Presentation - HBBA Apr 6, 2007

This evening I am going to tell you a little about TIMR Web Services. The rest of the time, instead of telling you how good we are, I will make a brief presentation on what you should be doing to market your product online.

I developed an interest in computers, first as a hobby and later as part of my job. I built my first micro computer in 1978. And, as computer technology progressed I kept up, as best I could, with some formal training, but mainly "working things out" for myself.

Teri Ingram, my partner in TIMR Web Services, started her career in Graphic Arts, attending Mackay Technical Institute where she took courses in Graphic Design and the Macintosh OS. While working at the Comox District Free Press and later at Parksville News, Teri held a variety of positions but was always the "go to" person for Macintosh support.

Teri and I met when we were enrolled in the Computer Science Diploma program at North Island College where we both graduated in 2005.

We started TIMR Web Services last year. I had been doing some custom programming and realized I couldn't take on the big jobs by myself. I needed to partner with some one who could not only do the code, but could also do the design. Teri was my first choice and TIMR Web Services was born.

Right away we made our first big mistake - we tried to do too many things. We quickly realized we needed to focus on one area. We looked at a number of things but always came back to business websites. Particularly sites for small and medium enterprise.

We saw that while a large percentage of small and medium enterprises had websites the sites did not seem to be effective sales tools. Further, the sites were using older production techniques that don't allow for easy maintenance or upgrading.

TIMR Web Services provides a whole range of services beyond web design. At TIMR Web Services, our goal is not only to give you a great looking website, but one that is easy to maintain, update and contributes to your bottom line.

In doing presentations, you are supposed to build up to your main points. But since I don't want to run out of time, I will give you the most important thing first.

Online is just a delivery system, nothing more. It is not a magic road to riches. It is just a delivery system.

Marketing is marketing. Everything you learned in "Marketing 101" still applies. So if any of you have Jackie's handout from last month, just put Internet Marketing on the top.

Applying that knowledge to online sales is part of what we do at TIMR Web Services.

There are a number of reasons for developing an online presence. The most common are product information, generating leads, and online sales. There are also opportunities to reduce operating costs by moving some of your business functions online.

Decide what you want for a web presence before you hire us. Also, have some idea of how your web presence fits into your marketing plan.

There is an industry term, "Field of Dreams" marketing. It come from the line in the movie, "If you build it, they will come." It only works in Hollywood. Your website MUST have a specific purpose that fits your marketing plan. Otherwise you are wasting your money.

The next thing need is do you find a domain name.

Two things to remember: domain names are cheap and the good ones are gone.

Good domain names are short, easy to spell (actually hard to misspell) and contain your company or brand name.

We chose to brand our service, so TIMR.ca worked quite well. If you are using your company name, try and register the .ca, .com and .mob extensions. Even though you have multiple domain names, you don't need multiple websites. You can either park the name (that is, not do anything with it) or have multiple domain names that all "point" to your one site.

Just one "techie" point. I am not a big fan of "free" web hosting sites. They all have limits either on what programs you can run or how much traffic your site can handle. Our hosted website has unlimited traffic, 30GB of storage and all the program options a small business could ever want costs under $100.00 per year.

The cost of setting up the website will vary depending on what the site is used for and how many pages the site contains. However, the price will be less than running an weekly ad in the local newspaper.

If you are doing online sales, consider the cost of remodeling a "bricks and mortar" outlet in estimating the cost of a website. Expect to pay the same amount for website. While this may seem high, since it is a one time cost and overhead is virtually zero your 3 year ROI can be much better.

Finally, if you are selling online, before you hire us - please "DO THE MATH". We would rather build you a great information site than one doing online sales where you lose money on each sale. The "New Economy" of the dot com era never existed. If it takes you 10 min to process an order for an item with a $2.00 profit, you are making $12.00 an hour, no matter how many items you sell.

Since we are running out of time I am just going to give you some "short snappers":

• Turn off the graphics: Javascript and Flash on your browser. Does it still make sense? This is how the visually impaired and search engines "see" your site?
• Sell yourself first. Tell visitors who you are. Give them a reason to trust you by telling your story (Jackie's first rule for marketing).
• Tell your product's story. Make your site the online authority on your product or service. Para-phrasing Tom Peters - "The product with the best story wins".
• Test and measure. Measure everything, not just unique visits. Measure where the visitor came from, both the referring website and where they live. Measure how long they spent on each page, even what type of computer system they are using. Measure it all.
• Do a split run. Half the customers to one version of a page, half to another. Which worked best? Why?
• Make a change then "test and measure".
• Use action words. Every page should lead the visitor to your website's goal. Whether that is to read a specific page or buy your product.
• At least one product, item or service should be visible on each page. Don't make the visitor search to find out what you are selling. Make it clear.
• Partner big. Amazon is the world's largest online retailer. They stay that way by innovative ideas such as their web store. This a great ways for small businesses to increase their market mix for online sales.
• Partner small. Share the setup costs by creating an online shopping mall with other HBBA members.
• Have an RSS feed - a news feed that automatically tells subscribers when you add a new item to your website.
• Keep your site fresh. Add new items on a regular basis.
• Grow your site organically. Add material that people want to link to.
• Make your site the authority on your product or service.
• Use the social linking sites such as Digg, Reddit, etc.
• "Turn your customers into salespeople" - Seth Godin
• Describe your product in eight words or less.
• Podcast - it's easier than you think, particularly if you own a Macintosh.
• Use Youtube. Digital videos are easy to make. Make one on how your product is used.
• Blog, blog, blog.
• Use MySpace.
• Blog, blog, blog.
• Cross browser compatibility. Microsoft has 80% of the browser market. You would be surprised how many sites turn away the other 20% of their customers. BTW, IE5.5, 6 and 7 are not 100% compatible.
• Newsletters are still a cost effective marketing tool.