Your small biz website: Light the fuse or thank the Muse?

Your Small Business Website: Light the Fuse or Thank the Muse?

Introduction
Review website development steps
Light the fuse on your website or simply your thoughts of a website
Rarely are we able to thank the muse when considering enhancements.

Where to Start?
Purpose & Motive
Target Audience
Domain Names
Website Hosting

Where to Start?
Content Management Systems (CMS)
Content – text, images, audio, video...
Functional components
Design development process

Purpose and Motive
Why are you moving forward on the Internet?

Market Differentiation

Branding

Increase Sales

Advertising

New Business Direction

Educate / Spread Information Town Crier

Keeping up with the Jones’s

Ready for Lift Off?

Not Yet

I want a website to…
Increase/reduce email/phone inquiries
Sell beyond the local area
Display a portfolio or calendar
Develop a community online
Provide e-books or case studies
Allow visitors to sign up for X

Target Audiences
It is not YOU – no trophy sites please
Existing clients
New clients
Influencers – trusted resources
Personas – demographics, buying habits, goals/needs, proficiency/knowledge

Serve current customers

Influencers

Know who you are trying to reach

Domain Names

Domain Name = URL
Web address = www.jbspartners.com
Email = [email_address]
Market your own business w/ each email
NOT [email_address]

Domain Names
Domains are registered, like a car.
Register for up to 10 years
Keep contact info up to date
Renew 6 months before expiration

Domain Name = web address
Shorter than longer
Easy to spell
Easy on the phone
Memorable
No Hyphens

Domain Names
Dot Com is king for business
Choose domain name before incorporating
Brand or describe your business
Don’t focus on search engines. They change
Sound legitimate. Not adf.bz

Website Hosting
Operating System
Linux
Windows
Shared server
Dedicated server
Managed server
Cloud Computing

Website Hosting
Support – “who ya gonna call?”
Open Source - Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP = LAMP
You get what you pay for

Content Management System
The Pitch – You can update your website
Depends on You
WordPress – known as blogging platform
Drupal - foundation to build on
Etomite or Modx

WordPress

WordPress Editor

Drupal

Revolution Theme

Becomes This

Thesis Theme

Your Website Content
Text
Images
Audio
Video

Your Website Content
Can you solve my problem?
Have you solved problems for someone like me before?
Details – quality, price and proximity

Functional Components
Shopping Cart
Blog
Forum
Photo Gallery
Dynamic Calendar
Client Login area
Subscription / Registration

Functional Components
Streaming Video (live feed = Expensive)
Online Giving / Donations
Podcast
Video
Interactive Driving Directions

SEO
Best Practices
On Page SEO
Key Word Research
Meta Data
URL structure
Internal Linking
Images
Off Page SEO

Design Factors
Logo – Very impactful
Keep page design simple and focused
Colors
Layout
Sound – usually not
Moving things – usually not
Three clicks to content

Insight into the Design Process
First concept through to completion
Art Direction for the client

Original Website

First Mock Up

Third Mock Up

Fifth Mock Up

Seventh Mock Up

Final Mock Up

Summary
Purpose and Motive
Domain name then incorporate
Keyword research
Select functionality required
Develop content
Customize a CMS pre-built theme
Plan on maintaining
Analytics – Mint or Google Analytics

Photo Credits from Flick r
mleak - artbear.etsy.com - branding
Flipped Out - ducks
iDream_in_Infrared - salesman
seeinside - advertising
Hoeski direction
lbsmsp town crier
denis collette – flock
DitB - Downintheblue – lift off
Sofia Katariina - stop
C&C Collision – auto body
bookielovescta - video
Businesscoach – business coach photobucket
datflydipsetchick2006 - sports coach photobucket
Thai Yin – blue shirt and suite
Simple Simon - server

Thank You
This presentation will be available at www.jbspartners.com
I look forward to your questions
any time.

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Your small biz website: Light the fuse or thank the Muse?

by Jim Spencer on Sep 30, 2008

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Your small biz website: Light the fuse or thank the Muse? — Presentation Transcript