Aligned Marketing Blog

Website design is often in the eye of the beholder. However, no matter how great your current website design is most of the experts say websites should be updated every 3-5 years. Technologies change, your audience probably changes slightly and giving your site a fresh new look seldom hurts. With that in mind, we're updating www.aligned-marketing.com.

To get some inspiration for our new site I visited 9 "award" sites. These websites let me glance at a bunch of websites that the experts have decided are the best-of-the-best for various industry segments. I thought I'd pass the list along so you can see what the folks in-the-know are saying about website design. Please feel free to add to the list.

• Davey Awards: http://www.daveyawards.com
• EduNet: www.edunetconnect.com/awards/index.php
• Interactive Media Awards: www.interactivemediaawards.com/default.asp
• Internet Advertsing Competition: www.advertisingcompetition.org/iac
• Kasina's Awards for Financial Professionals: www.kasina.com/Page.asp?ID=493
• MuniNetGuide: www.muninetguuide.com/top_picks.php
• W3 Awards: http://www.w3award.com
• Web Marketing Association's WebAward: www.webaward.org
• Webby Awards: http://webbyawards.com

Steve
800-707-9150

Do you ever feel dumped on?

I talked with two well-regarded companies last week, both leaders in their industry, and came away with the feeling that their marketing teams are being dumped on. Their stories are remarkably alike.

Their IT Departments built capable websites years ago under the direction of senior management. Both sites contain useful information, have comparable functionality to their competitor’s sites, and represent their brands well. They are, in effect, brochure sites designed to communicate a general message to a general audience. Both sites were developed based on generic business goals.

Sometime between the birth of those sites and today senior management figured out that a website is a strategic asset. A website needs to be part of an overall business and marketing strategy. I know, shocking.

Senior management goofed. Now they want marketing to lead complete makeovers of these websites and, in addition, launch the company into the world of social media. The word "world-class" was used by both teams. As Sportscaster Keith Jackson would say, “Whoa Nellie!”

First, this is a great opportunity for marketing to step up and make a major contribution. The problems are:

1. The existing marketing teams have minimal competence in online marketing. They have a basic understanding of the web, as consumers, but lack the deep understanding needed to create an exceptional web-strategy from the ground up.
2. The existing marketing team has always been a support group, the nice people that create brochures, so they have little strategic capabilities and the requisite confidence needed to lead effectively.
3. Senior management has failed to articulate the business goals that are necessary for successful online marketing.

That last point is critical. As mentioned, both teams have been told they need to build “a world-class website.” As I told them, I’m in the business of building websites and I don’t know what that means. No one does without a clear understanding of the overall business goals.

Here’s why. A world-class website must be tied to a business goal. The architecture of a world-class website built to drive lead generation can be markedly different from a world-class website built to be a central repository for technical information, a library of support, if you will.

Can the two goals co-exist on one website? Sure they can. You bet. In fact, every page should have a business goal. The same applies to social media.

The company’s social media goals need to be well defined. Are you trying to become or extend your role as thought leader? Is the goal to reduce customer service costs by utilizing platforms such as Facebook and Twitter? Or are you just trying to drive more traffic to your website?

There’s no absolute right or wrong here. I take that back. I think it’s wrong when senior management fails to do their job and then dumps on marketing.

Steve Hartkopf

800-707-9150

1. Project centric: The change that is required to make tomorrow better than today is often measured by the number of projects completed. Outsourcing is project-centric and delivers results with minimal impact on day-to-day operations or personnel.
2. Size doesn’t matter: Small projects such as web design, training and video production are ideal for outsourcing for all but the largest corporations, those with virtually unlimited internal capabilities. Large projects that require an outside perspective, such as institutionalizing Six Sigma or Strategic Pricing, are excellent projects to outsource since true change rarely happens from the inside out.
   
3. Skills: Outsourcing lets you acquire specialized skills to accomplish goals, complete projects and augment your existing resources. Projects that are popular to outsource are social media tasks, such as blogging, search engine optimization, and specialized training or coaching like improving presentation skills.
4. Cost effective: Outsourcing is a variable cost option and preferred by many over adding full-time employees, which is a fixed cost solution. In this economy variable cost projects are approved easier than new headcount. Since outsourcing is a global industry adding world-class talent to your team is not as expensive as hiring talent.
5. Velocity: Speed can make the difference between good and excellent. Outside providers can deliver resources, even in large quantities, quickly while hiring fill-time expertise can take weeks or even months.
6. Technology: Few companies can afford the money to purchase or the time it takes to learn the latest technologies available in every function – sales, marketing, IT, logistics, etc. Outsourcing allows you to rent the best technology available from the best providers.
7. Accountability: Outsourced resources do not suffer from goal diffusion or the day-to-day fire-drills that impact full-time staff and extend project deadlines. An outside provider of resources has one responsibility and one priority, which is to complete the project. Their focus delivers better results and greater accountability.

Can you think of more reasons?

Steve

Crush the Competition Contest

You can Win prizes valued at over $1,500.00!

Here are the prizes:

• A 1-hour Crush the Competition Session with me. In this session we’ll develop three new ways you can clearly differentiate yourself from your competition. In addition, you’ll receive a condensed version of my sales coaching webinar, including a 30-minute follow up session and a signed copy of my book, Communication Wins.

• A free professionally designed, customized page for Facebook, Twitter or YouTube from M3-SocialMindz (www.M3socialmindz.com), a leader in SEO, PPC and social media marketing. A professionally designed social media page sets you apart from the competition and is a great way to project your brand into online communities and generate new sales leads.

• A video Holiday Card (click on "Holiday Card" to see samples) from ImigPro, just like this one: www.imigpro.com. If you can’t get to their Charlotte studio, email your video or images and they’ll do the rest. This is a unique way to stand out in a  crowd and competitive world. Managers and executives can use the video-card to both extend a holiday greeting and rally-the-troops for 2010.

• A copy of Gary Vaynerchuk’s new book, Crush It!. Gary was using the power of video, social media and the web before most people knew they existed. In Crush It! you learn what Gary has to say about social media, why storytelling is your most powerful marketing tool and multi-channel monetizing. Gary has appeared on CNN, Fox News, The Today Show, and The Ellen Degeneres Show. 

How you’ll Win:
It’s easy. Write one paragraph, at least three sentences, describing what you like best about my interview with Gary and post it here, at www.aligned-marketing.com website blog page (it’s free advertising), under Comments (email address required to win). Then email your paragraph and additional comments to me at: shartkopf@aligned-marketing.com.

Bonus:
Those who tell me what you plan to do with what you learned from the interview will receive special recognition (it's a surprise!) for contributing to the community.  

Contest Rules and Prizes: 

• One winner will be chosen at random to receive our Grand Prize - the Crush the Competition Session, signed copy of my book, free professionally design social media page from M3SocialMindz and Holiday video-card from ImigPro and copy of Gary’s book.
• Five winners will be selected to receive the Crush the Competition Session.
• Ten winners will receive a personalized autographed copy of my book, Communication Wins.
• This contest runs from Tuesday, October 13, 2009, through Friday October 30, 2009.
• Winners will be notified by email on Friday, November 6, 2009.

Good luck!
Steve

In it’s third annual study the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council had a team from Deloitte Consulting ask 650 marketers, from various companies and industries around the globe, 28 questions about budgets, activities, priorities and constraints. Here’s some of what was reported:

• As a percent of sales, 41% of the respondent’s reported their marketing budgets are less than 2% of sales, 60% are less than 4%  and 72% are under 6% of sales.
• Conversely, 12% of those surveyed have a 2009 marketing budget in excess of 11% of sales. [These must have been consumer companies.]
• In actual dollars, 47% indicated they have a budget of less than $1.0M while 80% stated their budget was less than $10.0M.
• Those dollars are divided into two primary categories: 41% is spent on people and 59% on programs and initiatives. The Council's position on this issue was clear, "more needs to be spent on programs and less on people going forward."
• The largest single item in the marketing budget was “website properties and digital platforms” at 13%. Strategy and Branding, and Product Marketing were tied at second with 12%, respectively.
• It’s not surprising then that 72% of respondents are increasing spending in Interactive Web, 62% will increase spending on Social Media activities and 57% are increasing funding for Search Engine Optimization.
• Apparently a lot of marketers are unhappy with their marketing agencies because 42% plan on changing their web design agency, 29% their interactive marketing company, and 27% their public relations firm.
• All that web-investment is impressive. The report states that 60% of those surveyed will spend less than $100,000 in 2009 on technology.
• The biggest issue for marketers was a lack of sufficient funding for new media (44%), followed by a lack of talented resources (33%), and, then, limited insight and understanding [by senior management] of new media (32%).
• In this environment 23% of those who responded said they feel their job is at risk, and another 20% are “Not sure.”
• When I think about a Chief Marketing Officer I think about a large company but 46% of the companies that responded were under $50.0M in revenues, 10% are between $51.0M and $100.0M, and another 14% (70% total) have sales under $500.0M.

The CMO added a few closing conclusions:

• Marketing noise and clutter will increase.
• While costs of production and distribution are declining in most industries, customer acquisition and retention costs are rising.
• The systematic and significant decline in interaction costs has made it easier for customers to switch products and suppliers.

Here are my conclusions:

• The Web is obviously driving the force behind marketing priorities. So my open-question is: “Are we, as marketers, driving Web activities or is the Web activity driving us?” [The answer is both. Make sure you're driving your company's web-activities and producing the planned for results. ]
• Print will continue to decline by 20%-30%. More magazines and newspapers will be in financial trouble and more will convert to an online only format.
• Video will explode as the Google-YouTube relationship matures and more companies realize that people no longer want to read. They want to receive information in an interesting and/or entertaining fashion, in a story.

Steve
 

The next two blogs are dedicated to low-cost websites and the the 5 top reasons websites fail to deliver business results. We'll start with $300 websites:

A quick online search for "web design", "web designer" or "web development" will return literally millions of pages. The Internet industry has no shortage of companies and individuals who are enthusiastic about offering "website design packages" for your business.

The ads read, "Get a 3 page site for $x!" or "5 pages and a free email account for $x.” The prices vary but the approach is the same. You arbitrarily decide how many pages you want and they'll build you a site to match, just place the order, no questions asked. That approach is simple and works well when buying a pizza, but it's no way to make a decision about a critical business investment.

Years ago it was common for a business website to be little more than an online business card or brochure, and those bought-by-the-page website designs were a reasonable approach. And while today's cheap web designers provide more graphically rich layouts than in the past, in the end you are still left with an online brochure.

Assuming your brochure-site can be found, and that’s a huge assumption, it may give prospects some basic information about your company, but it won't do much to increase your sales, profits, or improve customer relations. That takes a clear marketing message and an online strategy.

I'm talking about measurable results. This is how most marketing companies differ from those "$300 websites” providers. A sound Internet Solution is derived from true business objectives. It is built with specific purposes in mind and measured according to your business plan, sales goals and activity goals. Good solutions are scalable, so no matter what size your business is today you have the tools and flexibility to be larger tomorrow.

The bottom line is, if your website is costing you money instead of making you money, then you need to change your marketing strategy and online approach.

Steve

I leave for the Industrial Supply Association Conference in San Antonio on Monday. My technology partner, Doug Schust, a leading expert in Search Engine Optimization, is joining me in the Aligned Marketing booth (#1060). We'll be meeting with key executives from 3M, Columbus-McKinnon, Kennametal, Saint-Gobain (formerly Norton Abrasives), Snap-on, Stanley Tools, and several other leading companies.

Some of these companies may not be household names to my readers. However, in the industrial segment of our economy, these are big-dogs.

We plan on making a splash. Here’s what we’re doing:

• We’ve produced a new video for our website that will be viewable Monday morning, just as people begin to arrive at the conference.
• We’ll have Phase 1 of our SEO completed, which will place us on page one of Google for selected (secret) keywords.
• We’ll have our evaluations of every ISA distributor’s website and evaluations of selected manufacturer sites available for discussion.
• We’ll be passing out our new capabilities brochure that was updated in February 2009.
• We’ll have 60 copies of my book, Communication Wins, that I’ll be autographing and giving away during our booth appointments.
• We’ll have our new touch-screen HP computer with several vignettes promoting our communication, technology and video capabilities.
• We’ll be showing nine additional one-minute videos describing our capabilities and services.

I’m very excited about the opportunity to share our full capabilities with my fellow ISA members.

See you in San Antonio!

Steve