David Terrar gave a presentation on website design and securing business. He discussed understanding marketing in 2014, setting goals for the website, understanding the audience, and creating useful and engaging content. Terrar also covered search engine optimization, blogging, social media, content management systems, and putting the customer first with a well-designed website that works on all devices.

1. Website design to secure business
or
Yes – I’ve got a website!
(but is it any good
and does it actually work?)
A lightning fast ride with David Terrar
(40 slides in 20 minutes!)
– D2C & Agile Elephant
Wandsworth Enterprise Workshops and ICAEW
17 September 2014

2. Agenda
• First we have to set the scene
• Do you understand Marketing in 2014?
• This website - what’s it for?
• What does your audience actually do?
• What is good web design?
• What about SEO – do I trust these gurus?
• Blogs & social media – any use?
• Do you have a decent CMS?

3. Hugh MacLeod – gapingvoid.com

5. 2004
2005
2006
2007
2010
2010
2011

6. 2007
2010

7. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXV-yaFmQNk

9. http://www.gapingvoidart.com/gallery/all-roads-lead-to-mobile/

12. Recommended reading
Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing out of Sync?
& Tribes – Seth Godin

13. The Cluetrain Manifesto
There's a new conversation
between and among your market and your workers. It's making
them smarter and it's enabling them to discover their human
voices.
You have two choices.
You can continue to lock yourself behind facile corporate words
and happytalk brochures.
Or you can join the conversation.
Still valid 15 years on!
http://cluetrain.com/

14. Old Marketing New Marketing
Limited number of media outlets Countless media outlets
Limited physical retail outlets Countless online retail outlets
Emphasis on horizontal success (hits) Emphasis on vertical success (niches)
Marketing-to-consumer communication Consumer-to-consumer communication
Barrier between consumers and makers Permeability between consumers and makers
Spam Permission
Product line limited by factory Product line limited by imagination
Long product cycles Fads
Market share Fashion
Features Stories
Advertising a major expense Innovation a major expense
Large overhead = stability Small overhead = low risk
Customer support Community support
Focus groups Launch and learn

15. Social Media is
Counter-intuitive
Communications Media Social Media
Space defined by Media Owner
Brand in control
One way / Delivering a message
Repeating the message
Focused on the brand
Entertaining
Company created content
Space defined by Consumer
Consumer in control
Two way / Being a part of a conversation
Adapting the message/ beta
Focused on the consumer / Adding value
Influencing, involving
User created content / Co-creation

16. think Business first
• What are your business goals?
• How can a website help you reach those business
goals?
• Who is your audience?
• What are they looking for?
• Who's going to write the content?
• How will the site be kept up to date?
• How do you drive more traffic to the site?
• How do you get people to take action once they've
visited your site?

17. "If web pages are going to be effective
they have to work most of their magic at
a glance" - Steve Krug

18. How long to judge your website?
50 Milliseconds!
http://www.nature.com/news/2006/060109/full/news060109-13.html

20. F-Shaped Pattern
For Reading Web Content
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/reading_pattern.html

21. They don’t read it the way you want!
• Users won't read your text thoroughly
• The first two paragraphs must state the most
important information
• Start subheads, paragraphs, and bullet points
with information-carrying words
• Make headings/language obvious!

22. They don’t make optimal choices
• They don’t consider all the available options
• They blunder on with the first reasonable
option

23. They don’t bother to figure out
how things work
• They don’t read instructions
• They muddle through

24. http://sensible.com/dmmt.html

26. Responsive Design

27. Design ingredients
• Simple layout
• Centered orientation
• Design the content, not the page
• 3D effects, used sparingly
• Soft, neutral background colours
• Strong colour, used sparingly
• Cute icons, used sparingly
• Plenty of whitespace
• Nice big text

28. Design tips
• Recognise every page is a home page
• Faster is always better
• Simple navigation, never let them get lost
• Use rich media, but host it on YouTube, Vimeo
• Use social media sharing
• Make search easy
• Use SEO techniques with care

29. Mistakes you can make
• Believing people care about you and your site
• Overcomplicating or obscuring your point
• Making it too different – style over substance
• Too many moving parts, distractions or irritations
• Flash or graphics which should be text (SEO)
• Thinking your website is your marketing strategy
• Not enough brilliant content

30. Search Engine Optimization
“Make your site useful and tell people about it”

31. SEO tips
• Content is King (and start a blog)
• Keywords, keywords, keywords
• Create great page titles
• Use meta descriptions
• Use meta keywords
• Use H1 titles in your pages
• Create SEO (and user) friendly URLs
• Bullets, link anchor text and image titles

32. SEO tips
• Link to others (and get them to link to you)
• Get your content syndicated by others
• Don't forget to link back to yourself
• Use Social Media as part of your publishing and
distribution
• Create a site map
• Avoid Flash
• Analyse how you are doing
• Use a Content Management System

33. The business of blogging
Blogs work when they are based on:
1. Candor
2. Urgency
3. Timeliness
4. Pithiness and
5. Controversy

34. http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/files/whos_there.pdf

35. http://www.wishfulthinking.co.uk/2011/11/18/business-blogging/

36. Social Media Channels
Where does your target audience hang out?
Go there and join the conversation!

37. Why use a CMS?
• You are no longer dependent on the web designers making changes for
you.
• Changes can be made any time they are needed, day or night. This is
increasingly important as your business comes to rely on the website as a
communications channel.
• All the technical details are simply handled by the CMS, allowing anyone
to manage and update the site.
• Multiple staff can keep the site up to date, instead of being restricted to
just one person. The CMS will track who is doing what, avoiding potential
confusion.
• You can even ensure that each staff person can only update the sections
of the site they are responsible for.
• The CMS ensures that all the pages are consistent in design, and will build
all the menus and other
• navigation for you.
• The many other powerful features of the CMS allows the site to grow in
sync with your business.
http://www.steptwo.com.au/papers/cmb_needcms/index.html

38. CMS options
…but there are 100s!

39. Summary
• Start with why?
• Put your customer first
• Don’t make me think!
• Does it work on a smartphone?
• Content, content, content
• Start a blog
• Use social media
• Find an agency who’ll teach you to fish!

40. References
http://gapingvoid.com/2009/09/13/the-nobody-cares-print-for-sale-individually/
http://www.gapingvoidart.com/gallery/all-roads-lead-to-mobile/
http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2013/11/5/mobile-is-eating-the-world-autumn-2013-edition
http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Meatball-Sundae-marketing-transforming-business/dp/0749929480/ref=sr_1_1?ie=http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tribes-We-need-you-lead/dp/0749939753/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1346395254&http://www.sensible.com/dmmt.html
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dont-Make-Me-Think-Usability/dp/0321344758
http://www.diliaranasirova.com/assets/PSYC579/pdfs/05.2-Marcus.pdf
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/files/whos_there.pdf
http://www.wishfulthinking.co.uk/2011/11/18/business-blogging
http://www.steptwo.com.au/papers/cmb_needcms/index.html
These links for reference only
Not for reading

41. Contact details
David Terrar
D2C & Agile Elephant
p: +44 (0)1727 866309
m: +44 (0)7715 159423
e: dt@d2c.org.uk or david@theagileelephant.com
w: www.d2c.org.uk and theagileelephant.com
skype: david_terrar
twitter: http://twittter.com/DT @DT
linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidterrar
blog: http://biztwozero.com