After another cliffhanger last week here’s the final part in our list of 30 reasons why your website is failing your business.

We meet a lot of people who are wondering whether or not they should invest their hard earned cash in a website redesign. They’ve already spent (sometimes a significant amount of) money and yet, for some reason, their web site doesn’t seem to be delivering results for their business. When we look at their site the reasons are usually pretty obvious but sometimes they’re more obscure.

Occasionally we have to tell people that their site is in fact doing more harm than good and that’s never a happy moment.

Here’s the final part of a list that, although by no means exhaustive, covers lots of the more common problems. Some of these things are more significant than others but they all have an impact. Let me know what you think….

Part three…

21. Not accessible

I’ve alluded to this elsewhere in this series. In this day and age you have a duty to try and make your site as accessible to as many people as possible regardless of their ability. I know a blind lady who knows more about the internet that you and I put together. She has a large disposable income, shops online regularly and does lots of research online for business. If she comes across a site that isn’t accessible she won’t phone you up instead she’ll just go elsewhere. There is also legislation on the horizon in the UK which will mean that your site (B2C sites first), will have to be accessible.

22. Poor usability

If a user has to engage their brain in order to use your website then it’s too complex. Do the granny test again or ask a five year old to accomplish some tasks on your website. Usability is a science in its own right but think about gadgets and websites that are pleasure to use – that’s good usability.

23. No call to action

You’ve gone to a lot of trouble to attract users to your website but are you asking visitors to your website to do something? Here’s a clue – the answer should be yes? It could be as simple as calling you (’call us now!’), or buying something (’buy now’). The web is direct, immediate and fast. Don’t muck about just ask the question. Be clear and maybe even be cheeky.

24. Long sign up process

Don’t do it. On the web you need to remove as much guff as possible from your sign up processes. Think about Amazon and their one click buying process or The Book Depository with their checkout and sign-up on one page process. The more steps in any process and the more likely it is that people will drop out. The more personal information that you ask for and the more likely it is that people will drop out. Don’t lose business simply because you have some need to know your customer’s inside leg measurement. Unless you sell trousers online of course.

25. Frames

You might not even know if you site has been built using frames but any web designer can tell you – maybe for free.  Your customers won’t be able to bookmark pages when they’re in your site so even if they find something they’re interested in they won’t be able to come back. But they’ll be so irritated by this time they probably won’t want to. I wouldn’t. Search engines don’t like them and find it hard to see the content – if they can’t see the content they can’t index you properly so they won’t. If a customer enters on a subpage they might find that some or all of the navigation is missing. Again, do you really want to irritate your potential customers?

26. Excessive use of Flash or Flash intros

Flash is a proprietary software that is useful for creating cool web effects and animations. Some websites are built entirely in Flash. They often look really cool. Oh, unless you’re using an iPhone. Or an iPad. Or you live in the country and have a slow web connection. There’s a lot of debate amongst developers about the use of Flash but essentially content displayed in Flash is largely inaccessible, it can slow down a website, if you’re one of the 2 million iPhone users in the UK it’s invisible and there are alternatives available. As for flash intros, read #3 again and add that argument to this one.

27. Ads that users can skip

There are some very big sites that have video ads that appear when you go to their website. You can skip the ad if you can find the little cross in the corner but essentially you are forced to watch an advert before you can see the content you’re looking for. The only organisations that can get away with this have unique and compelling content that cannot be found elsewhere. If you think you’d like to earn some extra pennies with this kind of advertising you’d better be certain that people will tolerate the ads.

28. You hired a black hat

Did someone promise you the top spot on Google? Did you hire them? The only people that can promise the top spot on Google is Google. And they won’t. Apologies to all the self proclaimed ‘web gurus’ out there but that’s a cold hard fact. The chances are that if you hire someone and within a couple of weeks you ended up in that coveted number one spot (for a competitive search term), they did something to deliberately fool the search engines. It’s impressive and exciting. Briefly. As soon as Google et al recognise that you’ve manipulated them (your site remember), they will penalise you and send you tumbling back down the rankings. There are legitimate ways to work your way up the rankings so hire a professional and be patient.

29. Meaningless domain name

Before you leap in and buy a domain name have a good hard think about it. If you sell toffees and your name’s John Smith you should probably steer clear of  johnsmith.com. That said jsmithtoffeemaker.com is probably a good bet – not to mention probably available. If possible try to make the name describe an action rather than an identity (although it might be possible to do both). Always go for a top level if you can .com .org or .co.uk. If you end up with jsmithtoffeemaker.tv everyone will think you’re an online tv channel.

30. It’s not your website, it’s you

If you have a website and people get in touch with you then please, please respond to them. Quickly. The web is instant. It’s all about instant gratification, instant information, instant availability, instant everything. If you think it can wait until later, you’re sadly mistaken. I recently made an enquiry for the same product on four different websites. One didn’t respond at all. One responded within 24 hours – not bad. One responded within 11 minutes – much better. The company that got my order responded to me in three minutes flat. They were quick, keen and professional. This stuff isn’t easy but you can develop processes that allow you to respond very quickly even if you’re a tiny company.

Essentially all of these things require attention because they adversely affect the users experience on your website and with your business. If there’s one lesson to take away from this series of posts it’s that visitors to your site will not tolerate a poor experience.

If your web site is out of date we can advise you on a sensible and cost effective way to put it right. If you ultimately need a new site and we design and build it for you, you now know of at least 30 things that won’t let it down.

The next blog post will be along shortly. I promise no more cliffhangers for a while but you don’t want to miss out you can subscribe to the blog. If it’s easier just let us know and we’ll send it to you in an email.

Ursus Media are based in Swindon, Wiltshire and specialise in web design, development, eCommerce and online marketing for small and medium businesses throughout the South West.

Unless you’ve been swanning around on another planet (and if you have, welcome back), you’ll have heard of Twitter. I guarantee your customers have heard of it.

Twitter is a social networking tool that effectively allows for small talk on the web. Using it has been likened to being at a cocktail party full of interesting people, all of whom are happy for you to introduce yourself and have a chat. They’re at the party themselves because they’d like to chat to someone they find interesting and so on and so forth.

On the face of it, it’s a pretty frivolous idea but people are doing exactly what they do at parties. Some of them have a laugh, some of them are silly, some of them are sharing great ideas and some of them are networking.

It has the potential to help you open dialogues with customers on their terms and is at the same time an effective marketing and customer care tool. But you have to get it right.

DON’T PANIC

Let’s deal with the marketing value of Twitter first and I’ll revisit the customer care aspect in a later post. There are lots of people and organisations using it to sell products and services and increase brand awareness. Inevitably some are good and some are bad.

If you use Twitter in the right way you will have an open, welcoming and visibly growing audience at your finger tips, providing you with constant, quality feedback and helping you spread the word about your business.

If you get it wrong you have the potential to alienate millions of people who between them have a massive web presence.

again DON’T PANIC

Although you can get it wrong it’s quite hard to do. You have to remember that Twitter is a conversation. As soon as you try and broadcast, unless you have a genuinely useful stream of information, people will tune out and they’re gone. This is a simple and (at least for the moment), free way to engage with millions of people. The key word here is engage; announcement after announcement about how great you are won’t work. No matter how great you are.

So what you need is a strategy. Ideally you already have a social media strategy, perhaps as part of a wider marketing strategy, which will outline your approach to the various social networking sites. If you don’t, don’t worry, you can hire us to write it for you.

I’m not going to write a strategy for you here; partly because we do this for a living and like to get paid for our work and partly because I don’t know anything about your brand or organisation. That’s no reason for you not do dip your toe in the ‘twittersphere’ so here are seven completely free tips for you to try:

1. Twitter is free but not effortless: You will get out of it at least as much as you put in but you need to devote some time and therefore resource to it.
2. Think about the tone of voice for your tweets: Twitter is informal but it’s not generally rude and it’s like (I know I’ve said it before) being at a party. It’s a party with your customers or people who know your customers. They’re enjoying the witty banter but they are paying attention and they will remember that they’re your customers so you must too.
3. Share: Twitter is a community which means people share things. Share information with others. If you add a web page, write a blog post or even just stumble across a piece of news (even vaguely) related to your sector, share by tweeting a link. Comment on it if you like but share it.
4. Follow people: You don’t have to wait for people to follow you before you can follow them. Work out if they’re a customer, a potential customer or in a related field and follow them. Say hello at the same time – it’s only polite.
5. If someone follows you, follow them back: They’ve voluntarily engaged with you so you should return the favour. There are tools available which allow you to do this automatically but I’d suggest that you check that they’re real and that they engage with other real people. I’m proud to say that I’ve been followed by Barack Obama (I’ve still got the email to prove it) and although I know it was probably automatic, I’ll choose to believe that he followed me because I’m cool.
6. Talk to people: This is all about the conversation. You must engage with people and try and answer every question. If someone asks for your opinion and you feel it’s relevant and appropriate give it. If you can’t answer a question, for whatever reason, don’t be afraid to say so or to suggest an appropriate alternative.
7. Ask for things: If you want to know something – a bit of impromptu market research for example ask people, need bit of testing of a new product or service – ask. This is part of the give and take of a community.

If you want to try Twitter you’re welcome to start by following us – just remember to say hello and mention that you read this post.

If you want to learn more about using Twitter for business Ursus Media run courses to help you get it right first time. We’ll help with your accounts and provide all the necessary tools and instruction to ensure that you and your team can use Twitter efficiently and effectively. Just give us a call or drop us a line.

Even in this, the internet age, is it a given that every business needs a website?
The simple answer is yes. Sorry; were you expecting something else?

I suppose that you want me to quantify my answer with good clear reasons. After all someone from a company that designs and develops websites is bound to say that.

1. The internet is a global shop window
   Unless you’re very lucky you’re facing competition from all directions. A good website can extend your reach to anyone with a computer, anywhere in the world, immediately. They can see who you are, what you do and how you do it instantly. They can then make contact and interact with you all the while marvelling at how you’re absolutely the right people for the job.
2. Communicate with your customers and clients
   I guarantee that most of your customers are already online. Perhaps they do business online, their banking perhaps; how many people do you know that have book a holiday online or ordered Christmas presents from Amazon? The web is an easy way to communicate effortlessly with your customers. Encourage them to get in touch with you. Get them to talk to you.
3. Open yourself up to new opportunities
   You can open up your business to opportunities that you didn’t know existed until you got online and your shiny new customers from around the world got in touch. £3.8bn is spent online in Britain alone every month and some of that could be yours.
4. Learn from the people on your site
   At the risk of making myself sound incredibly dull, I love the data that websites can provide. You can get an understanding of what people want and need, not just from what they say but from what they do. The data that you can gather from users of your website is empirical. You can adapt your website quickly and cost effectively based on real evidence as opposed to ‘gut feelings’. I know of a very famous online DVD rental company that increased sales by 10% overnight by changing two simple things on its website. The decision to do that was based on good hard data.
5. Catch up with your competition
   Not a good enough reason on its own but I bet the competition are online. If they use their website effectively they’ll be picking up business from your potential clients. Don’t let them get away with it. Remember too that the web levels the playing field – you get the same access to the same clients as anyone else online.
6. Work around the clock every day of the year
   Your website will work hard for you (at least it will if we build it), long after every other member of staff has gone home. If you sell online you can look forward to coming into work in the mornings and flicking though a pile of orders from around the world as you enjoy a nice hot cup of coffee.
7. Save lots of money
   I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The web is the most cost effective way of marketing and selling that there is. Do it properly and your website will make far more for you than it will cost. Don’t cut corners though or it’ll just be a white elephant with the name of your business painted on the side. The internet is complex and clever so hire a professional whose job it is to deliver value for money.
8. Free advertising
   Your website is the perfect place to advertise. If you have a good flow of traffic you can tell people about new products and services, sales and special offers. You can even let them send information to their friends directly from your website. Remember your reach is global and constant so make the most of it.
9. Portray the perfect image for your business all the time
   Keep your website up to date (little and often is the key here) and you can update your image and develop your brand continuously. The web is by far the most cost effective way to show people who you are and what you stand for.
10. If you think you’re so great – prove it
    Show people how great you are. Show them why your cheese is better than Sainsbury’s, why you can deliver better service than the other dry cleaners up the road, why your widget costs twice as much as your competitors. Sometimes you need to show what goes on behind the scenes in order to make people appreciate just what a great company you are. Make people comfortable with who you are and tell them exactly why they should buy your product or service and they probably will.

So there you are: 10 good reasons why you need a website. And 10 equally good reasons to give us a call and get our help to grow your business online.

Related items:

• 7 Questions to ask your web developer
• Special offer

Writing for the web is a skill that is often neglected. For a number of reasons it’s not the same as writing for print media so sadly you can’t just recycle the copy from your brochure.

A few key things to remember when you’re writing for web are:

1. Capture your audience’s attention: You have to capture you reader’s attention almost immediately – believe me if you haven’t got them interested with the first few words they’ll probably move on. Use the inverted pyramid technique and start with the conclusion and follow with the details.

2. Less is more: Be clear, be concise. If you can pare an article down to a headline and a series of bullet points then maybe you should.

3. Make it meaningful: Don’t waste your reader’s time.  If you’re going to tell them something, make it accurate and useful.

4. Have a call to action: Users time is precious so you might as well make the most of it. Ask them to buy, donate, download or simply comment. If they go on and follow your call to action you’ll get another useful insight as to whether or not your content is working.
   
   
5. Don’t forget the science: Writing content for the web has another more scientific dimension. Copy must be written in such a way as to make it more attractive to search engines like Google. Of course this can be overdone and it mustn’t compromise the integrity of your message. This science bit is a facet of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and I’ll cover this in a later post.

If, forgetting for the time being item 5, this all seems very easy then why don’t you try a little exercise? Take a 1500 or 2000 word article, maybe something from a corporate brochure and edit it down to 500 words. You still have to include all the salient points and it still has to make sense.

Harder than it sounds? Let me know how you got on by leaving a comment at the bottom of the page.

If you want to keep up you can subscribe to our feed for free and if you’d like some help with a project remember that we provide blogging, copywriting and training services. Drop us a line if you think we can help with your project.