Add more content.

There — I said it. The dirty little not-so-secret of the website industry is that you have to have content your users want. What kind of content do they want? It depends on your business. How do you find out? Go back to step 1 and look at the stats.

Before I go on, I should say that if you already have a large sales team and you want them to continue to do all the heavy sales lifting, you don’t necessarily need to do this. But, if you don’t have a dedicated sales staff, or you want to supplement the staff you have, then there’s no getting around it. You need to add more content. OK–Back to stats.

The stats are going to tell you a lot about your website and why people visit. Start by looking at the query strings, then look at what pages are most popular within a session. Is it exactly what you thought it would be? Maybe, but maybe not. The first content you should add should be built around what you’re users are already visiting.

That’s the easy part. Now it gets harder. You have to use your imagination. Based on the stats, and based on your knowledge of the customer, what is it that people want from you? That’s what you have to start creating content around. Make no mistake–this is work and it’s difficult, a process of trial and error. But it’s definitely what your visitors want. Visitors go to the web to find information. You must give them something to find.

Now it gets harder still. You have to create this content that people want, with a minimum of sales messages, and you have to give it away. That’s right–no registration required, no fee, not even a lot of hype about your product. Just solid information that you, as the expert on your product or service, can use to help them.

Does this strategy work? Well, yes and, unfortunately, I didn’t come up with it. See this little sales book I’ve been reading?

It’s all that guy. The thing is, you have to treat your website like your best, most knowledgable sales rep. People talk to it all the time–it needs to have something useful to say back. And “useful” is defined by the customer. Provide value to them first, and you’re more likely to get a meaningful response. That’s what creating this useful content is all about.

If you’re lost most small business websites, you won’t do this. It is a lot of work. But if you do it, I promise it will pay off. People will stay on your page longer, they’ll visit more pages and they’ll take action more regularly.

There’s another bonus that goes with this: more content means there’s more good stuff for search engines to find. But that’s another step.

Come back for more.

Forbes’ Video Network has an interesting video on their website about … adding video to your website. Great minds think alike? Or, it’s just a good idea.

Check it out here.

This one is a guy from BBDO talking about interactive advertising. Worth a couple of your minutes.

Welcome back! Or, if you’re like me and never really leave, hello again! Here are two very cool books I picked up over the weekend.

First is the sales manna.

My brother (yes, we did his site) mentioned this one to me. “Jeffrey Gitomer’s Little Red Book of Selling. 12.5 Principles of Sales Greatness.”

What’s so good about it? Good attitude, good advice, good perspective. The book is a quick read, filled with lots of pictures for those of us with short attention spans and doesn’t seem to require that you sit down and read from front to back. Open it up, get some manna, and go close that deal!

One of the things he talks about here is Googling yourself aka ego surfing. Here’s mine–they’re all me. Go ahead — google yourself. Where do you come up? If you’re not first, you should be.

Next up is the business mojo.

I’ll start with a true confession: I love Tom Peters. Ever since I read In Search of Excellence I’ve loved his stuff. Why? Probably the celebratory approach he takes. Tom’s just one of 33 writers behind a little book called “The Big Moo”.

Short little snippets from a whole bunch of really cool people on how to make work more interesting and how to do a better job. Also in the group are Malcolm Gladwell and Jay Gouliard. I just now opened up to the middle: “Fear vs. Anxiety.” A nice one pager (on page 51). Here’s an excerpt:

Fear saves our lives in the jungle, in the streets and event at the doctor’s office. Fear is one of the most useful emotions you’ve got.

Anxiety, on the other hand, is a killer. Anxiety is the false fear that corrupts your life. Anxiety is what happens when you imagine possible negative outcomes instead of embracing the reality of right now.

So that’s it. Happy Monday! Talk to you tomorrow.

P.S. The only bad thing about using the work “Mojo” in a title is that now my wife will have to put up with my bad Austin Power’s immitation for a week. Sorry sweetie!

So it’s the weekend and you’re ready to start your website. You take a look around and suddenly realize all of the choices you need to make. This quick article will guide you through those choices with an eye toward keeping ongoing costs down.

Hosting: Linux or Windows?

Now unless you’re from another planet, you’ve heard of Windows and may be more inclined to go with it because you’ve heard that Linux is hard. However, you should keep in mind that, unlike when you work on your PC, you’ll spend very little time interacting with the operating system on your webhost. Also, whether you use Linux of Windows, you’ll have to interact with the host in the same way. So which one is right?

Go with Linux, unless you have a reason not to. Linux is the 800lb gorilla of the web hosting world. It’s installed all over the place, all web developers know how to use it and it’s generally more reliable than Windows. MORE IMPORTANTLY: there are a ton of free scripts available that work well on Linux hosts, but not on Windows.

There are a couple of situtations when you should choose a Windows host. First, if you’re planning on publishing a Microsoft Access database to the web, you’ll need a Windows host. Second, if you are planning on using a VB or VB.NET application, you have to use Windows. If this all sounds like technobabble, stick with Linux.

Hosting Package: How much storage space? How much data transfer?

This is a very confusing part of hosting. Providers throw all of these numbers at you, but you have very little way of correlating those to your business goals. The best idea is to start small and cheap, unless you have a good reason to start with a more robust package.

If you’re starting a simple marketing site, the most basic hosting package is probably fine. It should be less than $10 per month and will likely include enough storage and transfer for your needs.

If you’re starting a community site, you’ll need a mid level package, one that includes a database and some scripts. You should pay less than $20 per month for this.

If you’re starting a site with streaming videos or some other special feature, you’ll need some special hosting. Call your preferred host and talk to them about your needs. They’ll steer you in the right direction.

Construction: Should you build your site with Website Tonight, Publisher, FrontPage or DreamWeaver?

Now that you have a host, you need to create some content. How should you do it? My advice is to either use the simplest free tool or get the best. Stay away from the middle ground.

The simplest free tools are like GoDaddy’s “Website Tonight,” a way to build your site online with a browser and a mouse. You won’t get the world’s greatest website, but you will have a good start that you can use for now. When you’re ready to invest a little more, you can rebuild it using the best tool.

The best tool is Macromedia’s DreamWeaver. DreamWeaver is what we use and it’s great. It’s also expensive. You’ll spend a few hundred dollars on it and it takes some time to learn. However, the results will be useful for the long term and won’t need to be rebuilt. Adobe’s GoLive is — or should I say was — also a good choice. “Was” because Adobe bought Macromedia and I’ll bet that DreamWeaver will become their only website authoring tool.

Which brings me to the tools in the middle, like Publisher and FrontPage. Why should you stay away from them? My experience is that websites produced with these tools often, but not always, take longer to build, require a financial investment, and then need to be scrapped when you get serious about your website. Unlike free tools, which you also will probably choose to scrap, you had to invest in these midlevel software packages and spend time learning how to use them.

A special note on FrontPage. FrontPage is not necessarily a bad tool, it’s just not a good one. What’s the difference? Well, it will put up a decent looking site, but it makes maintenance on that site more expensive and more time consuming. The code in the background is … yucky, for lack of a better word. Also: FrontPage requires special “extensions” on your webhost. Most webhosts support these in both Linux and Windows. However, they get corrupted and need to be reinstalled on a regular basis, adding to your site’s maintenance requirements.

Language: HTML or SHTML or PHP or ASP or JSP?

Note: if you’re using an online tool like Website Tonight, you don’t have a choice in this.

What are all these? They’re variants on how to build a website, but they all do essentially the same thing: describe how text and images should be combined as a webpage. But the way they do it, and the flexibility they offer, varies quite a bit. They all incude HTML and you’re really only concerned with how you name your files. If you know how to use each of these, this article is not for you.

The best choice here is PHP–hands down. PHP allows scripting and a bunch functions that will make your life easy in the long run. Even if you don’t use them now, simply naming the files on your site with a “.php” extension adds flexibility to your site.

Why not HTML? HTML is fine, but it doesn’t give you a lot of server side flexibility. PHP lets you use all of HTML, buit adds server side preprocessing. This includes scripts, databases and more. Very nice.

Why not SHTML, ASP or JSP? These all do the same thing as PHP, but aren’t as widely supported and require special host configuration. ASP and JSP are better for industrial strength web applications than web sites–too complex for what you’re probably trying to get done.

That’s it–get started!

OK, now you have some basic advice on the main decisions you have to make. Contact me if you have any questions–I’m here to help.

Forbes Magazine has an interesting cover story on blogs this month. I cover the story from a different angle on my other blog, but I think one piece of advice they gave is particularly useful for business website operators: “start your own blog”!

Why?

Precisely for the reason they mention: “adding your voice to the mix.”

My goal in seconding this recommendation is different than theirs. Forbes recommendation is a reactionary tactic, a way to fight back against negative or incorrect blog smears. That’s why I conclude that Forbes doesn’t get it. By the time you want to “fight back,” it will be too late to start a blog.

Forbes points out that there are a 100k new blogs started every day. 100,000. 50 million US Internet users visited a blog in just the first quarter of 2005. In May 2005, there were 10m blogs. By November? 20,000,000. (That seems a bit high–but cut it in half and it’s still huge. Forbes cites various sources. I’ve left out the stats that seem IMHO reactionary or inflammatory.)

Instead of getting a blog as a defensive measure, get a blog as a communications medium of choice. Get a blog as a powerful, next generation way to tell your story in your words and on your terms. Get a blog as a way to help people get to know you and your organization in a unique and meaningful way.

Time for a shameless plug. We can help you connect a blog to your website, with the correct look and feel, usually for less than $100. Just contact me to get started.

Blogs are out there. They’re not going away any time soon. You need one. Add it to your to do list.