Business Portal

Effective Sites Posted: 18 Jul 2008 02:06 AM CDT An effective site is one that does its job. It has a clear message and purpose that any visitor understands immediately. It also looks professional and welcoming helping visitors to remember your brand and bookmark the site. An effective site provides the information and interaction required by visitors. It encourages them to take the desired actions, making online ordering or other actions fast, easy and secure with clear feedback. An effective site grabs visitors’ attention with quality images, graphics, headlines and navigation that makes it easy for them to travel. An effective site downloads fast, works in the major browsers and has good search engine optimization so it can easily be found. A poor site A poor site has no clear message or purpose. Visitors can’t easily determine what it is all about. A poor site has content that never changes, broken links and out of date out of date price sheets and other information. A poor site has bad spelling, grammar, punctuation, graphics and images and won’t work in the major browsers. Building an effective site Building an effective site can be easily described, but like many things in life is frequently easier said than done! The key steps are: Define the purpose and layout of the site. Too many sites are designed ‘inside out’ and reflect the internal structure and politics of the organization. But customers don’t care about departments and functions; they just want to achieve their goals. So understand their goals first and then work with them to achieve yours whether that is to expand your customer base, provide information to existing customers, support other marketing activities or sell goods or services from the site. Determine what your customers are looking for, what they want to know, what they want to do, and what actions you wish them to perform. Draw a flow chart to help visualize the layout of the site and their journey through it. Use wireframes to understand each page ‘on paper’ first. NOT clearly defining the objectives for your site is similar to beginning to build a house without an architectural plan. You will not even be able to dig the foundation correctly. Build and test the site. Make sure that you have provided your visitors the opportunity to interact with you, whether through an email, a live web chat, a product order form, an application, etc. Test surf the site and all forms to make sure customers can find information easily and contact you with orders and questions. Make the site easy to use your company easy to contact. For example placing an order should be simple and straightforward. Customers should be told exactly what they can expect after their order is placed, such as how to print a receipt or track the order. They should always be reminded that their transaction is secure, that you will not sell or share their information, and that you appreciate their business. You should always provide a physical address and a phone number. If you don’t tell customers who and where you are, why should they trust you to complete an order or want to contact you? Hiding things like your address and phone number creates a feeling that you have something to hide and that is something that visitors and customers dislike. Manage the content. As your site evolves, pages will be added and removed and regularly updating the site and adding new information is essential. By refreshing your content on a weekly or monthly basis you will attract regular visitors who will check to see what’s new. The more relevant pages you have on your site the more exposure you will have in the search engines and the more potential you have for attracting visitors who use different search terms. Market the site. Search engine optimization, should be planned and integrated into the design of the site and don’t forget the simple basics such as putting your site address on your business cards, letterhead, brochures, advertising and all other marketing material. Avoid the……………. Busy site: Busy graphics, animated gifts, blinking text, silly icons and hit counters just put people off. Example: http://www.dokimos.org/ajff/ Designer site: The ‘designers dream’ site that defies conventional standards. Actually it is just poor in terms of usability, clarity, and content. Example: http://www.matthewmahon.com/ Flash site: Just because it’s ‘cool’. Example: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/archives/sts-108/flash/sts108.swf Illegal site: Stealing copyright. It’s illegal. There are plenty of good quality royalty free images and media. Also many end up putting spyware and malware on your PC. See: http://www.stopbadware.org/ Scrolling site: Sites that require horizontal scroll bars to view the page are generally hated. Example(s): http://www.thehorizontalway.com/

Search Engine Marketing in Iceland Posted: 18 Jul 2008 02:06 AM CDT Iceland is most likely not on your radar screen when it comes to search engine marketing, but don’t overlook this growing, prosperous country when it comes to client development. I lived in Iceland for 2 years from 2004-2006 and during my time there I was quite surprised by the Icelandic economy. I was employed by a large engineering firm that was involved with large, multinational construction projects in the development and expansion of aluminum smelting plants as well as hydroelectric and geothermal power plants. I was hired to do business communications and marketing for this firm and along the way, once word got out that I specialized in Internet Marketing, I was approached by several companies interested in promoting their respective goods and services to the larger world. Iceland is a very small country with a population of roughly 300,000 people. It is so small that it makes you wonder how they have such a strong economy. But what few people know is that Iceland has a very educated workforce, unique natural resources, deep involvement in high tech and genetic research and a growing tourism trade. What I discovered, in short, was that Iceland has a lot going for it. One of the items that I was closely aligned with is the knowledge transfer of Iceland’s years developing geothermal power schemes. These power plants are a major part of what is fueling the economy. This source of cheap electricity has brought extensive development of power intensive industries like aluminum smelting. And, in a world of rising global energy costs, many countries are looking to exploit their geothermal power potential and they are tapping Icelandic engineering and power companies for their experience. Software development is also strong in Iceland and I had the pleasure of working for a well-known game developer. They were hungry to market their online game to the larger world and I helped them develop an Internet Marketing strategy using natural and paid search. I worked with this company until they were large enough to contract with a large advertising agency. Now this company has combined with a large US game publisher and their collective futures are bright. I also had, and continue to have, the pleasure of working for several companies in the tourism industry. Iceland, with its unique and beautiful nature, is fast becoming a popular tourist destination. These companies offer everything from hiking and trekking tours to jeep tours and overnight tours into the beautiful outback. One of the great pleasures of working with companies in this far-off land is the personal nature in which business is conducted. Business is done face-to-face and personal networking is everything. And, Icelanders are so willing to help you make business connections. I have been in many meetings where, the person would say, “I know someone who could really use this service, let’s call him right now.” Meetings were very informal and top executives were available, responsive and approachable. And, due to the small size of this country, your reputation and name can spread fast. An additional bonus for is that pay rates in Iceland are quite high. I have even been told that I needed to raise my rates because Icelanders are used to paying top dollar for professional consulting, low hourly rates are almost seen as a sign of inexperience. That is not to say that I am advocating overcharging people or companies. But this was, at least to me, a valuable lesson in knowing the value of your experience. All-in-all, my time in Iceland was some of the most professionally rewarding years of my life. The demand for Iceland search engine marketing is growing and DSB Internet Marketing is dedicated to offering professional SEO Consulting to this unique nation. - David Brooks

You are subscribed to email updates from Business Portal To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email Delivery powered by FeedBurner
Inbox too full? Subscribe to the feed version of Business Portal in a feed reader.
If you prefer to unsubscribe via postal mail, write to: Business Portal, c/o FeedBurner, 20 W Kinzie, 9th Floor, Chicago IL USA 60610