing.

Is the reading level appropriate? Your target personas can help here. Content you write for building contractors is probably going to be different from that for research scientists.

Watch out for industry jargon. The fact that you know what you're talking about doesn't necessarily mean your audience will also. Eliminate jargon if you can. If you can't, at least explain it.

Finally, you're not going to look professional if your content contains typos, spelling mistakes or grammatical errors.

Don't Forget About SEO

Although your content should be written for people, you should also keep Search Engine Optimization (SEO) in mind. After all, it's likely that many of your visitors will have used a search engine to find you.

Although you're not likely to become an SEO expert, keep a few simple concepts in mind as you write:

• Think about keywords—Where appropriate, include in your content keywords and key phrases that searchers will likely use to find businesses in your category. Just remember that you should use them only if they make sense in context. Don't try to simply stuff your content with keywords.
• Include internal contextual links—there's probably a lot of interrelated content on your site. Link between related pages. Make sure the text of the link (what the visitor sees) contains keywords for the target page. For example, a link that says something like "articulated blue widgets" is much better than "click here".
• Link out to authoritative sources—providing links to high-quality, relevant content elsewhere on the Web can actually help your SEO. Don't be afraid of having your visitors follow a link to another site. They'll be back.

Wrap Up and Next Steps

I hope that this article has given you ideas about how you could improve your web content.

If you don't think that you or your employees can adequately create and proof your content, consider hiring a professional copywriter. You might find that doing so has a great payback.

If this has helped you, let me know. If I forgot something important, let me know that too.

Photo Gare and Kitty via Flickr

You've decided that you need a new website. Great.

Would you like to do what you can to see that it meets your needs? Gets delivered on schedule and on budget? Doesn't waste a lot of your time?

Building a website is like most projects—up-front planning can pay huge dividends.

But you probably don't buy new websites very often, so you might not know how to approach it.

A good web designer will spend the time to understand your needs before starting the project. But you can help the process along by doing some thinking before you ever talk to a designer.

In this article we'll cover some of the most important areas you should think about. If you'd like more detail, see my Web Design Client Questionnaire.

1. Understand Why You're Doing It

Why do you want a website (or a website redesign)? Good reasons might be:

• Provide a way for people to get information about my products and services, my location, my business hours, etc.
• Sell online
• Generate calls/contacts
• Help customers have a better experience with my products and services.

The following are examples of not-so-good reasons:

• Everyone else has one (not helpful in deciding what kind of website you need)
• I expect it to double my sales (not necessarily realistic)
• XYZ Corp. has a great (whatever) on their website, and I want one just like it (focuses on a feature, rather than what will make the website successful)

Thinking this through carefully will not only guide your web designer, but will also help you clarify your own needs.

2. Focus On Your Customers

A key to website success is keeping your visitors' needs in mind:

• Who is your audience? What can you say about their demographics (age, gender, education, interests, etc.)? Are they likely to be located in a specific region? If you are selling to businesses, do your customers come from a specific industry or a specific company size?
• How are they going to find you? If someone who isn't familiar with your company does an online search in your space what words are they likely to search on?
• Why do they come to your site? For example, if most visitors are interested in your line of widgets, your website should make it really easy to get information about widgets.
• What do they want to do? The actions your visitors will take can have a big influence on how the site is organized.

3. Know What You Like (and Don't Like)

Style is a tricky aspect of web design. If your designer has no idea what styles appeal to you, then it may take lots of trial and error to come up with something acceptable. On the other hand, it's almost always a bad idea to say “I want a website just like XYZ Corp.” Your website will be more successful if it reflects your own style.

Think of a some websites that you like, and why you like them. If it's easier, think of some websites that you don't like. Either (or both) will give your designer some guidance.

Also, remember that your website will be more successful if its style fits the audience. For example, a website for middle-aged accountants would probably be a lot different than one oriented towards teenage girls.

4. Match Your Budget To the Project

This can be a tough, as you might not have a good idea of how much websites cost.

The short answer is that even a small, professionally-designed website is going to cost several thousand dollars. Big sites or sites with online stores cost more. Relatively minor changes to an existing website can cost less.

Can you get a website for less? Yes, if you're willing to make compromises. There are design outfits that will do a quick generic-looking website for a modest fee. For a review of the options, see "Do Your Really Need a Web Designer?".

5. Be Realistic About Schedule

For most website projects, the exact completion date is not critical. On the other hand, if there is some time constraint (for example, a product launch or grand opening), you need to make sure the designer knows this.

It doesn't usually pay to demand quick turnaround if you don't really need it. A good designer is often working on projects for multiple clients and won't want to take on new work if they aren't sure they can complete it on time. If you demand an unnecessarily short development time frame, they may simply tell you that they can't take the job.

If you're anxious to get your new website up and running, consider whether you need everything immediately. If you've got a tight schedule and can identify some features that are only "nice to have", consider splitting the website development project so you get what you really need sooner.

6. Think About Who's Going to Keep the Site Up-to-Date

How often is the content on your site going to change? When your site needs changes, do you want to call in the designer, or do you want to be able to make the changes yourself?

For certain types of content, it's almost mandatory that you be able to make the changes yourself. For example, if you have a blog, you or your staff are going to have to be able to publish new blog posts. The software used for your website (for example, WordPress) should be set up to allow this.

Another example is an online store. You're going to need to be able to update the products, handle orders, etc., yourself. Again, the software used for your online store should make it easy to do this.

What about general site content (home page, about page, descriptions of products and services, etc.)? It's possible to set up your website so that someone with little or no technical expertise can make basic changes to the content. If you think that this is what you want, make sure your designer knows in advance.

If you expect your site will require ongoing changes and you don't want to do them yourself, then you should probably arrange a maintenance arrangement with your designer.

7. Be Realistic

I've mentioned it already, but I can't stress enough how important it is to be realistic. Everyone would love to have a beautiful professional-looking website, loaded with features and available by the end of the week. For $100.

If you're realistic, you can get what you need, when you need it, for a fair price.

If you're unrealistic, you'll probably have a hard time getting a good designer to waste time on you.

What Next?

Let me know what you think. Did I help you evaluate your web design project?

Image from www.projectcartoon.com