By Brody Dorland — June 15th, 2009
 As a website developer, I am regularly talking with B2B clients about the various bells and whistles available for their websites. One particular whistle, adding a search function, can be a very powerful tool for a website, but it often gets left on the cutting room floor when budgets are tight.
I do my best to explain the benefits of site search to clients, but in the heat of the moment, I inevitably forget to mention a few key selling points. Here’s a more thorough explanation with examples that should help you see that having a site search is really a no brainer.
The 6 Reasons Why Your Website Needs a Search Function
- Without a search function, some people might just leave – Countless usability studies have found that more than half of all website visitors are “search dominant”, so you run the risk of losing visitors right away if they can’t search.
- People are lazy – Search engines have taught us to search. If visitors see a search box on your site, most will go straight to it rather than having to use their brain and traverse your navigation bar. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: analytics, B2B, customer, development, function, inexpensive, intent, marketing, search, site search, strategy, usability, website
Posted in Website Design / Development, Website Strategy | 5 Comments »
By Brody Dorland — April 14th, 2009
 What’s a HiPPO you ask?
Coined by Google Analytic guru Avinash Kaushik
Have you ever been given the responsibility of designing/developing a new marketing piece (website, brochure, etc.) only to have your design or content ideas trampled by an upper-level executive who really has no clue? That’s a HiPPO, the Highest Paid Person’s Opinion.
As a website developer, I tend to run into HiPPOs a lot. And unfortunately, there are a lot of bad websites out there that have been designed based solely on the siloed, subjective opinions of upper-level management. I know the same can be said for logo and print designs as well. Ask any graphic designer and I’d bet they have a slew of designs that their clients “should have chosen”…But I digress.
Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: brody dorland, content, design, development, graphic, highest paid persons opinion, hippos, Something Creative, web
Posted in Marketing Strategy, Website Design / Development, Website Strategy, search marketing | 1 Comment »
By Brody Dorland — July 1st, 2008
 Last week a sales rep from a local printing company walked in to my office to pimp his company’s “superior” printing services. I gave him a few minutes and he proceeded to give me his pitch, walk me through his large list of printing capabilities, and show me a smattering of past print jobs that included an impressive mix of brochures, folders and binders with fancy die cuts, foil stamping and intricate embossing.
His sales presentation was actually very good and I imagine that he does a great job of new business development for his company. As I walked him out the door, he handed me his card and some cool branded notepads and I told him that I’d keep him in mind on future print jobs.
Upon sitting back down at my computer, I grabbed his card and typed in their website address. This is where things went down hill.
The Not-So-Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Now let me preface this by saying that I’m a marketing consultant/website developer by trade. So my critical eye for proper website design and usability is a bit more sensitive than the next guy. But wow, this company’s website was REALLY bad. Their design looked remedial, severely dated and unorganized. Their logo looked completely different than the logo on their business card and notepads. The content was poorly written. There were very few images of printing samples. And upon scanning their printing capabilities page, several of the services that the sales person had mentioned were nowhere to be found.
I threw his card in the circular file (the trash). I kept the notepads.
This situation serves as a good example of the vital role that a website plays in your company’s overall sales and marketing strategies. It is critical that your website convey a consistent brand image, perceived value and sales message for those soft-selling opportunities that happen when you’re not present.
A Quick Test for Your Website
- Can a website visitor get a thorough understanding of your bread-and-butter product/service and reach your contact info page in two clicks or less?
- Is your website design and content consistent with the quality of your company and its products/services?
- If you looked at your website and sales materials/brochures side by side, are they conveying a consistent brand image?
- If your salesperson were to read aloud your website’s content word-for-word during a sales call, would they close the sale?
I could go on, but hopefully you get the point. If you answered “NO” to any of the questions above, your website probably needs some work.
A Marketing Strategy Lesson
Back to the printing company with the horrid website. Let’s say they’ve come to their senses and hired me to revamp their website. In our initial meeting, I would do a quick audit to learn about the different strategies and tactics they use to develop new business. Next, I would find that they execute a nice mix of advertising, sales and local tradeshows, and since they are a printer, they have very nice brochures. They even do educational sessions on the latest printing techniques through their local Chamber of Commerce.
When I ask about their website, they say, “It’s a low priority and we’ve always worried about the cost.”
With so many opportunities to utilize the online tools to market your business and sell your wares, it’s a shame that so many companies view the web as their last priority. And some don’t even realize the amount of clients and dollars that are going to their competitors who have made an appropriate investment.
5 Ways to Get Your Website on the Same Page
- Perceived Value – First impressions are everything. In the first few seconds of a site visit, your website’s design quality and content layout is subliminally communicating your company’s value to the visitor. If your site’s design quality is poor or unorganized, your company will be perceived as poor quality and unorganized, and thus, the visitor bounces.
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How to Get On the Same Page: Work with a professional website designer who can help you design your site’s look and feel to match (or exceed) the quality of your company, products and services.
- Brand Consistency – Your company’s brand is what people think of you. And whether people notice a magazine ad, see your booth at a tradeshow or find your website, it’s vital that you present a clear and consistent sense of who you are at every customer touch point.
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How to Get On the Same Page: Everything you put in front of a customer needs to look and sound consistent. This means every ad, every brochure, your website, corporate identity elements, etc. An integrated campaign works wonders when designed professionally by a single designer or agency.
- Message/Content Quality – I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…content is king. Keeping your website updated with fresh, high-quality, informative content positions you as an expert in your field. And people want to do business with experts.
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How to Get On the Same Page: Hiring a professional content developer/copywriter is a great way to ensure that your message is delivered in a high-quality fashion, and with a consistent voice. Have the copywriter sit down with your salespeople to discuss the most effective messaging to help convert your visitors into buyers.
- Self Promotion: Be Your Own Cheerleader – If you’re not promoting your latest happenings (new product/service offerings, company news, upcoming educational sessions, tradeshows, etc.), no one else is going to. But don’t get caught with a site that is difficult or costly to update. Nothing screams “dinosaur” like seeing a news page where the last news item was from two years ago.How to Get On The Same Page: If your salespeople are out there telling customers about a new product or an upcoming educational session, your website should be doing the same. Frequent site updates tell customers that you are an active company that is on the move, as well as providing new content that serves as food for search engine spiders.
- Track Your ROI – It baffles me that companies will spend thousands of dollars each year on marketing tactics that make tracking your return very difficult (a.k.a. advertising, direct mail, brochures, etc.), but they won’t spend a few thousand dollars to build a decent website with an analytics program that practically gives you a two-way mirror to watch your prospect’s browsing behavior.How to Get On the Same Page: Website analytics, and even e-mail marketing, now offers great, inexpensive tools for customer research and ROI tracking that not only help you calculate ROI, but also help you hone your marketing strategies towards the content/messaging, products and services that bring home the bacon.
The Bottom Line
How many clients has that printing company lost over the years because of their poor, neglected website? Who knows? The bottom line is: they lost my business, and as a marketing consultant, the amount of stuff that my clients print alone could probably pay for a website in a matter of years.
Tags: brand image, business card, logo, marketing consultant, Marketing Strategy, message, notepads, opportunities, perceived value, sales, soft-selling, usability, website, website design, website developer
Posted in Marketing Strategy, Website Design / Development, Website Strategy | No Comments »
By Brody Dorland — June 1st, 2008
 Recently I was approached by a friend to provide an estimate on a new website for his company. During our initial discussions, we talked about his company’s strategic goals, their audiences and the markets in which they serve. Also during our discussion, he mentioned the fact that his boss, the owner of the company, was not necessarily sold on the need to invest much money on the website since referrals are really their primary focus for generating new business.
As the owner of a referral-based small business myself, I certainly understand the notion that making a significant investment in something that may not bring a return might not be a smart move. But as a website developer, I have also seen first hand how a solid website can be the soft-selling opportunity that gives prospects the confidence to pick up the phone and call you.
Sales & Marketing Are a Lot Like Dating
I find it funny how sales and marketing can be a lot like dating. As a confident guy, you feel like you have a lot to offer a girl and most of the time, when in social situations, you can get her digits, which may or may not lead to something. But she hears good things about you from her friends, so she decides to take the next step and try out your goods (bare with me here people).
But what happens when a nice girl, who has just moved into the area and doesn’t know a lot of people, starts her search on the web? She’s busy with her new job and doesn’t really make it out to the social scene. Other than the web, she really has no way of knowing you exist and might just be her soul mate.
So she starts her search and finds a lot to choose from. There are big guys, little guys, and cute guys with lots of flash, but not much substance. She’s determined to find the right guy that “completes her”, but since you didn’t make a proper investment in your website, this match made in heaven may never happen.
There are a few key points within this analogy that I’d like to drive home…
- You Can’t Be Everywhere at Once – While your personal networking efforts may always be your number one new business generator, you can’t be everywhere at once. Business growth really starts ramping up when you can duplicate your presence (your brand and your message) in many different, targeted mediums.
- Search Engine Optimization/Internet Marketing – The internet is the first place people go to source products and services. And search engines are the driver. Period. In order to capitalize on these buying opportunities, search engine optimization and internet marketing strategies should play an ever-increasing role in your marketing efforts.
- Perceived Value – First impressions are everything. If your site’s design and organization are subpar, your company will be perceived as the same, subpar. A proper investment in your website design and website architecture will go along way in raising the perceived value of your company.
- Content Expectations – Every time a new visitor stumbles onto your website, they are looking for something, and they expect to find it. If they don’t, they move on. A solid website is one that has been carefully engineered to quickly provide the content that your target customers will need to make a buying decision. And the most effective content is professionally written and delivered as if you were providing it in person.
All Alone on a Saturday Night
Bottom line, it doesn’t necessarily take a big investment to build a solid website that can be found on search engines. The key here is to make an appropriate investment to build a site that can help you reach your goals for business growth. Not investing enough may leave you sitting at home alone on a Saturday night waiting for the phone to ring.
Tags: brody dorland, internet marketing, marketing, networking, new business generator, perceived value, referral based business, sales, Search Engine Optimization, search engines, small business, soft selling opportunity, Something Creative, strategic goals, target markets, website, website architecture, website content, website design, website developer, website investment
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By Brody Dorland — March 1st, 2008
 In today’s business environment, every company needs a website. And if you’re a small business with a limited budget, a low-cost solution may be tempting. But what if your website was a real-life salesperson? Would your lack of investment in them set them up for failure?
I’m forced to use this analogy more than I would like these days. While I can’t do anything about the people/companies that offer so-called high-quality website development services for dirt cheap, I can try to help small businesses understand why you need to make an appropriate investment in your 24/7 sales workhorse.
You Get What You Pay For
Developing a high-quality website from scratch takes most, if not all, of the items listed below. Completing these items is time consuming and takes a lot of creative and technical talent. So how do the cheap service providers charge so little? Simple. They don’t offer many of these services…
Website Strategy – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Like any successful marketing initiative, proper research and planning need to be the first step. Getting website marketing experts involved early on will give you an outside perspective and help you profile your audiences, define their needs and adapt your corporate growth strategies to the web.
Content Strategy – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Once you have a good handle on what your customers need, your content needs to feed those needs and keep them coming back for more. A content strategy helps to keep your content fresh and establish internal or external processes for ongoing content development and website promotions.
Information Architecture – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Website users can quickly feel lost if placed within a space that is not well organized. Information architecture focuses on usability and designing an effective site organization, navigation and nomenclature, all of which are best handled by professionals.
Custom Design – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? Kind of.
Do you consider customizing a pre-designed template as “custom design”? I almost can’t wait to be contacted by a company that was told their site was “custom”, only to come across another site that looks suspiciously similar.
Website Production Standards & Compliance – Included in Low Budget Solution? Probably.
I’d bet that a large majority of the cheap service providers out there are actually programmers (not marketers), so your website will probably meet compliance and compatibility standards.
Professional Content Development – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
You can dress up an attractive salesperson in a custom tailored suit, but if his sales pitch stinks, he’s not going to convert prospects into buyers. Heck, he probably won’t even make it past the receptionist. Writing engaging copy for websites is an art and a science and getting a professional website copywriter involved is a very wise investment.
Content Management Tools – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Many low-cost providers don’t provide content management options because they are banking on the recurring revenue your website will provide.
Search Engine Optimization – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? Kind of.
Ask any professional search engine marketer about submitting your site to search engines and optimizing your site’s Title and Meta tags and they’ll tell you that those techniques are important. But if you ask them, “Will this get me to #1 on Google?” They’ll probably laugh at you. These few techniques are all you’re going to get out of cheap website service providers.
Website Analytics Integration – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Since many low-cost providers are also programmers who are probably running their own servers, they will probably include some basic traffic statistics for your site. But this is only the tip of the iceberg when you integrate free tools like Google Analytics into your site that will provide so much more user behavioral analysis and conversion tracking.
Internet Marketing – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
With so many internet marketing tools at our fingertips, developing and launching your website is only the beginning. Now it’s time to go fishing.
Conclusion
A small business need to think of their website as a salesperson. A salesperson with vast potential. When you provide that salesperson with proper training (website and content strategy), a sharp business suit (great design), an engaging sales pitch (great content) and great connections to a huge network of potential customers (SEO and internet marketing), you may be surprised at how quickly your investment is returned, and then some.
Tags: analytics, CMS, compliance, content, content development, content management systems, custom, development, high quality, information architecture, internet, limited budget, low cost, marketing, salesperson, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, small business, strategy, website
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You’ve even read articles (here) about why you should have a blog. And these articles make sense and spell out the benefits that a blog can provide in terms of helping you market yourself on the web. But how do you get started? If you’re ready to pull the trigger, what are the things you need to consider so that your blog is not set up for failure?
