Sunday, December 20th, 2009
Marty Shmanka asked:
Professional website designers pride themselves on creating a visually attractive piece of work. It is actually a very unique skill set brought on by the internet where a website designer needs to not only know about what looks good and works smooth, but also the variety of programming languages behind designing a website. A website these days can be powered by not only HTML, but XHTML, CSS, Perl, ASP, VBScript, Java, Javascript, SQL and of course FLASH.
Flash programming, now more than 10 years old was first developed by an ingenious company called Macromedia which is now owned by once rival, Adobe. The value of FLASH is its ability to deliver multimedia motion graphics for animation and interaction on the web but using the least amount of memory possible, thus making its programmers highly sought-after for upper-end website construction.
So as a small business owner you may have run into a “FLASHY” website in your surfing travels and been in awe (ok, jealous) of how great they look. Well the thing is really, I have seen thousands of small business websites with expensive Flash programming and immediately thought to myself, “What a complete waste of money!”
Creating and designing your small business website using all the latest software, enhanced graphics and in depth programming will almost certainly lead you to eventually lose interest in your own website, commit you to future invoice headaches for every little update you need to make, and cluster your website with a slew of others in your market that are equally as glamorous as they are ineffective.
You do not need a glamorous, gadget-filled website to get a customer to sign up for your email newsletter. You need an incentive. Surfers (potential customers) might be impressed with your website, but you will never impress them more than the next business which has one-upped you, yet again in the Flash department. It’s just a silly waste of time and money. Surely as a small business owner you can see through that.
Give your prospective customer a reason to be interested. In exchange for their email address you can send them a dinner-for-two coupon if you are a restaurant. You can offer them a 15 point safety check on their next oil change. You can catch their interest with a set of free labels for their wine making project. You can offer a free wash and dry with next hair cut. The bottom line is you have to put a financial incentive out there for them because once you have their contact information the likelihood of that web-surfer becoming your customer one day soon is radically multiplied.
Therein lies your distinct advantage over your competition. Their website may be full of bells and whistles, but yours is full of profit.
Professional website designers pride themselves on creating a visually attractive piece of work. It is actually a very unique skill set brought on by the internet where a website designer needs to not only know about what looks good and works smooth, but also the variety of programming languages behind designing a website. A website these days can be powered by not only HTML, but XHTML, CSS, Perl, ASP, VBScript, Java, Javascript, SQL and of course FLASH.
Flash programming, now more than 10 years old was first developed by an ingenious company called Macromedia which is now owned by once rival, Adobe. The value of FLASH is its ability to deliver multimedia motion graphics for animation and interaction on the web but using the least amount of memory possible, thus making its programmers highly sought-after for upper-end website construction.
So as a small business owner you may have run into a “FLASHY” website in your surfing travels and been in awe (ok, jealous) of how great they look. Well the thing is really, I have seen thousands of small business websites with expensive Flash programming and immediately thought to myself, “What a complete waste of money!”
Creating and designing your small business website using all the latest software, enhanced graphics and in depth programming will almost certainly lead you to eventually lose interest in your own website, commit you to future invoice headaches for every little update you need to make, and cluster your website with a slew of others in your market that are equally as glamorous as they are ineffective.
You do not need a glamorous, gadget-filled website to get a customer to sign up for your email newsletter. You need an incentive. Surfers (potential customers) might be impressed with your website, but you will never impress them more than the next business which has one-upped you, yet again in the Flash department. It’s just a silly waste of time and money. Surely as a small business owner you can see through that.
Give your prospective customer a reason to be interested. In exchange for their email address you can send them a dinner-for-two coupon if you are a restaurant. You can offer them a 15 point safety check on their next oil change. You can catch their interest with a set of free labels for their wine making project. You can offer a free wash and dry with next hair cut. The bottom line is you have to put a financial incentive out there for them because once you have their contact information the likelihood of that web-surfer becoming your customer one day soon is radically multiplied.
Therein lies your distinct advantage over your competition. Their website may be full of bells and whistles, but yours is full of profit.