It has been one of my continual themes when talking with clients about their websites that their site needs to serve their business. When I work with a client, I look at their website as an extension of their business model. I take a look at their overall business and evaluate:

* How do they make their money?
* Who is their public or target audience?
* How can their public be promoted to?
* How can the web be used to help automate their business?

I'll listen to what they want to achieve with their website and then recommend options to help that website achieve the points above: making money, automate and promote to their target audience.

Anybody looking to put up a website for business purposes needs to look at this. Too many business sites are very poorly thought out and underutilized. A good website is a lot more than good design. A good design and some content means only that a website is acting as a glorified brochure. Its better than nothing and any business today which does not at least have that really needs to get on the ball. However, beyond design, you can look at how the site will achieve the points above.

Now, a business which is all web-based is very straight-forward in this department. A web-based business is going to want to collect payments from customers via the web, so we're going to want a secure payment system on that website. We also want that website to be well-designed so that it does not confuse people and attracts the customers' eyes to those things which make the business money. We're also going to want to discuss how the web can be used to promote. A business which is not web-based would want to consider what they can provide on the web to extend their business. Traditional brick-and-mortar businesses may have a storefront or may need to deal with clients in person, but what can they do on the web to extend their reach?

Promotion is paramount to success in business and on the web. A website can perform any of many promotional tasks such as:

* Collecting sales leads by asking visitors to fill out a form. Perhaps give them some free, valuable content in exchange for their information.

* Collecting email addresses for use on a mailing list.

* Auto-responders sending targeted emails automatically based on customer's indicated interests on a form.

* Providing metrics on customer interest using landing pages and keyword advertising.

* Running polls and surveys to find out what your potential customers want.

* Running free articles which educate your customers on the subject matter of your business and get them interested.

A website is a footprint on the internet which is viewable worldwide. Depending on the nature of your business, visitors located well away from you may not be that useful in terms of potential clientele. However, there is no reason why you cannot still gather information from them to use with your local clientele. After all, if they arrived to your website, they were interested enough to come. They are a public for you regardless of their location. Perhaps you can even find a way to change your business model to include these people which are not located locally to your business.

In terms of automation, keep something in mind. A web server is simply a computer. Computers are great at doing repetitive tasks that humans either hate or would find a huge waste of time. For this reason, it is always a good idea to look over those business functions which are repetitive and see if your website can serve to make your life easier. For example:



Entireweb Newsletter * October 17, 2006 * ISSUE #275
If you can't see images, click here to view this newsletter online * Printer-friendly version

Integrating A Website With Your Business

It has been one of my continual themes when talking with clients about their websites that their site needs to serve their business. When I work with a client, I look at their website as an extension of their business model. I take a look at their overall business and evaluate:

* How do they make their money?
* Who is their public or target audience?
* How can their public be promoted to?
* How can the web be used to help automate their business?

I'll listen to what they want to achieve with their website and then recommend options to help that website achieve the points above: making money, automate and promote to their target audience.


Anybody looking to put up a website for business purposes needs to look at this. Too many business sites are very poorly thought out and underutilized. A good website is a lot more than good design. A good design and some content means only that a website is acting as a glorified brochure. Its better than nothing and any business today which does not at least have that really needs to get on the ball. However, beyond design, you can look at how the site will achieve the points above.

Now, a business which is all web-based is very straight-forward in this department. A web-based business is going to want to collect payments from customers via the web, so we're going to want a secure payment system on that website. We also want that website to be well-designed so that it does not confuse people and attracts the customers' eyes to those things which make the business money. We're also going to want to discuss how the web can be used to promote. A business which is not web-based would want to consider what they can provide on the web to extend their business. Traditional brick-and-mortar businesses may have a storefront or may need to deal with clients in person, but what can they do on the web to extend their reach?

Promotion is paramount to success in business and on the web. A website can perform any of many promotional tasks such as:

* Collecting sales leads by asking visitors to fill out a form. Perhaps give them some free, valuable content in exchange for their information.

* Collecting email addresses for use on a mailing list.

* Auto-responders sending targeted emails automatically based on customer's indicated interests on a form.

* Providing metrics on customer interest using landing pages and keyword advertising.

* Running polls and surveys to find out what your potential customers want.

* Running free articles which educate your customers on the subject matter of your business and get them interested.

A website is a footprint on the internet which is viewable worldwide. Depending on the nature of your business, visitors located well away from you may not be that useful in terms of potential clientele. However, there is no reason why you cannot still gather information from them to use with your local clientele. After all, if they arrived to your website, they were interested enough to come. They are a public for you regardless of their location. Perhaps you can even find a way to change your business model to include these people which are not located locally to your business.

In terms of automation, keep something in mind. A web server is simply a computer. Computers are great at doing repetitive tasks that humans either hate or would find a huge waste of time. For this reason, it is always a good idea to look over those business functions which are repetitive and see if your website can serve to make your life easier. For example:

* Sending your email newsletters could easily be done using your web server. Click a button and email your entire mailing list. Easy.

* Auto-responders can take care of automatically emailing your customers relevant information at regular intervals.

* Automatically compile sales statistics and email them to you each morning (if you do web sales).

* Export sales transactions directly into your accounting software to avoid typing them all in manually.

There are a number of ways a web server can be used to serve a very real business function and actually do some of the work for you.

A lot of this comes under the heading of programming. Design is design, however making the site actually DO something means it has to be programmed. So, if you are skilled in this area, you can do it yourself. Or perhaps you can hire it out to somebody. Before any of that, though, look over your entire business and the website you have and see how it can be utilized to make your business easier to manage or actually drive in business. Unless your website is personal in nature, then it is through the lens of business that your site needs to be evaluated.

Okay, so we have all learned about the 4P's of marketing in undergrad: Product, Place, Price and Promotion. If not, you can open up one of your old marketing text books, blow off the dust and read about it there. The 6 C's, however, is a not a concept that replaces the 4 P's; rather, it just expands on the promotion element and provides a more granular approach to consumer marketing.

CUSTOMER:

In this day and age, a company's marketing strategy needs to be customer focused. It's about understanding the target consumer; their wants, needs and motivations. Not as demographics, psychographics or any other graphics, but as real people. Its understanding why customers do what they do (or don't do),when they do it and why they do it. Such knowledge is critical in marketing since having a strong understanding of buyer behavior will help shed light on what is important to the customer. It's about focusing on the target customer first and then working back to the brand. It's imperative that companies have mindshare before focusing on market share.

CONSISTENCY:

Companies need to maintain consistency in their message; a practice called integrated marketing communications - from packaging and advertising to sales promotion and publicity. This will maintain and reinforce a brand's personality and image in a real life context and avoid doing something brainless like changing the distinctive color of the UPS truck to orange. I am sure it's been talked about.

CREATIVITY:

Creativity is imperative to attract attention in a world cluttered with thousands of messages. Creativity means laying aside the rules, and engages in out-of-box thinking so that marketers can reach beyond logic and structure and tap into their imaginations.

* Creativity Informs: Marketing's responsibility to inform is greatly enhanced by creativity. Creativity makes marketing more vivid, and many researchers believe vividness attracts attention, maintains interest, and stimulates consumers' thinking.

* Creativity Persuades: The ancients Greeks created legends and myths about gods and heroes -symbols for humankind's instinctive longings and fears - to influence human behavior and thought. Today's marketers are doing the same thing; they are creating new myths, heroes and symbols like Ronald McDonald, the "Can You Hear Me Now" guy from Verizon, and more recently the Gecko from Geico Insurance.

* Creativity Reminds: Imagine using the same invitation, without any creativity, to remind people to try a particular product everyday for a month. The invitation would become stale very quickly. Only creativity can transform boring reminders into interesting, entertaining marketing communications. Nike is proof. Several commercials in a Nike campaign never mention the company name or even spelled it out on the screen. Each communication told a story. And, the only on-screen cue identifying the sponsor was a single "swoosh" logo inscribed on the final scene.

CULTURE:

All marketing communications needs cross-cultural research to be able to succeed. It's simple to see things from your own perspective, assuming that everyone else in the world thinks exactly like you and should understand what's so great about your product or service. Just reading about all the mistakes made by large corporations proves that even the most sizable and experienced marketers have made errors time and again.

One of the most famous examples is Coca Cola translating the name into Chinese without back-translating it ("bite the wax tadpole"), ultimately resulting in a horrible response from an insulted society. Marketing books are full of examples like these. As David Ogilvy, known as the Father of Advertising, states, "If you are trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language in which they think".

COMMUNICATION:

This one is basic. Consumers don't want to be "marketed to". Rather, they want to be "communicated with". Good marketing communication creates value with target customers, speaks in their language and tells your story. It's about building long term, trustworthy, and profitable relationships with your customers. As Seth Godin states, it's about reinforcing the lies that consumers tell themselves everyday (i.e. I look much better in these jeans from Abercrombie; they make me look sexy).
CHANGE:

Marketing is not just a business function, but a process. There is a beginning, middle, but there is never an end. Marketers must constantly CHANGE as society changes. They should never be afraid to try something new. Marketing today is not what it was 2 - 5 - or even 20 years ago. Marketing needs to be an evolving process that considers change in the world, economy, market, consumers; as well as internal change within the organization.

Conclusion (not the 7th C)

So there it is; the 6 C's of marketing - Customer, Consistency - Creativity - Culture - Communication and Change. I am sure that these will be published in every text book in the country within the next ten years and I will be a rich, well known author. Yeah right!