Questions to ask your web designer

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1. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Introduction Many entrepreneurs rely heavily on web designers. In addition to designing and updating the web site for the entrepreneur, web designers also often assist with areas such as domain name registration and hosting. Some entrepreneurs have found that this heavy reliance can turn into a nightmare in the event their relationship with their designer sours or they just want to make a change. In some cases these entrepreneurs have found that their web designer controls access and even ownership of their web site and domain name! Horror Stories I Have Seen & Heard Here are some real live horror stories told to me by my clients, students and readers. 1. After a dispute with their web designer, one company found their web site AND e-mail was disabled. They had no copies of their web site, so I had to find new hosting for them, find archived copies of their web site on the web, recreate all the forms and re-upload their site quickly to get them operating again. In the meantime, they may have lost 1,000s of dollars. 2. One of my students had custom programming done by a web designer for her shopping cart. When she went to change hosting companies, she found that she could not move her shopping cart program as it was owned by the designer. She had paid for 1,000s of dollars in development costs that were now wasted. 3. Spelling and pricing mistakes on web sites that remain uncorrected for weeks despite repeated requests by the site owners to the web designer to have them corrected. 4. Web sites being redirected to other pages, making it difficult for search engines to find them. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 2 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
2. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer 5. Web sites that re invisible to search engines because they are designed in formats like Flash and frames that search engines have difficulty indexing. 6. A web site designer demanding a full partnership in the business or they will set up a competing site and take their existing clients. Protecting Yourself Of course, not all web designers are unethical. But there are a lot of people professing to be web designers who lack experience, skills, and business knowledge. Therefore, it is prudent for you, the web site owner, to ensure that you are protected and that the 100s or 1,000s of dollars you pay are well spent. Here are some basic ways you can make sure your web site belongs to you and to improve your web site’s chances of Internet marketing success. Who Owns Your Domain Name? Many web site owners let their web designer register their domain name for them. In some cases, the web designer lists themselves as the owner and main contact and the real web site owner can’t move to new hosting or make changes without the permission of the web designer. To check to see who owns your domain name, try Whois Source. To protect your domain name, we recommend that you register your own domain name using services like Dotster. Dotster lets you register a domain name for as low as $14.95 US per year. Most hosting companies now give you an ID and password to access and change your domain name. You should create a password database or document to record the login information and make sure all these passwords are kept safe. It is also a good idea to print copies of all passwords and access information sent to you. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 3 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
3. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer You should also be careful about domain name renewals. If you forget to renew your domain name, someone else may take it, rending your web site and email inoperable and making all your business cards, brochures and advertising obsolete. I strongly recommend you set up a system to remind you about your domain name renewal. It is important that you also keep your contact info up to date as it is very difficult to make changes to your domain name if your email address is changed and your old one no longer works. Where is it Hosted? If you are hosting your web site with your web designer, you have no control if the relationship sours. When you host your web site it is important that you are working with a reputable company and that you have all the IDs and passwords and other information necessary to manage the web site yourself. You can consider the suggested company recommended by the web designer, but you should ensure that their relationship is arms length and you can continue to deal with the hosting company in the event of relationship problems with your designer. If you are looking for a good quality, inexpensive hosting company, the service I use is Easy Hosting. Easy Hosting’s packages start as low as $3.95 per month. Want to see how well your hosting company is doing? Try this free service from Internet Seer. Internet Seer will test your web site every hour to see if it is working and then email you to let you know it is down. In addition they will send you statistics each week showing what percentage of the time your site is down. When choosing a web site hosting company, you should also ask if they provide statistics tracking. How Can I Track Statistics? It is critical to your Internet marketing program that you know how well your web site is doing. Good quality hosting companies will provide you with these statistics as part of your package. A decent quality statistics package should track the following statistics. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 4 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
4. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer • Number of unique visitors. • Number of page views. • How many visitors are from search engines and what key words they used to find you. • How many people come from country domains such as .ca (Canada), .de (Germany) or .uk (England). • What search engine “bots” have visited recently. • What pages of your site are most popular. • What web sites refer traffic to you. Ask to see a demo of the statistics offered so you can ensure the tracking will meet your needs. If you don’t have tracking available, you can try free services like Extreme Tracking. Who Owns Your Web Site? This sounds so simple. You pay for the web site so you own it, right? Maybe not! Here is a clause I found in MANY sample web designer contracts I found online: Copyright to the finished web design site produced by [web design company] will be owned by [web design company]. The Client will be assigned rights to use the Web Design Project as a web site, once final payment under this agreement and any additional charges incurred have been paid. Rights to photos, graphics, source code, work-up files, and computer programs are specifically not transferred to the Client, and remain the property of their respective owners. Many web designers and programmers feel that the creative work they do on your web site is copyrighted by them and that they retain an ownership right. So they just license it to you to use without giving you the original files so you can make changes yourself later or change designers. This is especially true in cases of programming code where programmers feel they can use the code on their other client’s sites, but you can’t change or move the code. To protect yourself, ensure that your contract with your web designer includes who owns the web site and all its components, including source code of any programming and that you retain the right to change designers and hosting. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 5 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
5. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer What Formats Will Be Used? The way your designer sets up your site affects your ability to move it and your ability to market your web site. For example, if they have used Flash, frames, multimedia, or database generated web sites your web site may be invisible to search engines or not index fully in the search engines, making it harder for you to attract visitors. If they used custom programming in formats such as php, asp, perl, cold fusion or other systems, you will need to know this so that when you move to another hosting company, you can ensure they support the same formats. Cold Fusion, in particular, is a database program that requires special, more expensive hosting and programming. What Custom Programming is Involved? Why? Custom programming is expensive and may take many hours of troubleshooting before it works properly. After all, if large professional firms like Microsoft have to continually issue patches to their programs to make them work properly, what is the chance a less experienced programmer will develop a bug free program for you in the first attempt? Here are some questions to ask your designer in this regard: • What custom programming will be done? • How much will it cost? • Why use this instead of an “off the shelf” option? • How long will they continue to fix any bugs? Programmers love to program, so they will sometimes use a customized programmed solution such as designing their own shopping cart system rather then using affordable, proven technology that is already developed and trouble free. I highly recommend using proven tools as it is usually less expensive, has fewer bugs and has less potential ownership problems than programming from scratch. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 6 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
6. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer What Tools are Used in your Web Site? When tools such as shopping carts and auto responder systems are added to your web site it is critical that you own the tools and that you have a list of all the tools used and all the IDs and passwords to them so that you can manage your own site if need be. Some common types of tools include: Tool Type Our Recommended Tool Shopping Cart Marketer’s Choice Electronic Newsletter Management Constant Contact Auto Responder Marketer’s Choice Ad Tracking System Marketer’s Choice Affiliate Management Marketer’s Choice Payment System PayPal I have put a list of our favorite tools for successful web sites at the end of this guide. Do I Have E-Commerce Capability? Most successful web sites let visitors buy right online. You can easily add e-commerce capability to your web site using Marketer’s Choice or PayPal. Marketer’s Choice is a secure web-based shopping cart that can be added to any site. Features include e-commerce capability with over 150 merchant service providers, an upsell module, an electronic coupon and discount module, unlimited auto responders, broadcast e- mail, newsletter management, affiliate tracking and management, ad/revenue tracking, digital delivery system to deliver e-books and software, survey forms and a pop up wizard. It will work with most credit card merchant services systems, including PayPal or you can use it to capture orders and process them manually if you prefer. PayPal offers a low cost method of letting people pay by credit card or from their bank account online. They also offer a free, basic shopping cart that you can add to any web site. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 7 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
7. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer If your designer is adding e-commerce to your site, make sure you know which system they are using, and the pricing and features. Make sure you own the software being used or are the registered owner of the service. Who Is Doing The Work? Some firms contract out portions of the work to others. Ensure you know who is doing the work and what your obligation is to them. How Can I Save Money on Design Costs? Web design can be very expensive. Here are some tips on how to save money on design costs. Start with a professionally designed template. For as low as $10 US, you can purchase a beautifully designed, professionally designed template for your web site from services like Template Monster. Template Monster has 1,000s of web templates to choose from and offer them in common formats such as html and Flash. If you want a unique look that no one else has, you can pay more to purchase exclusive rights to the template. If you want an all in one system, Atomic Shops enables you to quickly build and update your own professional website, complete with hosting, 1500+ templates, email, 2000+ stock photos, newsletters, shopping cart, message boards, forms and much more. Very affordable at under $20 US per month INCLUDING hosting. And it even connects into eBay. You can either edit these templates yourself using software we will talk about later in this guide, or you have your web designer edit them to add your own content. This will save a lot of time and expense. An additional benefit is that you know exactly what you’re getting. Because web design is a creative process, you may not like the first few versions your designer comes up with. With 1,000s of templates to choose from, you will be able to get the look you want. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 8 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
8. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer If you still want a custom look, you can use Template Monster to find out what you like and then have your web designer set up something similar. Royalty Free Photos When a graphic designer set up an e-book cover for me, they informed me that there would have to be an extra charge of $300 to license the photo they used in the design that came from one of their professional photo databases. One of my clients had a web designer use photos that they had no permission to use and had to take them down and redesign the site when this was identified later. Make sure that you know who owns any of the photos used in your web site. I use services like Stock.Exchange and IStockPhoto to find good quality royalty free photos to use on my web site and in my newsletters. Most of these photos are free or very low cost. ($1 to $3 per photo at IStockPhoto. Can I Update my Web Site Myself? It is important that you retain the capability of updating the web site yourself even if you don’t use it all the time. This helps keep costs down, quickly correct errors and update information on your web site, and lets you make changes to your web site in the event of emergencies. An excellent software program for this is Macromedia Contribute. Macromedia Contribute allows beginners to update their own web site without learning web design, in an easy-to-use “what you see is what you get” interface similar to Microsoft Word. Macromedia Contribute is made by the makers of Dreamweaver, one of the most popular professional web design programs. It is meant to be compatible with Dreamweaver and other html sites, while making it easier for beginners to use. At a cost of only $149 US, it is affordable for most entrepreneurs. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 9 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
9. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer How Do I Choose the Right Designer? With a great template plus software like Macromedia Contribute, you may be able to have a high quality site without a web designer. But if you do need a professional web designer, here are some tips on choosing the right one. 1. Review their portfolio of web sites they’ve done to make sure their style is what you are looking for. 2. Contact some of their previous clients and ask them: a. Are they happy with their work? b. Was it on time and on budget? c. Were there any surprises or problems? d. Did they receive all the access information needed for the web site, hosting and tools used? 3. Ask for a copy of their web site services contract to ensure the terms and conditions meet your approval. Or use your own contract written to the terms and conditions you want. What is the Role of a Web Designer in Marketing my Site? I like to think of a successful web site as a stool with 3 legs. If all three legs are strong, you have a strong web site. If any of the 3 legs is weak or missing, the stool falls over. The 3 legs are: 1. Your knowledge of your customers and their needs, your products and services. 2. A high quality web site that showcases your products and services and speaks to your customer’s needs. You can make this “stool leg” strong by using a professional web designer or a template system and by learning from us how to ensure the web site is able to turn visitors into customers. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 10 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
10. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer 3. An Internet marketing program to reach your target audience. This attracts people to your web site to that your web site can turn them into customers and generate revenue for you. Most web designers have a graphic design or programming background, not an Internet marketing background. Larger firms may have an Internet marketer on staff, so make sure this person is involved in the planning of your web site. Here is a table to show you when to use template programs, web designer, programmers and Internet marketers. Needs Template Web Programmer Internet Program Designer Marketer Basic web √ √ √ site Low budget √ √ Basic √ √ √ e-commerce Custom look √ Custom √ tools Web portal √ √ Custom √ e-commerce solutions Content √ development help Making your √ site sell Coaching on √ how to market online Traffic √ building programs Search √ engine ranking help Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 11 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
11. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer If the firm you are working with does not have an Internet marketer on staff, you will need to either develop these skills yourself through resources like our workshops and e-books or work with a reputable Internet marketer like us. Check out my FREE e-book, “How to Promote Your Web Site for FREE” for some great ideas on how to market online. What Should A Web Design Contract Cover? What happens if your web site takes longer than originally planned? What if it is over budget? Your contract with your web designer should clearly state: • Ownership of the site, graphics, pictures, programming and any tools used. • A requirement that you have copies of all access instructions, IDs and passwords and that you have the capability of changing them after the project. • How much you will pay and when you will pay it. The payment schedule should also state what the payment is based on. For example, you might set up the payment structure so that each payment is based upon certain key components being finished and approved. • Who will be doing the work and if portions of the work will be subcontracted. It should also be clear what your responsibilities are to any subcontractor. • How extra charges will be handled or approved. • How often they will report to you and what will be reported. How Else Can I Protect Myself? A web site is a serious marketing investment with great potential. Many web site owners pass off the web site to their designers and then get busy and don’t pay attention to the project. When this happens, it’s easy for the project to get off track. To make sure you project stays on track: Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 12 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
12. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer • Stay involved. Be in regular contact with your designer so that you can quickly correct misunderstandings and remove obstacles to the project’s success. • Do your part. Make sure you get any material needed by the designer to them on time so that you aren’t holding the project up. • Get weekly reports. Agree upon a reporting system where you are regularly updated as to progress and quickly made aware of potential problems and obstacles. How Can The E-Business Tutor Help? I am the critical “third leg of the stool.” I provide you with the Internet marketing help you need through the following resources: € Guides like this one € Workshops € One on one coaching and mentoring Coaching help starts as low as $30. I love to speak to groups and I would appreciate an introduction to any industry associations or other groups you belong to so that I can show them how I can help their members. Call me toll free in North America at 1-866- 413-0951 (alternate phone 250-483-4155) or email me at gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com. About the Author Since 1998, Garland Coulson, “The E- Business Tutor” has been teaching entrepreneurs how to market successfully on the Internet by embracing the philosophy, “the Internet is about people, not technology.” Speaking the common language of the small and home business owner, he is a “technology translator” helping his Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 13 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
13. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer audience understand how to unlock the power of the Internet without getting tangled up in the technical details of computers and technology. Garland’s special talent is finding powerful, affordable marketing tools and techniques that allow entrepreneurs to launch and market successful businesses worldwide for only a few dollars a day. He has also authored an easy to understand Chat with Garland for a few minutes and you'll be making e-book, “Internet Marketing for Beginners,” statements like, "What a great and provides Internet marketing tips to idea!" and "Now I get it!" readers of his FREE monthly newsletter, He is the e-business Buddha! “The E-Success Express.” Thanks to Garland my mind is racing – the possibilities for success are endless. Join My Affiliate Program Murray Fuhrer Advanced Hypnosis Like this guide? Want to recommend it to Seminars/Extreme Esteem others and be rewarded? My affiliate Workshops program pays a 25% commission on sales of my e-books, workshops and coaching through people you recommend. Visit my web site to find out more. Our Favorite Tools Marketers Choice What do we use Marketer’s Choice from 1ShoppingCart for? A better question is what DON’T we use it for! Marketer’s Choice is like an Internet marketing “Swiss Army Knife”. It is a shopping cart system built for marketers. Its features include unlimited ad tracking, unlimited auto responders, shopping cart, payment gateway for over 150 credit card merchant services including PayPal, e-mail broadcasting, form generation, opt in programs and much more. Marketer’s Choice can be added to any web site because it is web-based itself. Click here for a free trial. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 14 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
14. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Constant Contact Electronic newsletters are one of my most powerful marketing tools and Constant Contact is THE easiest, most powerful way to design, deliver and track newsletters quickly. Using this tool, we have automated subscriber signup and management and prepared and delivered high quality html newsletters in as low as 19 minutes! And that’s not all. The system also tells us how many people opened the newsletter and what links they clicked on! An excellent, affordable tool. Click here for a free trial. Atomic Shops Atomic Shops lets beginners set up e-commerce web sites in just a few minutes! Their easy to use system makes it simple for you to have a professional looking site without learning html. Features include hosting, email, shopping cart, easy site editing, professional templates, newsletter management, auto responders, form handling and much more for only $19.95 per month! Template Monster Looking for even MORE template choices? Template Monster gives you access to over 5,500 professionally designed web site templates for as low as $10 each. These templates come in many formats including html and can be easily edited using Macromedia Contribute or other html editors. Macromedia Contribute Macromedia Contribute lets you browse to a page on your web site, click “edit page” and then edit a template in a simple, Microsoft Word-like environment. Then you just push the “publish” button to make your changes live to the web. You can change text, ad pictures and make changes without learning html or web design. They also have a “roll-back” tool for beginners to let you roll back to an earlier version if you make a mistake. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 15 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
15. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer An excellent tool for editing existing sites or web templates. GoogleCash Google Cash shows you how to make money with Google Adwords campaigns even if you don’t have a web site. You'll learn step by step how you can start earning good money immediately by writing effective Google AdWords promoting companies, their products and services. Every time your ad results in a sale or sign up - You Earn Money! PayPal PayPal lets you easily add e-commerce capability to your web site by making it simple for people pay you online with credit cards and from their bank accounts. PayPal has no setup and monthly fees and has over 56 million account holders in 45 countries. Dotster Dotster lets you register your domain name for as low as $14.95 per year. They handle .com, net, .org, .info, .biz, .us, .bz, .nu, .ws and .ca. The Amazing Formula Marlon Sanders' best-selling e-book on the formula for marketing successfully on the Internet. Great resource for writing sales letters and web content and getting your Internet marketing program on track. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 16 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
16. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Web Position Gold This software allows you to test your search engine rankings and will give you detailed help on redesigning your site for the major search engines. The #1 tool used by most professional search engine optimization companies. You can download a free demo of the program. eBay The world's largest online auction and marketplace. You can buy or sell almost everything at eBay. Speaking for Millions Fred Gleek’s excellent e-book on how to approach making money as a professional speaker. As a professional speaker myself, I have found his approach to be unique in the field and very effective. I am adapting my approach to speaking to follow Fred’s recommendations with great success and paid speaking engagements EVERY month. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 17 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
17. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Amazing Ad Copy Secrets Most of us have to write text for ads to promote our products and services. But if we write poor ad copy, our marketing budget is wasted. This e-book by Marlon Sanders does a great job of telling you how to write ad copy that sells! Step by Step Copywriting Course Learn how to write copy that sells well AND helps your web site improve your search engine ranking and traffic at the same time. Easy Site Hits Easy Site Hits provides targeted traffic to your site by redirecting traffic from high traffic expired domain names. They have programs to expose your web site from 5,000 to 100,000 unique TARGETED visitors in a number of categories including business, arts, automotive, career, computers, education, entertainment, family, games, food, health, webmasters, real estate, marketing, software, shopping, financial, travel and sports. As an example, a campaign for 5,000 viewers is only $ 28.95! Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 18 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
18. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Overture Overture lets you advertise on Yahoo, MSN and other busy sites. Your advertisement is keyword sensitive so it will show up when people search for key words related to your site and you ONLY PAY when people visit your site from the ad. Interactive Sales Letter What if your sales letter changed based upon what your visitor wanted? It can! With the Interactive Sales Letter generator, you can generate sales letters that let readers make choices based upon their needs. Each time they make a choice, the letter changes to fit what they are looking for. This system interacts with each visitor and instantly Customizes Your Sales Letter to € Solve Each Visitor's Immediate Problem € Showcase a Specific Benefit to the Visitor € Overcome a Visitor's Objection All on Autopilot! More Great FREE Resources Here are a number of other free e-books & resources to help you make your online venture a success. How to Promote Your Web Site for FREE The best things in life are free, including some of the most powerful Internet marketing techniques. In this FREE e-book, Garland Coulson, “The E- Business Tutor” shares his favorite free Internet marketing tips and tools. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 19 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
19. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Instant Buzz Instant Buzz is a free system that should easily give you 10,000 to 100,000 ad impressions every month. Instant Buzz works by putting a toolbar on your Internet Explorer. This toolbar consists of an Instant Buzz button and a single ad headline. The ad headline belongs to another Instant Buzz members and links to their web site. Just by browsing the Internet as normal and inviting others to the system, your own ad is shown on 1,000s of other computers. Netwriting Masters Course Want to sell more? Write better. Write smarter. First, write to PREsell. Then write to SELL. The only course on the Net that shows you how to do both. And it's free! 5 Days to Success With Google Adwords The author of the Definitive Guide to Google Adwords offers a FREE 5 day email course on how to become successful with Google Adwords. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 20 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
20. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Affiliate Masters Course This free course shows you how to become a high-earning affiliate champion. Service Sellers Masters Course Attract new clients from around the world Or from around the block with this free, downloadable course. Make Your Net Auction Sell!, The Masters Course Start and grow a profitable Net auction business. Webmaster BUSINESS Masters Course The Webmaster BUSINESS Masters Course will help you get your business up and running smoothly so that you can spend your time and energy on what you know and love to do best designing and building successful Web sites for more and more satisfied clients. Idea Marketers Idea Marketers is a free article repository where you can make your articles available to 1,000s of other web sites and newsletters. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 21 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com
21. Questions to Ask Your Web Designer Make Your Price Sell!, The Masters Course "How much money are you leaving on the table?" Price with complete confidence & double your Net profits. Copyright 2005 by Garland Coulson 22 www.ebusinesstutor.com Toll Free in North America 1-866-413-0951 gcoulson@ebusinesstutor.com