thejourney

Keep the Bad Guys Out

2011-03-02T21:37:00.000-08:00

Just when you thought we were getting a handle on the bad guys, they get tech. So, here's a few free software downloads you can use to protect your computer from the bad guys:

Microsoft® Windows® Malicious Software Removal Tool
Spybot Search and Destroy
Malware Bytes
Avast (antivirus)
PCTools Antivirus

Informed Pursuit

2011-02-05T20:45:00.000-08:00

Risk taking is part of the thrill in the business world. Business people that survive are those who take the time to calculate the risk and formulate alternate paths to mitigate damage before it happens – two very important exercises in the pursuit of greatness.

A wise man once told me, “the great ones adjust.” The great ones do indeed adjust – but greater ones take informed steps and have less painful adjustments.   Here are a few tips to consider along the informed pursuit:

Stop Guessing – Opinions are Expensive
Guessing is best done at a gambling table in Las Vegas. This is also the best testing ground for opinions. Business decision making, however, deserves a smarter approach. I’ve seen an enormous amount of money and time wasted on decision-by-opinion. With just a little information gathering before decisions are made, companies will be on an informed path, have a more productive staff and reap stronger returns.

Small Effort, Big Rewards
In a few short months of redesign and user testing, a company I consulted with increased their annual revenue by $6M (for them it was a 6% increase).   The process cycle we did was design, test, analyze, and change. A small sample of test data drove usability changes that significantly impacted the business output. It doesn’t take much to earn big rewards.

Big Heads Not Allowed
Check your ego at the door. This is no place for know-it-alls. The world of technology and user interaction is moving quickly. Information grows old faster these days. Be open to fresh perspectives and new data. Listen and learn from others.   Cooperation and teamwork is essential.

Plan, Project, Posture
It takes some measure of discipline in planning and positioning to remain successful. Whenever I start a new job I take a little time to understand the history and culture of the company. But I don’t linger on the past, it’s not healthy for a moving-forward company.   Capture the vision. Make goals and drive hard with a plan. Always look forward.

Primal Instinct Factors in Project Work

2010-11-20T21:23:00.000-08:00

The role of the project management requires primal instinct. Through the forest of the business, one must have a natural ability to identify the landmarks that define the business, analyze the landscape and scout the path without getting eaten by all the beasts along the way. Schooling helps, experience matters, but at the end of the day it seems the greatest success factor is the amount of raw instinctual talent. Let’s look at three factors: Awareness, Sense of Direction, and Agility.

Awareness

Pay attention. Listen. Observe. The best first step is to do nothing, except to watch and learn. Take notes. Gather gross amounts of information. Ask a lot of questions, even if you think you know the answer. Animals that survive are fully aware and alert, constantly organizing data from observation, and keenly in tune with everything happening around them. Information is essential to an analyst; awareness is what widens our perspective so we can correctly organize that information.

Sense of Direction

One who is fully aware will have a keen sense of direction, speed and timing of movements. The best second step is to gain a sense of direction. Note that I didn’t say ‘move’. Action is not prudent until we are certain about the direction and comfortable about what will result from our action. There is an amount of gut in setting a course. Some of it comes from experiences we’ve survived. But, sometimes we just know. It feels right. But don’t let feeling trump logic every time. It’s a dangerous place – proceed with caution, even after careful consideration and planning.

Agility

After stepping into action, be ever ready to dodge the bullet and adjust course. Even the best plans can get spoiled. Stuff happens. Change is sure. Someone who can adjust to unpredictable situations is the one that lives to take on the next project. Rigidity can sometimes make things easier to brake. Be agile enough to keep everything in tact while still moving forward.

Awareness, Sense of Direction and Agility are three primal and necessary traits for any project manager to be successful. Practice these to win every time.

Technology Put In It's Place

2010-08-12T00:20:00.001-07:00

Us geeks tend to get all caught up with technology, the web, and the irresistible amazement with every step we take deeper into reliance on these things. It’s easy to get this way, and it seems there’s no end in sight. But, can I have you take a step back… deep breath… and join me on this reality check?

My grandfather never owned a computer. He never used a touch-tone phone, and wouldn’t know what to do with satellite TV. You wouldn’t see a microwave in his kitchen or even a digital watch on his wrist. These things had no place – no purpose – no application in his world. He lived a very simple life and was really quite content with as little technology as possible… yet still managed to be successful and influential.

You’ll notice the logo I use for Journey Internet. ‘Journey’ is in a larger font and capitalized – ‘internet’ is of a lower font and in lower case. To me, this is how it should be. The journey – the steps along the path we take; the people we surround ourselves with; the goodness of life – these hold a much greater significance compared to the things we pile on ourselves to clutter our lives. Yes, at times technology is clutter.

A distraught mother watches her little 11 year old daughter die after a long struggle with cancer. A lady on her way to a wedding was in a car wreck that took her leg. A young man died from a severe head injury and left his family in utter despair. Technology, in all its greatness could not help any of these people or their families in the hour of their greatest need. They all discovered the most powerful thing in their life didn’t have a power button and it wasn’t connected to the Internet. The survivors in all these cases dug deep into the treasures they discovered along their journey – the non-technical treasures – and found things even more powerful and amazing than the advancing world around them.

If you must geek out – do it about the wonder of life, the little treasures of greater meaning you’ve discovered along your journey, and all the amazing people around you.

Sure, technology is ever expanding and gaining a greater hold on us – but I encourage you to take time to realize the greater amazement in the people and treasure we discover along the journey.

How to Convert Website Visitors - Dos and Don'ts

2010-08-10T12:28:00.000-07:00

Those who have had a web site already know that it’s not enough to have a web site out there. If your web site isn’t causing the phone to ring or orders to come in than it’s just taking up space on a server and it begs the question – what’s the point?

It is time to rise above mediocrity. It’s time to make your website work for you – not against you. Here are five Dos and Don’ts for converting web site visitors:

THE FIVE DON'TS

Don’t Follow Fads

I’ve met a lot of business owners, mindlessly following Internet fads. It’s interesting to watch - reminds me of high school. Here’s the rule: If it fits your marketing plan and you’ve formulated a real way to bring in customers - do it. If not, don’t. It might be fun for a while, but I guaranteed that you will eventually realize that you’re wasting precious time and resources which will start to show itself in what matters most - revenue generation. Establish and maintain a firm foundation - complaint code, strong SEO elements, smart designs, good usability, marketing integration, brand centered messaging, etc - these things are proven strategic elements in converting visitors and creating return customers. Fads? Not so much.

Don’t Look Cheap

Here’s where underestimating the power of perception comes into play. It’s quite simple. If you look cheap, then you are. If you look professional, then you are. If you look like you only have one customer, than it will be difficult to convince someone that you’re experienced. The question becomes: what type of customer do you want to attract?

Don’t Assume Anything

Converting and creating loyal customers is not a game of chance. It’s a process of purpose and intent. People are complex creatures. There is much to learn by tracking how people behave on web sites and in the purchasing process. Trends and patterns can be analyzed from web site traffic data. Surveys and user studies can reveal these patterns as well. It is on these data points we should base our decisions. Guessing and assuming when making business decisions is a very risky policy. Don’t assume the way people will react and how they will make decisions. Don’t expect to convert visitors to customers unless and until there is purpose and intent behind the effort. Study the data and only make moves based on a good analysis and verified information.

Don’t Hire an Amateur to do a Professional Job

I can hear it coming already. It’s a long series of yeah-buts. Yeah but we don’t have the money. Yeah but we can do this; it’s not that hard. Yeah but I don’t have the time to find someone good. Yeah but my friend was ripped off by a so-called professional. Get it all out. Release the bad energy.

Bring your yeah-buts to another party; they are not allowed in business. After seeing countless examples of disastrous results from substandard web design work done by amateur web designers, I can tell you this approach doesn’t pay the bills.

You have 10 seconds or less to gain the interest and trust of first time visitors to your web site. It’s just not worth the loss of revenue and reputation to skimp on putting your best foot forward when getting your web site built.

If you would hire a plumber to do your next colonoscopy, then by all means, have your secretary to do your web site. But if you want real results that come only through experience, hire a professional. Ask about their experience, look through their portfolio and talk to their clients. Have them work up a solution for you and ask many questions. Take just a little time to do it right.

Don’t Do Nothing

The reality for most business web sites is that the first year marketing budget for the web site should match or be greater than the cost of building the web site. By not putting any planned effort into the marketing effort, you should not expect to gain a whole lot from the web site. Doing nothing is not an option if success is part of the plan.

THE FIVE DOS

Be Motivational

Many web site home pages are filled with fluff that does nothing to motivate visitors to move deeper into the site. Other pages can also have motivational language and imagery, but the home page is by far the most important. Entice me to click into the site. Be irresistible. Capture my interest. Answer my question of “what’s in it for me.” This requires positive, constructive language. Avoid negative words.

Present a Clear Value Proposition

State the innovation of your service or product and don’t be shy about what value you bring to the customer. There are tangible values such as saving money or owning a more durable product. There are intangible values such as experience level, customer service or saving them time.

What values are most important to your customers? You can answer this by surveying your customer base. If reliable service is more important than lower cost, then lowering your price point won’t help much. It pays to know.

Create Incentive to Take Action

Every page on the web site should have a call to action. But if you want someone to act, give them something up in return. Reward your active visitors. For instance, if you want their email address, give them something they value more than the intrusion of an occasional marketing email from you.

Reduce Friction

Every process on the web site should be clearly understood, quick and easy. Here are a few ways to do that:

Minimize the information collected from customers.
There must be no programming errors on the web site.
Reduce wait times by using code that executes quickly and reducing the volume of images.
Make navigation very simple to understand.
Illustrate steps in the process.
Make clear and concise instructions and directions.

The processes on your web site are a reflection of how you conduct your business – don’t make things difficult. As no one wants to deal with a difficult person, no one wants to deal with a difficult web site.

Reduce Anxiety

Trust is a huge issue on line. The level of trust directly affects the volume of conversions. Nearly every day identity theft is in the news. Anxiety about giving out any personal information on line is growing. Therefore, it is becoming more and more important to build in layers of elements that together help gain the trust of site visitors.

Develop a well-written privacy policy that gives your customers the maximum amount of protection against unnecessary distribution of their personal information. Create links to this policy throughout the site and make it obvious whenever you are asking them for information.

Third-party verification services that offer ‘trust seals’ are also an effective way of gaining trust. Invest in these.

Another important step in reducing anxiety is to make your phone number and other contact information available. This lets them know you are a real business and it allows them to connect with a person - a big step in gaining trust.

CONCLUSION

Well, we haven’t covered everything here – but these Dos and Don’ts should get you on the right path toward improving your web site conversion rates. People and technology change quickly - it’s important to understand that maintaining strong conversion rates is a continual improvement process.

Smarter Money - SEO or Usability

2010-08-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

In Lane One we have SEO – Search Engine Optimizing – a favorite among Googlites.

In Lane Two we have Usability – an infrequent small business consideration.

Take your mark, get set…

Which of these should be the first consideration in making a web site more successful? Which is the best choice for the largest business impact? In this article I’ll attempt to set the case for what is the most logical and fiscally responsible approach in budgeting for SEO and Usability.

SEO

SEO is simply the process of improving ranking in online search engine results. This is typically accomplished through HTML code and content manipulations along with increasing the volume of links from other websites. It’s a long-term process that involves surveillance and maintenance. The cost for search engine optimizing varies, depending on the size of the site and the volume of research and analysis from the SEO consultant. Realistically, small companies should expect a minimum of $5000 for the first several months with ongoing maintenance costs that can total $5-10,000 per year. Some of this work can be done in-house; some of it may need to be contracted. Larger companies will spend $20,000 or more for the initial analysis work and execution plan development. Annual maintenance costs for larger businesses can reach into six digits.

USABILITY

What good is a web site if it’s not friendly to use? Studies through the years have shown consistently that the primary reason why sales don’t happen and people don’t come back to web sites is because they couldn’t find what they were expecting to find or it was difficult to navigate. These numbers are very significant – upward of 75% of first time visitors don’t engage the business and don’t come back to the site. Improving usability would make for stronger customer interaction and interest, higher conversion rates and greater customer satisfaction and loyalty – translate: greater revenue generation. The first step in making a web site more usable is to find out what is making is unusable – this is most often accomplished through ‘user testing’. User testing is accomplished through a variety of methods, but the basic premise is that users are given an objective when they first get to the site, then they are observed in their attempt to accomplish the objective. The cost for user testing a website varies per site. An average size small business site takes approximately 40 hours for first time testing, which includes planning, creating test plans, recruiting users, conducting the test, analyzing the results and writing the report. An experienced consultant can have this delivered in a week at a cost of approximately $3000. But that’s not the total expenditure; don’t forget to add in the cost of re-design based off the recommendations for improvement. This, like SEO, is not a one time effort. Usability testing and measurement should be built into an annual budget as part of web site maintenance. If usability engineering is conducted as part of the original design the overall cost is substantially less. Large web sites do take considerably more time and require larger budgets. The smarter approach to larger sites is to consider testing on specific processes or objectives on the web site.

THE LOGICAL APPROACH

According to a recent study from Harris Interactive, about half of all searches are conducted for the purpose of finding non-business related information, like hobbies, news, entertainment, jobs and directions. And so it is quite reasonable to expect that a good portion of people who browse to a web site via a search engine are not seeking to engage in a business transaction. It is important to understand that search engines bring a great deal of unqualified business traffic – that is, those that are not interested in purchasing and don’t intend to engage in a financial transaction for a product or service – they are simply just looking for information. The traffic analytics will prove this. Simply look at the depth of the paths taken into the website from search engine visitors – typically most paths are very shallow – one or two pages deep, not significantly contributing to the return on investment for SEO.

Although it is true that a greater volume of visitors will eventually bring a greater number of customers, consider the costs and be careful to calculate return on investment over very specific periods of time.

Many business owners will put a great deal of time and money into SEO with little orno consideration for usability. Having good SEO and bad (or even marginal) usability seems to be an illogical approach. Bringing large numbers of people to the site only to disappoint them is a bad formula that actually serves to lower both long and short-term qualified site traffic (remember, people talk more about bad experiences than good ones).

I suggest a more logical approach: Spend the money on usability and good, relevant content before committing to a dedicated SEO effort. If usability is done well and if content is well written and in the appropriate volume, a good portion of the SEO effort will happen naturally (assuming basic search engine friendly code is deployed along with the good content). This will reduce the need and cost for the SEO effort. Some SEO effort is still recommended – but with good usability, SEO comes at a much greater economy.

Blog On!

2010-08-10T10:33:00.000-07:00

So, I decided to start a blog. I’ve been toying with the idea for some time now, not being one to geek out on the latest gadget. I don’t hang out on the edge very often. The edge can get dangerous – one step away from disaster. My dad broke out in sweats when we played with the edge of anything. So, blame it on heredity. We often do; maybe too often.

All right; so, truth be told, I’m a little conservative. I’m an observer. And it seems this blog thing caught on and we’ve actually found a meaningful purpose for it (I’m a master of the obvious.).

That’s good. I’m glad. Pop Rocks were cool until one too many of the less advanced decided to over indulge. We’ve learned the boundaries and have outgrown the excitement of Pop Rocks, and I’m sure this blog thing will follow the human pattern as well. It’s the way of the world. It’s the way of technology and the web. But, for now, we’ll have fun with it. I’m in!

Quickly, before I loose your attention with my rambling, my synopsis on blogs, twitter, social media outlets, and the long list of faddish technology toys: No doubt, these things have application and purpose, at least for a time to some measurable degree; and they hold important places along the journey of our technology pathway as we plow through all this uncharted territory. These things should be explored and cultivated and stretched and adopted. It’s all a part of discovery and advancement; and that’s what creates the excitement generated by these things – even to the ungeekable among us – it becomes more than a toy; these things invade our life and affects our lifestyles in ways unpredictable. And without question there is money to be made in toyland – so, for all those good reasons, by all means good friends, blog on!