When Building Your Website, Call In Your MVP; And I Don’t Mean Your Most Valuable Player.

engineering diagrams

If you are running a business chances are you either have a presence on the web or will in the future. For many businesses, especially those just starting out, a simple out-of-the-box website solution may be all that you need to meet business and marketing goals. But for other businesses looking to capitalize on the strengths of the internet and emerging technologies, a custom website or application can be far more worthwhile. Making the transition to a web-based app is easy for some and difficult for others, but there are ways to avoid spending loads of cash on specialized labor to end up with a web product that does not yield a return on your investment. The solution is to let the MVP drive the process. No, not the Most Valuable Player; the Minimal Viable Product. Find out how this iterative approach can save you a ton of time and money and keep you from wasting any.

Before You Build Your Website Or Tackle A Redesign, Read This: How To Do It Right The First Time

dartboard

Whether you don’t have a website at all, are ready for a makeover or upgrade, or went down the “my son’s friend’s father’s nephew knows a guy who knows web design” route only to regret it later, I’m about to share with you some practical insight into the reality of building a website. Find out how to do it right – the first time – before you spend your valuable time and money.

5 Questions With Claude Blanc, President & Business Coach, CHB Associates: How To Thrive In A Difficult Economy

Claude Blanc

At one time, he led international corporations. Now, he’s a local business owner who coaches other local business owners. Claude Blanc offers a unique insight into what it takes to overcome challenges and thrive, even in a difficult economy.

What We Can Learn About Marketing From Ralphie’s Aunt Clara

disappointment opening gift

Holiday gift giving and marketing actually have a lot in common. They both fill needs, solve problems, make life easier, and hopefully, make people happy. To make either work, you have to know a little bit about who you’re reaching and think about what makes them happy.

Whoohoo! Someone filled out your contact form! …now what?

hand cursor clicking send button

For a lot of small businesses, seeing that contact form submission come in is a little like having a birthday. It’s a gift wrapped in an email. It says someone noticed your website and liked it enough to ask for more. So once the jolt of excitement wears off, what do you do? Call your prospect? Send an email? Stick the message in a follow-up folder and forget about it for a month?

100 Mojitos will help your marketing and sales

mojito

Businesses often fail at establishing goals. This is a serious mistake because setting goals is critical for knowing if a process, product or service is succeeding. Enter the 100 mojitos. My favorite restaurant is Victor’s Cafe in New York City. Needless to say, they make a mean mojito. But how many mojitos does it take to make a successful day? As it turns out, 100.

5 (more) things to ask before you hire a web developer: the wrapup edition

question marks

Before writing this post I did a quick scan online to see what questions other people were suggesting. What I found interesting was that the questions leaned toward the technical and practical aspects of development, but my questions lean toward the professional and “service side” of development.

Want to hire a web developer? Find out if they proactively offer advice.

question mark in notebook

When you hire a developer, you should be thinking beyond the rote development of your site to its potential. There are plenty of people who are proficient in HTML, CSS, SEO or [insert acronym and/or technology here] but that doesn’t mean they’re going to build you a successful website.

Want to hire a web developer? Find out who’s responsible when things go wrong!

see no evil monkeys

This is not the same thing as “who’s in charge” or “who’s the boss”. And I mean this in a very literal sense, not as in, “is my web developer a responsible person who can get the job done?” I mean, very specifically, when something goes wrong, when there’s a problem, a delay, an issue, a bug or some other unforeseen event, ask yourself this: who you gonna call?

Want to hire a web developer? Find out who answers the phones!

phone dial

You’re ready to take your web presence to a new level and you’re looking to hire a company – the right company – to help you do it. But it can be challenging to navigate through the differing opinions, ideas, processes and price points of competing web development companies and almost impossible to make an apples-to-apples comparison when there are so many widely diverse options available.