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Eliminating the Clutter on Your Website

At first glance, your site might not seen cluttered to you. Now you need to take a step back a pretend you are a visitor who has never been to your site. Is your message being conveyed easily or is it difficult to find among all the various changes and upgrades through the years.  This isn’t meant to say everyone’s website is a disaster.  I want to you to see if you can eliminate some of the useless clutter that has accumulated over the years.

Here are two areas you need to focus on if you want to remove the clutter.

Header/Logo

  • Does the header clearly show your logo and display who you are? This is your brand. Its needs to be clear and concise.  Without this nobody knows who you are.

Nav-bar

  • The navbar needs to be simple and direct.  Minimize the buttons. Take complete advantage of the dropdown menus, but keep it organize.  One of my favorite examples of a simple, well-organized nav-bar is Best Buy.

How do we remove the clutter? Not as difficult as it may seem.

  1. It is important to design the site from the customers perspective.  They don’t know where everything is like you do.  Ask a friend to take it for a test drive and try to break it or get lost within the site.  If a first time user can navigate from start to finish without getting lost, then the clutter has been removed from the navigation.
  2. The Nav-bar requires some basic data crunching to decide if its organize properly.  Use analytic’s to see what pages your visitors enter and exit on.  Also keep an eye on the visits by page breakdown.  This shows the most important pages to your visitors. Making the top pages easy to access is a key factor.
  3. Use WordPress.  Makes quick adjustments easy. Need help getting started?
  4. Do not make the logo so it dominates the valuable screen real estate.  I like to make the max height of a header/logo 160-200px.
Now head over to your site and look at it like its the first time you have been there.  Write down your thoughts.
Filed Under: Business Model Innovation, Digital Presence, Innovation, Weekly Innovation, WordPress Design Tagged With: , , , ,

Seven Words

Challenge.

Engage.

Interact.

Innovate.

Live.

Learn.

Connect.

Filed Under: Business Model Innovation, Digital Presence, Innovation, Journey, Weekly Innovation

Have You Thought About Tomorrow

Have you thought about your plan beyond today? How are your going to use your website to promote your new ideas, products or services? In the fast paced business environment, it is EXTREMELY important to have a short term and long term plan.  So what is the best way to approach tomorrow?

Filed Under: Business Model Innovation, Digital Presence, Innovation

The Value of Conversation

collaborate!Does your website “talk” to the visitor? Not literally speaking. As I witness and learn more about the new business environment, I see a recurring theme. Relationships. Conversations. There will always be someone who can do what you do cheaper and faster. How do you differentiate yourself from the growing pool of competitors? Interaction. Conversations. Relationships.

Tools to help your business and website interact with customers.

Social Media

I am not going to start ranting about all the different methods and tools out there. There is already enough blog posts that explain the value of all the different tools.  If all you do is sit and watch the Twitter and Facebook streams then you will never gain anything.  Create a conversation, jump into a conversation, even if it has nothing to do with your business and service.  Check out Linkedin Answers and see if you can share knowledge and create trust.

Sliders on the homepage

Simple tool that will communicate your message out in a short time period.  Get straight to the point and it will lock your visitor in.

Blog Comments

Reply when a visitor comments on a blog post.  The worst thing you can do is let it sit there and age.  Get it while it’s hot and interact with the reader.  Maybe they will make a point that you missed.

These are just a few tools that help create and nurture relationships.  Visitors want to know you are listening and will see your businesses value when you engage them.  How do you interact? Any other cool tools you use engage your visitors?

 

Filed Under: Business, Business Model Innovation, Innovation, WordPress Design Tagged With: , , , ,

Your Website Needs The Human Factor

Every website needs an identity that your visitors can relate to you and interact with. Social networks may put your face and thoughts everywhere, but does it give your website the “human factor”.  Some might ask, what is the human factor and why is this important?  The digital world has left the world of static websites in the dust.  Dynamic platforms, like WordPress, have created a new way to interact with your visitors.

What is the human factor?

Your website has the ability to passively and proactively interact with the visitor.

  • Passive: Information that explains your purpose and digital presence.
  • Proactive: Dynamic content that creates and nurtures thought. (The blog)

Why is it important?

A dynamic, interactive experience helps create repeat visitors.  Investing time into thoughtful content produces a fertile environment for comments and questions.

WordPress gives you the tools needed for a “human” website.  Take advantage of the blog and constantly look for new tools that allow you to proactively interact with your viewers.

I am currently investing more time in understanding BuddyPress in combination with GenesisConnect (affiliate link).  Instead of relying solely on others to create a social platform you can embed one into your website.

 

Filed Under: Business, Business Model Innovation, Genesis, Innovation, Journey, WordPress Design Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

The Art of Time Management

Random, slightly off topic thoughts from my usual subjects.

After taking the time to review my life and business, it is clear I need to go about improving my time management and remove distractions.   I have read many different blog posts about both issues. There has been plenty of practical knowledge but I think its time to custom tailor it for my busy life.

After I go through my daily routine, the plan is to analyze and optimize it.  When it is all said and done I want to hear your opinions.  Maybe even share some of your best practices.

Questions:

  • What are my daily, weekly, and monthly goals?
  • What are my distraction? How do I control and/or eliminate them?
  • Is creating a daily schedule worth it?
  • Metrics?

Before anything the plan is to track my time and activities for one week.

Do you have any resources or suggestions for time management? Please share.

Filed Under: Business Model Innovation, Innovation Tagged With:

New Company Website

Learning HTML has been an experience so far.  Enjoyable but extremely frustrating at times.  Been occupied with the task of updating the company website over the past few weeks.  Without any previous knowledge of html or any other web page coding language this has been challenging.

Until I complete this I will be taking a break from my blog post (which have been infrequent lately).  I am going to post the links for the site so any suggestions will be appreciated.

http://knottsco.com

Filed Under: Business, Business Model Innovation, Innovation

Differentiation

How do you differentiate yourself in a “Price” world? What steps are being taken to prevent the common stigmata of everything only revolves around the price?  What steps need to be taken to make you different from your competitors?

The above questions are tough to answer in the current market.  Due to the current environment it is more important then ever to take action.  It is important for each person within the sales force to create a Personal Brand. The goal is to have your name tied to key words such as, quality, dependability, value, etc.  To keep moving forward in differentiating yourself it is extremely important to document each event.  How did you lower the customers costs? What was done to increase their revenue?  Creating documentation builds up your personal brand and keeps you a step ahead.  How many times have you purchased a higher cost product due to the trust you have in the brand?

Important Step in Creating a Personal Brand:

  1. Document your value.  Directly link your personal brand to your customers bottom line.
  2. Market yourself.  Create an E-Rep (Check out Todd’s blog for greater incite into it)
  3. Never stop innovating your personal brand.  The competition will never give up.

Differentiate
Engage
Collaborate
Innovate
Deliver
Exceed

Filed Under: Business, Business Model Innovation, Innovation Tagged With: , , , , , ,

UID Day #2 – Solution Based Selling

Today’s class was “Solution Based Selling” presented again by Tim Underhill.  The main focus of class today was on the selling your solutions to the customer.  A percentage of customers may solely focus on price offers but others will go beyond that if there is a compelling reason.  How do you compel them to do business with you? Solutions that strategically produce value. Providing solutions is the best way to differentiate yourself from your competitors by giving you a competitive advantage and showing that you more than just  the “Price Guy”.

Steps in my Solution Process – D.E.C.I.D.E.:

  • Differentiate Yourself.  Market yourself as a solution provider.
  • Engage the prospective customer. Learn the customer’s objective.  What are their cost drivers? What are their objectives? You need to understand where you can provide a solution that will impact their cost and revenues.
  • Collaborate and Innovate. Create a solution WITH the customer.  Collaboration will create a long-term relationship that will be profitable for both parties.
  • Deliver results that show value. Measure and Record the results.
  • Exceed their expectations. Build a relationship that will last and create continuous business.

As in my previous post, it is extremely important you document EVERYTHING.  When the time comes you want to be able to show the customer you accomplished the objective, improve their revenue, and/or reduce their costs.

Success in solution based selling will result in a strategic business partnership and break you from being the “Price Guy”.

Let me know your thoughts and comments.

Filed Under: Business, Business Model Innovation, Innovation Tagged With: , , ,

UID Day #1 – Creating Competitive Advantage Through Total Cost Savings

Today’s class was “Creating Competitive Advantage Through Total Cost Savings” presented by Tim Underhill.  The class’s purpose was to explain the importance of documenting the value you create for your customers. What is the importance to documenting value? In the current economy it is extremely important.  You need to be able to justify your price when your competitors will cut yours by “X”%.   You can finally answer, “What have you done for me lately?”, with solid documented proof.  It is important to show the customer the increases in revenue and/or decrease in cost from the solutions you provide.

In a poll by Value Added Partners, end users were asked if the ability for a distributor to provide documented cost savings would enable the distributor to earn a larger portion of their business. 74% said YES!!!

How do you get the information needed from your customer to show the total cost savings and value you provide?
ENGAGE THE CUSTOMER! COLLABORATE! Learn about their strategic goals.  Understand their operation. What are their cost drivers? Listen.  I know it isn’t always possible to learn the customers true cost so making educated assumptions is important as well.

Is one Value Document enough? NO! As time passes it gets harder to show more value.  External factors can influence the customers market resulting changes of their needs.  In order to continue to provide value it is imperative to innovate and continuously improve your business solutions.  Documenting and showing the value to the customer will keep you ahead of your competition.

Another advantage of documenting your value is the ability to create case studies.  Case studies allow you to show prospective customers what value you can provide them.

Tomorrow’s class is “Proving Total Cost Saving”.

Filed Under: Business, Business Model Innovation Tagged With: , , ,