Great Customer Service will always win the day
No matter what is going on in the world, people always will respond positively when they have a good customer service experience. When it comes to my business that comes in the form of responsiveness. When one of our clients requests a change to their website, we always respond the same day. Now, this seems like something everyone would do, but you would be shocked that some firms take weeks to respond to a request to simply make a small text change to a website. So no matter what is going on in the world, whether it’s a pandemic or good times, people will always respond to good service and will recommend you to their friends and colleagues. I know of what I speak, as I have been doing this since 1996 and we are still experiencing tremendous growth, even during the pandemic.
BS will never get you very far
We’ve all dealt with people who had a great line of bullsh*t, but in the end that’s all they offer, fast talk and nothing to back it up. I have never considered myself to be a great salesman, although I have a closing rate of around 98%. I don’t tell people things just because it’s what they want to hear. I would rather be honest and set proper expectations. That way people are happier in the long run versus someone who sells them a bill of goods and then doesn’t come through. This is true now more than ever before as people are very careful of who they will do business with. They need to feel comfortable and sure that you’re there to help them, and that your actions speak much louder than your words. Talk as they say is cheap!
Thinking long-term rather than short term
A lot of people get into business and have a short term plan as to how they will approach their business. This is almost always a mistake as you have to plan into the future and set goals to get there. This has always been the case and it will not change due to the pandemic or any other disaster which may confront you. In fact, long-term planning is more important than ever. Now you need to plan for a possible re-occurrence of a horrible virus. That way you can survive, and even flourish in the event of another pandemic. Listen, no one thought this would ever happen, as we haven’t had a pandemic like this since the Spanish flu. Now that it has happened we need to be ready, and the best way to do that is the plan for any eventuality.
Substance over Style
We run into a lot of companies who are pushing very glossy solutions. But most of the time they’re missing out on the true mission of the company they are working for. That is to explore what problems we are solving for them. Taking my business as an example, anyone that looks at our portfolio will see that our sites are all easy to navigate, pleasing to look at and accomplish our clients goals. As I take over a lot of sites to manage I ran into many which have serious engineering issues. As Steve Jobs one said design is not only what something looks like, it is how it works. And you can see this in most Apple products, they are not on the good looking, they are functionally near perfect.As Duct Tape Marketing says:
“Your website is the heart of your online marketing efforts. All other channels should drive users back to your website, so it’s critical that you build the most effective one that you can. Good website design is way bigger than just building a site that looks appealing. Truly effective website design is about the substance underlying the style.”
Buying a product is more important than buying a price
You may recall a blog post we had about this very topic, You Buy a Product or You Buy A Price. I used to work with a web developer who was a former finish carpenter and a brilliant musician. He told me that people either shop for price or they shop for a product. If they’re shopping for price then you’ll never be happy no matter how good the product you offer may be. And in the long run they almost never succeed with their company goals as they only care about who gives them the lowest price. Now I am not telling you not to consider price, just consider what are you getting for your money. The proposal that may be a bit more expensive may also net you a much better end result. One other thing to consider is what the company will be doing for you after you build and launch your website. We believe that the management of your website is every bit as important as the design and development phases. So when we make a proposal, it also includes a management plan. This is so important as we not only backup your site daily, we also keep your website plugins and themes up to date. This is critical for Content Management Sites, such as WordPress which require constant attention.
Bottom Line: So just as the last post we had talked about five things that will change forever, these are the 5 Five things that will never change for small business websites, no matter what the world is going through at a given point in time. If you need help with your website design or the management of your site, please feel free to contact us anytime. And please let us know what you think will never changes, we’d love your feedback.
I was at an old mill last weekend where they now sell furniture and all kinds of vintage items. Outside the place was this ancient pickup truck. The truck was rusted and probably hasn’t run for years. Now, instead of scrapping this old truck, they chose to make it into a planter. And what a beautiful planter it is!
So, like everything else I am always drawn back to ideas for my business, designing and maintaining websites. (I know, only a geek would be constantly thinking about web stuff. I am what I am)
But I had some ideas looking at this old truck. Many websites (like the truck), don’t need to be scrapped, but they do need some sprucing up.
So here are five ways you can do that:
Number One: New or Updated logo.
By changing your logo, even a little bit, you can really make a statement. I feel that every design should start with the logo as that is the key to your branding, color scheme, etc. Over the last decade, more and ways to design logos have sprung up, so for very little money you can have a great logo.
Years ago you would go to an agency to create your logo. They would spend time and asking questions and finally come up with three possibilities to choose from, which they charge you 15, or $20,000 or more. Contact me, I will show you how to have a great logo at an affordable price. (And you’ll have many options to choose from)
Number Two: Update your sites imagery.
Is your site filled with tacky stock photos, like the operator wearing the headset (see below) or a number of the other photos you’ve seen on a million websites? If so, consider updating the images on your website. The best photos are the ones of you and your company and your business. You can either take the photos yourself or hire a professional photographer to come in and spend a couple hours. It isn’t that expensive and the results can make a huge difference in the look and feel of your website. If must use stock photography, do it in such a way that it doesn’t have that stock-ish look. So use images that are a bit abstract, something eye-catching, but not the two guys shaking hands. (One of my pet peeves)
This Photo is on 100s of sites (if not 1,000s) and example of overused Stock Photos.
Number Three: Video
Video is a great way to add value to your website. The numbers prove that people will watch a video, more then they will read pages of text. The best part is that you can take a video yourself; it doesn’t have to be professionally produced, although of course that is a good option as well. Videos are also great to promote on social media, as people are more likely to click on a link to your blog with an embedded video than just a plain text article.
1) Mobile video usage has increased by nearly 10 million daily viewing minutes in the last 2 years.
2) Cisco projects that global internet traffic from videos will make up 82% of all consumer internet traffic by 2021.
3) 70% of YouTube viewers watch videos for “help with a problem” they’re having in their hobby, studies, or job.
Video is important, as these numbers prove. #3 is one to consider if you are looking for ideas. People love “how to” videos. So if you can produce a video that solves someone issue, chances are you will get plenty of views, and who knows, perhaps a viral video.
Number Four: Typography
One thing a lot of people don’t think about when designing or working on their website is typography. Simple changes to a font as an example can make such a big difference. I was looking at a potential new client’s website the other day. Well, what hit me was they were using the smallest font sizes, and it made it hard to read. Their headline fonts were using this very fancy font-face that was difficult to make out. So, by just bumping up their body font a couple of pixels and changing their headline fonts to something far more readable, their site looked hundred times better. Because we now have Google fonts and other embedded fonts available, people have gone crazy trying to use nonstandard font families. For me, when we are talking about body fonts, the cleanest, easiest to read fonts have always been and always will be the best to use. Now, don’t get me wrong I like fancy fonts for headlines, you just don’t want to go to crazy and end up using something that people have a hard time reading. And remember, over half of your audience is probably on cell phones which makes goes small and fancy fonts very hard to read.
Number Five: Form Simplification
When you go to a website and someone has a contact form with 10 or 15 fields, chances are you don’t fill those out. So my number five tip is to simplify those forms. You want people to contact you or request more information, so collect as little information as possible. Someone’s name, phone Number and perhaps a text area for them to tell you what they need or are interested in. In this day and age people are afraid to fill out forms as they’re so scared with what company may do with the data. So by simplifying your forms hopefully you will get a better response. As most people will tell you the amount of forms filled out has declined considerably over the last five years, so make it as easy as possible for your website visitors.
In Closing
So like that beautiful old truck seen above, you don’t have to scrap your website, you can make changes to spruce it up and get it looking good again. This of course is only five tips, there are obviously many things you can spruce up your website. We would be happy To help you, contact us anytime.
If you have some tips of your own, please leave them below, we always welcome comments and the opinions of others.
