Web Design Reality Check
by Robyn Harton
Before you put a web site up, especially if
you're hiring us or any web professional, it's a good idea
to take a stop for a reality check. We'd far rather you know
these facts of life on the web and not hire us, than have
you unhappy down the road.
You have to do some work to get a good web site up
and running, even if you hire a web professional.
We can't transmute lead into gold, or create a successful
web site for you with no information. No web designer can.
You know your wants, your needs, and your business; but unless
you tell your web designer, she or he probably doesn't. So
be prepared to work to provide the information your designer
needs to make your site work for you.
If you don't trust your web designer, get another one.
This includes us. Unless you've spent as much time on the
web and designing sites as your web designer, he or she probably
knows a bit more about it, and will give you useful, helpful
advice. If you feel like they're trying to rook you or just
too nuts to make sense, you probably won't be happy with the
end result. Find someone you can trust to build your site.
As with everything in life, you can't have everything
you want all at once. Sometimes we have to compromise.
However annoying it may be, we all have to work within the
technology available to us at the moment, and some things
are just prohibitively expensive.
"Build it and they will come" is a pipedream.
You not only have to build a web site, you also have to market
it, update it regularly, have a good plan, excel at customer
service; you have to do all the things any business has to
do, on the web or off it.
Content is still King. Your site needs to have
content. Your site must have content. Sets of links don't
count, unless you're running a directory of some kind. People
surf the web looking for stuff that interests them. Even your
friends and family won't come back if you don't have something
of interest, and something new, for them to read and look
at.
You won't get in the top 10 on the search engines in
a week. Many search engines don't even review sites
within a week. Even with the ones they do, you're competing
against millions of other sites for those top 10 spots. There
are MANY factors that affect how your site ranks in the search
engines, and it takes time to build up your ranking.
Submitting commercial sites to Yahoo! now costs $299.
And that doesn't even guarantee that your site will get listed
on Yahoo!, only that they will LOOK at your site. So be sure
that your site is in top form before you submit your commercial
site to Yahoo! This is also applying more and more to other
directories and search engines as they try to make money by
asking for fees to submit sites.
You are not likely be overwhelmed with sales immediately
after opening an e-commerce site. Sadly, but truly,
it takes time for an e-commerce site to start producing. People
have to find out that it exists, read it, decide to buy, then
actually do the buying. This often takes several visits to
get the money in your hands and the product out the door.
This is true even if you have a super fantastic product at
a great price. A caveat to this is spending BIG bucks to advertise
your site, and even that may not do it.
Not all your site visitors will buy your product or
service. You may want 100% of them to buy, but it's
not likely to happen. People land in your site by accident
and find out it doesn't have what they were looking for in
the first place. Their computers crash. They have to leave
to pick up the kids. Their husband has the credit cards. They
don't buy on the web. They don't make impulse buys. And on
and on. A site visitor is a chance to sell your product, not
a guaranteed sale.
If you don't accept credit cards on your commercial
site you probably won't sell much at all. Whether
you have your own merchant account or use a third party service
such as 2Checkout.com,
PayPal,
or Kagi,
accepting credit cards is a must on the web.
Web advertising is only sort of free. It might
not cost you money, but if it doesn't, it will cost you time.
Time is money, no? You get to choose how much of each you
wish to spend on advertising your site or business on the
web.
In spite of all these oh-so-cruel realities, you can
have a successful web site. This is absolutely true.
Our owner has personally gone from just spending money on
the web, to someone who earns their living primarily on the
web. She's not rich yet, and it didn't happen overnight. But
you can be successful too!
===================================
by Robyn Harton, Owner
of Robyn A Harton Creative
Articles & Tips on Making Graphics
and Web Design Work for You
Copyright ©2002 Robyn
A Harton Creative All Rights Reserved
http://rahcreative.com and http://robynaharton.com
You may reprint this article on your website, email, or print
publication with no additional
permission required as long as
this entire copyright statement and links are included.
>> Have a copy sent
to directly to you, just email webdesignreality@rahcreative.com.
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updated 8/11/02
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