Why Your Website Should NOT Use Flash

Oh Steve Jobs, you’ve read my mind. You also started a discussion that is long overdue. Job’s wrote an open letter today about Flash and why Apple has chosen to still not support the software made by Adobe. He makes some good points. I agree on all of them.

There are so many websites (especially restaurant websites) that are built in flash, it just boggles my mind. It’s extremely frustrating when you’re on a mobile device searching for a restaurant. You’ll do a quick search, get the website and location, but when you access the site to check out their menu, hours and delivery details it’s usually a site built in flash, UGH! Even if your phone was able to display the flash content, typically it’s really tacky, tasteless design thats hard to navigate. Usually I get frustrated and move on to the next restaurant.

Calling all restaurant owners! Make the change now! If you want your business to be bustling, then you better order up an experienced designer to build your site hopefully in CSS3 and make your site mobile friendly. Most people will do last minute searches for a restaurant, so not only does your site need a search presence, it also needs to be easily read and optimized for mobile devices.

Technology as a Social Commodity

In an interesting experience I had several weeks ago I noticed something about technology. No matter what, there is always a market for something. My girlfriend and I chose to sell our iPhones. In my opinion the iPhone is over hyped, is too restricted with it’s sdk’s, and the AT&T network is just horrible, (we’re getting Droids *plug).

We both posted our iPhones on eBay. They both sold incredibly under 2 minutes of being on auction via the buy now feature. Now here’s the interesting part. I noticed both buyers were Chinese. So I did some investigating and found out a tremendous amount of “gray-market” iPhone demand in China. Turns out that China does not allow wifi enabled iPhones to be sold due to some local regulation.

Suffice to say the phones sold for more than we paid for them with a nice profit. Seems that no matter where you are in the world, the demand for technology whether it’s legal or illegal and whether those determinations are just or not, people want to be connected at any cost. This gives great hope and promise within the social networking arena which much of the world isn’t even participating fully yet.

I believe that technology will actually become a sought after commodity as more and more restrictions come into play. Especially with all this talk about Google filtering China’s search results. I expect that there could also be a large Black Market Internet which will push the limits of technology even further.

Marketing your Website? Don’t be a Qwitter!

Ashton Kutcher has almost 4 and a half million followers on twitter. That’s equal to more than half the population of New York City. Dude couldn’t find his car, but he found 4,291,162 people that think he’s worth listening to.

How did he do it?

Ashton Kutcher was one of millions and millions of people–famous and not–that flocked to Twitter and started sharing, chatting, an selling to each other.

Of course Twitter, has been the hottest thing on the internet for two years and was an obvious choice for reaching that huge number of potential movie-goers, reality-show watchers, or whatever else he wanted his fan base to become.

But wait…

Studies show that a full 60% of people leave twitter after a month and never come back. Who are these people? For obvious reasons, I like to call them Qwitters. They heard about a fad, decided to follow it, and then for whatever reason, decided it wasn’t worth their time and lost interest.

Which is fine unless…

You’re an internet marketer. As a web marketer, you aren’t allowed to just stop interacting with your customers or selling your product–a web marketer should always have something to say about their service or product.  Tweet about a new offering, blog about your holiday–or comment on a friend’s blog mentioning it, create some fun link bait, or even post a couple of inspirational quotes. Anything is fine as long as you are asserting your existence an letting your customers know you are there and still believe in the message and stand behind your product.

But I don’t like Twitter!

And that’s fine. We’re the first undead marketers to tell you not to blindly follow web marketing trends. But no matter whether your platform is your twitter page, your facebook, your myspace, your blog, or your email newsletter, never stop letting you’re customers know you’re there.

The point is…

Even aplusk started with a big 0 as his follower count, but he tweeted everyday, stayed on target and never quit. Take the same attitude towards your website marketing. Remember to assert your existence and speak to your customers everyday in any way you can and never be a Qwitter.

Don’t React to Trends, Set Them

One trend I see on a regular basis, are companies following a dead trend or one on it’s way out. Typically once a marketing trend catches on, it’s already dead. Your competitors are hoping you follow their lead. Thats what makes them the leader and you the follower. They are already thinking 6 months ahead and you can barely keep up. It’s all about taking chances. If the risk you take is successful enough that will carry over and hopefully will snowball into more trend setting ideas. Yes there is trial and error involved, but it’s always the risk takers who reap the benefits.

One great and recent example is a friend of mine, Phil Kaplan just launched a new business called “blippy“. It’s controversial in the fact that it involves making credit card purchases publicly available online for all to see. It’s the next Twitter. Instead of telling your followers what your doing, you passively do so by making purchases. This creates a way of letting people know where you are, and what you’re doing and gives a clue on what you really purchase without even typing in an update.

Phil’s always been a progressive thinker, thats what makes him so successful.

Bottom line, take risks. If you don’t you’ll always be in second place.

Does Your Website Smell Like a Rat?

I can always tell when someone is being fake. So can you. It’s a gut feeling, a natural instinct that tells you that something isn’t the way it ought to be. Think about those expressions old movie cops used for when something just wasn’t right: this smells fishy, I smell a rat, etc. That’s because when something or someone is phony, it’s as tangible and obvious as a smell.

The same principle applies to your web copy, or anything you write about your business. If it’s fake, it’ll smell fake. That is, it will come off feeling forced or unnatural to your readers or potential customers.

Will your readers know why they don’t want to click the “go to checkout” button or even why they don’t want to navigate further in the site? Maybe, and maybe not. Some people are very good at understanding their gut feelings, while others just feel a sort of uneasiness that makes them want to go down to the next result on the Google page.

In either case, the reason will be the same: your writing doesn’t seem natural.

Natural writing sounds like it’s something you want to be saying in the way in which you normally say things in your everyday life. Of course there are matters of formality–slang isn’t appropriate for web copy because it doesn’t seem professional, and not everyone understands it. But the idea is simple: write the way you would naturally speak if you were discussing something you love with someone who would like to know more about it.

So for example, if you loved say, model trains and met a very attractive lady (or guy) at a Model Trains convention…how would you go about explaining to her the details of your thrilling new concept that will innovate model transportation as we know it today?

You would probably: explain your concepts well, make sure she understands everything you’re saying, and go into just enough detail to keep her interested in your concept without putting her to sleep.

The same principles should be in your writing whenever you’re updated the sales copy on your website or sending an email to a client. After all, you want to leave your reader feeling as clear as a spring day; not pinching their noses and clicking the close button.

When All Else Fails, Hire an Expert Creative Thinker… Please!

Every industry has experts. They have years of experience, and can make decisions from the gut that some can’t or may have a hard time doing. Most times companies will take the low road of hiring within even if it comes at a cost of potentially ruining a company. Don’t make this mistake. Just because an employee may have taken a web design class in college is by no means a foundation for them to be a Web Designer, let alone Art Director. Management will usually opt to not spend time and resources searching for the rock-star candidate. They will happily settle for less, if it means less hassle and less money to spend.

If your business is in a situation where it finds itself in dire need of an expert, please hire one. The expense that it may cost upfront for a seasoned pro is far less expensive than the misery you will put your business through promoting the wrong person.

You need someone who has a lightbulb going off all the time throughout the day. A true creative visionary. Someone who doesn’t hoard their ideas because they’re so abundant. There are plenty of people like this out there, the question is, if it is a matter of your business surviving from their ideas, are you willing to financially support this need to save your business?

Your own, Personal Google…A Search Engine to hear your prayers, a Search Engine that Cares

Wow, well aside from the long cool headline this is big news from Google. Basically Google will soon take your personal web habits and cater the results for you. This is good and bad depending on what side of the fence you stand. Google has always been about search relevancy. This is great is you search for similar things on a regular basis and want to omit the search results you never choose anyway. The ones who will suffer from this are the companies who will infomercial you via search results. You know who I mean, the ones who optimize their sites to rank for terms that sometimes have no relevance but are hoping to find customers blindly.

I think this can be great for legitimate businesses. Yes it may be harder for you to gain ranking but you know what, this means fair and equal balance among competition online. Build a strong brand the old fashioned way and you will be rewarded. If you’re a new business, then concentrate on word of mouth and standard marketing strategies first before shoveling a bunch of cash into a pay per click campaign.

Web 3.0, Augmented Reality Marketing

Ok, first off. If you don’t know what Augmented Reality is you may be asking, whoa… this sounds pretty weird. Actually Augmented Reality is a new Web 3.0 coined term which merges online life with real life.

Here’s an example. There are several iPhone apps that allow you to view through your iPhone camera in real time while overlaying web elements on the screen (map, directions, description of what you’re looking at through the camera). This sounds very sci-fi. But really we need to start thinking of how marketing strategies will be developed this way since we are quickly moving towards a reality of merging web life and real life.

Dreamers can now apply far fetched ideas into something real, usable and profitable. Imagine being able to create unique ad’s for customers walking by your store in real-time, or being able to find restaurant reviews and locations based off a geo-targeted picture taken on your phone. There are still plenty of kinks and new developments to be made to make this hybrid of web and life truly functional. But right now is the catalyst of ideas to come.

Even more far fetched, imagine using Google Street View. Now imagine you see a car in street view, you hover over it and an ad is displayed for used cars of that make and model. The ideas really are endless and I’m really looking forward to what Web 3.0 brings us.

Fact vs. Opinion based Marketing, Your 2 Cents

Here’s a topic that most of you can relate to. You have an opinion and I have an opinion and most of the times these will be different and thats ok. Thats what’s great about us humans, we agree to disagree and great ideas come of these situations sometimes. One thing that can really throw a wrench in the mix, is letting your opinion override fact when making business decisions that can have a significant impact on your company.

Lets say you have a certain taste and style associated with that. You like cartoonish looking designs and thats ok by me. But, when making a decision to implement a serious tone and professional attitude, you may want to let your personal taste step aside and let reason do the talking. Many businesses suffer from this problem. Allowing someone to make high level decisions on style when in fact they are not qualified to do so will create a serious snowball effect and your project will most likely fail.

If your company uses analytics to make educated decisions on marketing strategies, then they’re on the right track. Go with the flow. Utilize all the tools necessary to make your decisions based on fact and not opinion. Users web behavior are done with reason, if you’re not paying attention to their habits, then you’re basically passively ignoring them and you will reap the benefits of not catering to your customer.

Zip Codes and User Reviews Boost Localized Search Results

If you’re a small local business and you want to get on your local customers online radar, your first priority is getting your physical address all over your website. Zip codes and alternate names of the neighborhood your business is in will definitely increase your organic rankings in Google. When customers are searching for a local business, they usually enter a keyword followed by the zip code, or the name of the neighborhood with the keyword of the product they’re searching for. Then Google will show a hybrid local result using their map and normal search engine results link underneath it (see map image above).

Getting local organic results is the first challenge, next is getting quality customer reviews about your business. Setup a customer survey questionnaire, have customers fill them out and encourage them to post the results on google maps. Come up with an incentive for your customers to do this. This should be your top priority, think of it as word of mouth which essentially it is because the quality of referrals you get from word of mouth are usually high.

Bottom line is having an established connection between your physical business and online presence should be taken seriously. With little effort you can boost your customer reach significantly.