Tuesday, July 08, 2003
Form B4 Function: It Hurts
It actually happened twice this year: I met with two U.S. companies who spent over $100,000 developing corporate sites, yet neither of them had an online marketing plan or strategy in place before they designed their pricey properties.
In both instances, I got called in for consulting months after the launch. Both companies had the same problem and the same question:
Problem: No one is coming to our site.
Question: How can we get people to come to our site?
I wish I could have turned back the clock for these two companies and worked with their programmers before they designed sites that had no hope of being indexed by any search engine -- ever.
Don't get me wrong: both sites were utterly beautiful. One is very consumer friendly and content-rich. Unfortunately, all the content is contained within pop-ups. Not much hope of getting indexed there, without a major re-design, or making a whole nest of content rich html or other readable pages.
The other site was a sorrowful state of "nothing but pictures". Yep, even the copy blocks were converted to jpgs or gifs, which means that all their content was invisible to the search engines.
You'd think that businesses would show more marketing savvy. You'd think they might want to make the most rudimentary marketing or promotion plan before they spent the big bucks and months of time developing a site. You'd think that with all the information available on the internet, that someone in the marketing department might intervene and insist that their corporate site gets developed with their audience needs, wants, and desires in mind.
OK, maybe you wouldn't think that. But I would, and that's where I'm wrong, as it turns out. It's 2003, and even with the big old dotcom bust of a few years ago, some sites still haven't learned a very basic lesson -- a solid online marketing plan needs to be in place or else they are simply throwing development money down the drain.
So, if you know of anyone who's in the process of developing a brand spanking new site for their company, I beg of you: tell them to get their marketing and promo plans in place before they build, design, or re-design. Have them consult with an internet marketing specialist who can consult with their web designers before any programming begins. A marketing specialist (as opposed to a techie) can help a company maximize exposure to search engines, but also provide insight into a variety of other necessary promotional strategies and techniques and their budgets.
Bottom Line Hints: If you're designing a new site, think about what your audience wants and how they'll find you. How many people visiting and buying from your site will you consider "successful"? What attraction strategies will you be deploying? How much will they cost? What's your communicational calendar look like? If you don't know the answers to these basics, you need help, my friend!!
¶ 7/08/2003 01:26:00 PM
It actually happened twice this year: I met with two U.S. companies who spent over $100,000 developing corporate sites, yet neither of them had an online marketing plan or strategy in place before they designed their pricey properties.
In both instances, I got called in for consulting months after the launch. Both companies had the same problem and the same question:
Problem: No one is coming to our site.
Question: How can we get people to come to our site?
I wish I could have turned back the clock for these two companies and worked with their programmers before they designed sites that had no hope of being indexed by any search engine -- ever.
Don't get me wrong: both sites were utterly beautiful. One is very consumer friendly and content-rich. Unfortunately, all the content is contained within pop-ups. Not much hope of getting indexed there, without a major re-design, or making a whole nest of content rich html or other readable pages.
The other site was a sorrowful state of "nothing but pictures". Yep, even the copy blocks were converted to jpgs or gifs, which means that all their content was invisible to the search engines.
You'd think that businesses would show more marketing savvy. You'd think they might want to make the most rudimentary marketing or promotion plan before they spent the big bucks and months of time developing a site. You'd think that with all the information available on the internet, that someone in the marketing department might intervene and insist that their corporate site gets developed with their audience needs, wants, and desires in mind.
OK, maybe you wouldn't think that. But I would, and that's where I'm wrong, as it turns out. It's 2003, and even with the big old dotcom bust of a few years ago, some sites still haven't learned a very basic lesson -- a solid online marketing plan needs to be in place or else they are simply throwing development money down the drain.
So, if you know of anyone who's in the process of developing a brand spanking new site for their company, I beg of you: tell them to get their marketing and promo plans in place before they build, design, or re-design. Have them consult with an internet marketing specialist who can consult with their web designers before any programming begins. A marketing specialist (as opposed to a techie) can help a company maximize exposure to search engines, but also provide insight into a variety of other necessary promotional strategies and techniques and their budgets.
Bottom Line Hints: If you're designing a new site, think about what your audience wants and how they'll find you. How many people visiting and buying from your site will you consider "successful"? What attraction strategies will you be deploying? How much will they cost? What's your communicational calendar look like? If you don't know the answers to these basics, you need help, my friend!!
¶ 7/08/2003 01:26:00 PM
