Gadgets, doodads and gimmicks

A few years ago, it seemed every developer learned how to make cool-looking sliders for users to make selections. This is great for something gradual and subjective, like a “hot/cold” temperature gauge. When used for selecting finite information, like your exact age, it is extremely frustrating and lacks any focus on the user. On touch screens, it can be even more painful. Users don’t want to use gadgets or gimmicks if they don’t support what they’re actually trying to do on your site.

Org-Chart Navigation

Your users shouldn’t be expected to find what they need based on how your company happens to be organized. It becomes up to the user to decipher how to access the warranty information or contact the company by determining if the printer he just purchased is under “electronics” or “home-based products.” Don’t make your users work so hard.

Fantasy World

We live in a 24 hour world. News breaks at any moment, and typically it’s before the official press release. Many sites ignore what’s really happening in the NOW. If a product recall is rumored or a company executive scandal hits Twitter, having a way to alert users via the site is vital. Not doing so is pretending your users don’t know, and quite frankly it’s insulting. Trust your users.

We don’t need no stinking feedback.

Customers are finding ways to reach out and provide valuable feedback to companies in faster and more passionate ways than ever before. Going to the site is a straightforward way to talk to a company. If your site and/or application is lacking a clear, easy, inviting way to gather this feedback, then you might as well have a “we don’t care” sign up in your front window.

5 Ways to Invite Users Into the Experience

1. Build the site for your user, not your boss. We don’t take off our customer hats when we walk into the office, but sometimes we act like it. Instead of asking if the site serves the purpose of our boss, we should ask first if it serves the purpose of the user. Do this FOR REAL. If you hear you or your team talking yourself into why something SHOULD work, but doesn’t, try again.
2. Keep in mind your site is not your user’s top priority.  Your user will not spend all day there, reading all the carefully-crafted (yet lengthy) copy to get the most out of your site. They will visit with a purpose. Help them get the task done quickly and easily.
3. Visitors may be checking out the site at work, on the phone or via tablet computers. Too many sites just don’t work in these scenarios. I don’t want to view a video with audio blaring (that I can’t control) on a tiny screen while riding the train, but I may want to check out some information about your products. Give the user options and control.
4. Assume your users will be distracted. It would be great if users all approached your site from the same place, visiting the straight line of navigation you anticipate for each task. But, alas, we are human. Humans jump around, get distracted, come back later, or forget how many tabs they have open. Don’t assume one straight line for each task – assume many curved, blocked and different ones. Test all of them.
5. Ask for – and receive – feedback graciously. User feedback will help improve the experience. Listen, respond, test, and then ask for more.

User experience is not just about applications working as you think they should or positive analytics. Your users can actually love you more based on improving the experience. This makes it easy for them to share the love and help you and your company in countless ways. It’s time to help them help you!

By Jeannie Walters, 360Connext

Jeannie Walters has been focused on the customer experience for more than 15 years, consulting to companies big and small on their retention strategies. She is principal at 360Connext, a speaker, and mom to two young boys.

Headshot photo credit: Valerie Foltz

Chicago Cause is a philanthropic partnership between Orbit Media, Lightspan Digital, Flanigan Communications, and ShiftFocus Productions. Together as partners we committed to donate over $32,000 in marketing services to one deserving Chicago nonprofit. Each partner contributed their time and resources in their area of expertise for web design, video production, social media efforts and public relations.

The 2011 Chicago Cause Winner

We received over 30 applications from a variety of different nonprofit organizations located here in Chicago. Myself and 4 other judges then had to narrow down the applicants to 10 finalists, threw a party to meet them all, and then after much deliberation (it was a tough one!) we chose the 2011 Chicago Cause winner.

This year’s recipient is…dun dun dun dun…Inspiration Corporation (clap clap clap!).

If you’re not familiar with the Inspiration Corporation here is their mission statement:

• Inspiration Corporation helps people who are affected by homelessness and poverty to improve their lives and increase self-sufficiency through the provision of social services, employment training and placement, and housing.

After 21 years of service, Inspiration Corporation has grown to serve over 3,000 individuals every year and continues their mission to end homelessness and poverty in the Chicago area.

In my own words; they are extraordinary humans, doing incredible things. We recently went to the Inspiration Kitchen, which is a restaurant training skills program started by Inspiration Corporation, and had the pleasure of meeting some of the people that they’ve helped. Honestly, some of the best people, stories, and food (insert “I want to hug everyone around me right now emoticon”). I highly recommend you head there with some friends to see what I’m talking about!

A little more about the other 9 finalists…

We love all of the finalists so much and what they do for the Chicago community, so we decided we wanted to offer something to the rest of the 9 organizations. Here’s how we’re trying to help:

• Free web marketing consulting (Orbit)
• Free use of EventBrite for one year (thanks to our friends at EventBrite!)
• Free half day seminar on social media marketing, event planning, and promotion (Lightspan Digital and EventBrite)

We’re so proud to be able to help these super-humans that are making a difference around Chicago. If you’d like to learn more about the finalists and how you can help, we’ve included all of their information below.

• Book Worm Angels – Book Worm Angels is a literacy organization that promotes development of recreational reading habits among students pre-kindergarten through 8th grade.
• Read/Write Library Chicago – Read/Write Library, formerly known as Chicago Underground Library, is an all-inclusive collection of Chicago-specific media, produced by and for the community whose current focus is on print. However, the RWL is planning to expand into audio, video, and performance documentation.
• Slow Food Chicago – Slow Food Chicago creates dramatic and lasting change in our local food system to ensure equity, sustainability and pleasure in the food we eat.
• Support 1000 – Bra Donation – Support 1000′s mission is to affirm the dignity of women by collecting new and lightly used bras to donate to organizations that serve women and families.
• Growing Home, Inc. – Growing Home provides job training on its organic farms, creates green jobs, promotes healthy food and organic agriculture, and increases the availability of local, healthy produce in the City of Chicago.
• Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation – The PFF is an advocate for the pulmonary fibrosis community, promoting disease awareness and providing a compassionate environment for patients and their families.
• Snow City Arts – Snow City Arts is a pioneering program that provides arts, cultural, and educational programming to hospitalized children unable to attend school because of serious illness.
• Haymarket Center – Haymarket Center’s mission is to aid people with chemical dependency in their recovery by providing optional professional care that is responsive to the needs of the community.
• Illinois Science Council – The Illinois Science Council was created on the premise that having an understanding of the scientific method and of scientific discoveries is crucial to a well-rounded civic life.

What some of the finalists had to say about Chicago Cause….

Oz, Support 1000
“Gotta tell you. I found out about the contest right before the deadline and jumped on in. Glad I did! Congrats to Inspiration Corporation, they’re really a big contribution to the community. Good choice!”

Monica, Illinois Science Council
“Thanks so much for letting us know the decision for Chicago Cause.  I’m familiar with Inspiration Corporation; they do great work and are absolutely worthy of the award.  I really enjoyed meeting you and the others, and learning about the other finalist organizations through Chicago Cause.  Even writing the application was a worthwhile effort as part of this process for me.”

Mike, Book Worm Angels
“Amanda, our congratulations to Inspiration Corporation, and to you and your partners in Chicago Cause for the excellent initiative you all exhibited in putting this together.”

Polly, Growing Home, Inc
“Thanks Amanda. Was out of the office at the farms yesterday, so just getting this. I was inspired by Inspiration Corporation too – have signed up to volunteer with them! I know they’ll really benefit from the package! All the best and thanks again for involving us in this initiative”

We’d love to hear from you about your experience with the Chicago Cause or if you have any recommendations for the 2012 Chicago Cause, please feel free to leave comments below.

Keep it up do-gooders!!

By Amanda Gant

Here are some of the top fears of website owners that can slow down your web marketing:

• Fear of launching a website before things are “final”
• Fear of sharing your secrets
• Fear of being in a web video

Let’s look at each of these and consider how emotions can get in the way of results.

Fear of Launching a Website Before Things Are “Final”

“I don’t want to go live until everything on the site is completely finalized.”

It’s common for people to hesitate or delay before launching a new site. They’re reading the copy, looking at the pictures and they’re finding things that could be just a little…bit…better…

Why not take an extra week and wordsmith that last paragraph? Because the extra time isn’t worth delaying the value you’ll get from the new website. You’ll get better results sooner if you launch it now and tweak that paragraph next week.

By the way, there is no such thing as a finished website! A good site is designed to change. Hopefully, you’ll be updating and changing things regularly for years. That means the best time to go live with a new site is the first day it’s better than the old site.

Digital ink is never dry.

Fear of Sharing Your Secrets

“I don’t want to write about that topic. My competitors might steal my ideas.”

It’s natural to be afraid to say too much. Some of us have had information taken and used by competitors. (I once saw a proposal from a competitor that looked awfully familiar. As it turned out, most of it was language I had written a year before for a different proposal. Where did they get that?)

But it’s probably a mistake to not write something useful because you’re afraid it might be used by others. It goes against the premise of the Internet. When you share something you become more widely known and more relevant. I would rather be plagiarized than be irrelevant.

If you’re interested in SEO and link popularity, you may actually want other website owners to take your content. When you share your content with other bloggers (guest blogging), you’re actually hoping people will take your writing and put it on their sites, because when they do, they’ll add a link back to your website.

You get what you give.

Fear of Being in a Web Video

“I don’t want to be on camera. I won’t look good in video.”

We’ve all felt this before. It’s common. It may be more shyness than fear. But since video is such a compelling upgrade to a website, getting over this shyness can make a big difference. People want to know who they are working with or buying products from. It’s called trust and video helps you build it.

If you had a potential client or customer to your office, would you want them to see your face and hear you talk? So if you have a visitor to your website, why don’t you want them to see and hear you? Think about it: it’s not that you don’t want to be seen and heard by others, you just don’t want to see and hear yourself. Silly, isn’t it?

So give it a try. The 3 minutes you spend talking about your business may be seen hundreds of times. This might be the most effective use of marketing time you’ll ever spend.

Say it once, say it well, say it to many.

Other examples of how fear can inhibit web marketing…

• “I’m afraid to ask for reviews from my customers.” – Positive reviews are becoming more important than ever. Muster up the courage to ask your biggest fans to write a review; you’ll be glad you did.

• “We don’t want to show too much information about who works here. We’re afraid our competitors will try to steal our people.” – This is understandable, but leaving out team bios makes your site less personal and makes visitors less likely to feel a connection to your business. If you think including bios of your team will affect employee retention, you may have bigger problems. [This is a good point that would also make sense in the section about video. Especially because the video section doesn’t specify WHY video is compelling (humanization, face-to-a-company, etc etc)].

• “I’m afraid of what people might say about us if we try social media.” – People talk. They’ll talk about you whether you use social media or not. The real question is, do you want to be part of that conversation? Skip social media and you have one less way to listen to and learn from others.

 Here are some tips to help get you going…

• Trust yourself: Think of your past successes and how good you are at what you do. Imagine yourself getting it done, one step at a time. Think of what the next success will feel like.

• Get out of your comfort zone: We grow the most, professionally and personally, when faced with challenges. When you’re vulnerable, you’ve got opportunity to improve.

• Start Small: The first step may be hard, but take a small step. You don’t have to do it all at once, but you can start now. If you don’t do anything, nothing will happen. In marketing, that’s a bad thing.

• Read “Getting Naked”: This book makes an excellent case for putting yourself out there, focusing on helping others and always being honest, even when it’s hard.

Being concerned about getting things right is good. But worrying too much can cause problems, especially online, where the best results are seized by those who embrace taking action, sharing information and putting themselves out there. Remember, accomplishments are proportional to attempts!

“Audentis fortuna iuvat.”
Fortune favors the bold.
The Aeneid, Vergil

by Andy Crestodina

And for good reason! You need to redesign the site within the fragile ecosystem of your search engine rankings. Here are seven things you need to know when undertaking website redesign, with SEO sustainability in mind:

1. Survey the Landscape

Make sure you know what phrases you’re ranking for and which pages are ranking. These phrases and their rank will be the benchmark that you’ll use to measure the health of the new site. Use Google Analytics to find and list the pages that are getting traffic from search engines. You’ll need to make sure each gets a new home in the new environment.

2. Reduce Changes, Reuse URLs

Don’t make drastic changes to your site, such as changing the domain. This would be a shock to the system and can cause a complete SEO collapse. If possible, reuse the URLs of your most important pages. This will drastically minimize the footprint of the changes and reduce the impact to your rankings.

3. Recycle Page Content

Just as you sort out paper and plastic from the trash, sort the reusable content on the current site. Recycle the good stuff; keyword phrases in your title tags, header tags, and internal links that are currently working. Toss the rest in the garbage; duplicate content, bad marketing copy, and low-traffic, low-quality pages.

4. Keyphrase Biodiversity

Make sure you have a range of pages: one page for every current keyword phrase, but also new pages matched to the new keyword phrases you’ve identified. A redesign should increase, not decrease, the diversity of target keyphrases. Whenever possible, create keyphrase-focused links between these pages: in the navigation, the footer, the sitemap and within the page content itself.

5. Don’t Let Endangered URLs Go Extinct

Your pages may have deep roots. Over time, they’ve become trusted by search engines and linked to from other websites. When you transplant these pages to their new environment (your new site), you need to let everyone know where they will live now.

Create 301 redirects for all pages that are indexed and ranking. This is absolutely critical – if you don’t do this, search engines may not find them. Google may think all those pages died off and you’ll end up in the desolate wasteland of page five, rather than the lush jungles at the top of page one.

6. Preventative Measures

Before you launch the newer, greener website, check the last-minute details that will help it thrive. Update your XML sitemap so the new pages get found quickly. Check to see if everything in your robots.txt file is still accurate. Create a custom 404 error page, so if there is a breakdown in the system, the effects will be minimized.

7. Monitor Carefully

After you go live, monitor the SEO health of the site carefully for a few weeks. You’ll be watching your rank, of course, but also check Google Webmaster Tools for crawl errors and broken links. These are toxic to your ecosystem, so put on your hazmat suit and clean them up fast or you’ll be left with an SEO Superfund site.

Bottom Line: Avoid Mass Extinction

A website redesign can either be the environmental equivalent of a catastrophic meteor impact, causing mass extinction to your rankings, or a natural, healthy evolution to the climate of your search marketing niche.

By Andy Crestodina. You can also find Andy on Google+ and Twitter.

We know that restaurant websites can be accessible, user-friendly, and beautiful given the right functionality and design. When Straits Restaurant Group, a collection of trendy dining establishments with locations along the West Coast and Southern U.S., came to us in need of new website, we gladly jumped aboard to make it happen.

Here are the goals we set for this exciting project:

Goal 1: Design a site that people will want to use

Goal 2: Showcase Ambiance + Passion without compromise to user experience

Goal 3: Build an effective mobile site

Goal 4: Manage all sites, desktop and mobile through one CMS

Read the full restaurant web design case study >

• If I hire Orbit to create something for me, I have the right to get a return on my investment, be it through:
  • Cost or time savings
  • Traffic  volume and quality increases
  • Sales opportunities through leads
  • Conversion of visitors to leads or sales
  • Exposure through visits and views
  • Education on products or services
  • Direct sales of products
  • Enhanced brand awareness and differentiation
• I have the right to expect that Orbit will understand my business and my overall marketing strategy and incorporate that knowledge into every decision so that I get the most out of my money
• If Orbit doesn’t have faith that there will be a return on investment, or if there are external factors or risks that may affect the return on my investment, Orbit will explain and advise.
• I have the right to understand the total cost (initial, maintenance, etc.) of my website so that I can adequately assess costs and bene

DO (Due) Process

• I have the right to a service level and attention to details from Orbit that is consistent with their best practices and processes.
• I have the right to never be surprised by always having my expectations set and managed appropriately relative to the scope, process, plan, deliverables, and the what is expected from me during the process
• I have the right for all projects to be delivered on-time and on-budget, provided I fulfill my own project responsibilities.
• I have the right to be unique and demand flexibility from Orbit rather than just being put through the motions or process.
• I have the right to mutual professional courtesy and respect in all communications with Orbit.
• I have the right for quality websites that function properly and are error free, as defined in proposals and during planning.

Right to Counsel & Advice

• I have the right to expect Orbit to demonstrate their expertise and consult me on what’s best for my site for the life of our relationship.
• If there are trends or changes to the Internet that affect my marketing, I have the right to be notified and advised.  Orbit will inform me of major trends that may affect my website and advise me of the implications and opportunities.
• If I contact Orbit to discuss a change I have in mind, I have the same rights of counsel and Orbit will provide me advice.
• If changes to my site are recommended or needed, I have a right to a fair and accurate estimate if costs are incurred.

Support for the People

• I have the right to prompt assistance if something goes wrong, even if it’s my fault.
• I have the right to get help solving my website problems and assistance with my ideas.
• I expect to get a quick response to my request and have it resolved in a reasonable time frame.

Technology

• I can expect Orbit to keep up with the latest technology trends and only recommend or use technologies that are proven and reliable
• If Orbit is hosting a website for me, I have the right to reliable, secure and up-to-date hosting with minimal downtime.

Usability & Design

• I have the right to a design that is consistent and complimentary to my brand
• I have the right to designs that are both visually appealing and usable
• I have the right to expect my users’ experience to be efficient and pleasant

Independence

• I have the right to update my website content without needing help from Orbit
• I have the right to adequate and accurate reporting tools that allow me to manage my site and support my business processes.
• I have the right to be educated on how Orbit tools work so that I can maintain my site.

Happiness

• I have the right work with Orbiteers who have an awesome attitude that includes a results focus, positive energy, balanced urgency, and genuine partnership.
• I have the right to expect that Orbit will make me happy about choosing to work with them!

Partner Rights

• If I am partnered with Orbit, I have the right to mutual respect, genuine dialog and a sincere advice on what is best for the end client.
• I have the right to my clients.  I am entitled protection from Orbit working directly with my clients without my permission.

Real Technology

Web nerds hate to admit this, but most people are nowhere near the cutting edge. Every site is different, of course, but your analytics will show a significant amount of people visiting your site with very old browsers.

StatCounter has Internet Explorer 7 as the fourth most popular browser in the U.S. over the last three months—and Internet Explorer 7, released in 2006, is three versions old (Internet Explorer 8 is by far the most popular U.S. browser over the same period; Internet Explorer 9 is still just a blip). Furthermore, mobile users likely account for only a fraction of your site’s total visitors (over the last three months, mobile users accounted for under 10% of the traffic to orbitmedia.com). And according to a recent Nielsen study, only 4.8% of consumers own a tablet.

At Orbit, it’s very important for us to keep up with the latest technology, especially because a lot of it can be implemented without requiring users to upgrade. But we have to be realistic about adoption rates, and we have to anchor every decision in real-world data about what (non-web-nerd) people are actually using.

Real People

Technology is important, but your visitors are people, not devices. Which means it’s even more crucial to be realistic about the human behind the browser.

Over the years, we’ve watched a lot of real people use real websites. We’ve supplemented this data with research from other groups doing the same thing. We’ve spent a lot of time discussing detailed recommendations and making specific decisions. Ultimately, however, what we’ve learned can be reduced to a single sentence: Real people don’t give a damn about your website. If this sounds insane coming form a web design company, please, keep reading…

Visitors come to your site looking to do something specific. They move really fast. They’re not going to read all of your beautiful marketing copy, and they’re not going to stop to admire that stunning rollover effect in your navigation. If your visitors aren’t able to accomplish their goals, they’ve got no problem going somewhere else.

Here’s where it gets tricky: not giving a damn doesn’t mean people will use any site. It just means they don’t want to think about it. If the design is unprofessional, people will assume the product or service is too. If it’s difficult to place an order, people will go to a different site where it’s not. Being successful means working hard to provide a pleasant and easy experience that meets the specific needs of your visitors. You need great design to inspire confidence and convey your brand without getting in the way. You need great writing to communicate in mere seconds. And if you do a great job, people still won’t give a damn about your site. But they will come back.

Where’s my flying car?

We were supposed to have personal helicopters and robot servants by now. We were supposed to be walking on Mars. And we were definitely supposed to be done with Internet Explorer 7. But the only people who will ever visit your site are the ones who are real. So embrace them. Talk to them. Learn about them. You may find you like real people more than some ridiculous flying car.*

—

* Also, we have the Internet. Popular Science didn’t see that one coming.

Usually, I recommend against it. Having another website means more work: more time spent managing and promoting. Think of it this way: should I live in two houses? Sounds nice to have two places, but it’s going to take more effort to make each feel like a home.

Making a new section on your website may take only a few hours, and as long as you have a content management system, it might cost nothing. But there are times when it makes sense to have a separate website.

If you’ve ever asked this question, first consider the downsides to promoting and managing a separate site:

• Web Development Costs: Yes, I’d love to have Orbit build a new website for every domain name owned by every client, but I can’t recommend this in good conscience. Building great sites takes a real investment of time and money!

• Management Time: Hopefully, both sites are easy to update. But another site will need more content, which means more writing time and content development costs.

• Search Engine Ranking: The number and quality of incoming links is probably the most important factor in search engine rankings. It’s better to have one site with 100 links than two sites with 50 each. In other words, it’s better to have one site rank on page one in Google, than have two sites on page two.

Keeping these factors in mind, the pros had better outweigh the cons.

So when does a separate site make sense?

Of course, there are cases when you really should have another site. Here are my guidelines:

Ask yourself these two questions:

1. Would the new site have a different audience?

2. Would the new site have different goals?

If the answer to only one of these questions was yes, I don’t recommend a new site. It’s probably best just to have a separate section on your existing site. Only consider building a separate site if you answered yes to both of these questions.

Examples:

• Widget Co. sells widgets to businesses.  Now they’re thinking of selling widgets directly to consumers.  In other words, same goal (sell widgets), different audience (consumers).
  Yes + No = Separate Section

• Tony’s Unicorns (remember Tony?) is expanding, and now they’re going to start servicing griffins.  It’s a different goal (service griffins) but for the same audience (owners of mythical creatures).
  No + Yes = Separate Section

• Glenda does event photography for corporations.  But people keep asking her to plan weddings and she’s going to promote these services online.  It’s a different goal (promote planning services) and a different audience (happy couples).
  Yes + Yes = Separate Website

What about all these domains I have?

If you really want to take advantage of those domains, you can always redirect them to your main site. This doesn’t have a search engine benefit (it’s actually not a new incoming link), but it might make you feel better for having spent the money! Besides, there are other reasons to own domains, such as defense against competition, speculative investment and conversation at the bar on Thursdays.

Bottom Line

Next time you think about website design, pause and ask yourself those two questions. You might reconsider. Deciding not to make another site may save you thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours. But you may also find that a separate site is a great idea!

By Andy Crestodina. You can also find Andy on Google+ and Twitter.

All of us who own or work for Internet-based businesses are blessed to be living in groovy times. This is especially true if you’re in Chicago.

While Groupon – with its multi-billion dollar valuation and ascent as “the fastest growing company ever” – deservedly gets all the headlines, the pioneering daily site is not the only story in town. Chicago is emerging as a viable and distinct alternative to Silicon Valley, Boston and other tech industry epicenters for entrepreneurs starting web and mobile media companies.

Venture capitalists are finally starting to pay attention to Chicago. In recent weeks, online restaurant delivery service grubHub.com and social media software developer Sprout Social have raised tens of millions of dollars from world class investors. Online brokerage OptionsXpress, founded a decade ago, recently sold to Charles Schwab for a billion dollars.

There is no ceiling to what is possible.

So what can you do about it? Here are three things to consider when starting an Internet-based company in Chicago.

1) Don’t put off for tomorrow what you can do today

For too long in Chicago, entrepreneurs looking to start a web company waited until investment money or a lucrative customer to emerge before launching a website. Buzzed by the ludicrous success of dot-com high-fliers, people devoted more time to business plans and what their vision could ultimately become than they did to getting a site up and running.

When the bubble burst, those who were left standing operated serious websites with real customers. In the intervening years, costs to develop, maintain and market (especially through social media channels) a site have decreased exponentially. So you can afford to get your site up and running right away, gauge feedback from your constituents, and innovate from there.

2) Community membership has its privileges

Just as you are building a website, you are also creating a business. You’re not alone. There are several outstanding organizations for business networking and education in Chicago that can help you land a customer and share best practices with others in the space. The Illinois Technology Association, The Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center, and TECHcocktail are all great resources.

If you are looking for more of an entrepreneurial boot camp, Excelerate Labs is a great place to learn from those who have done it before and to pitch your idea to investors. While applications for the 2011 year are closed, Excelerate still offers multiple public events throughout the year that are worth attending. For more specific matters like learning about search engine marketing or meeting mobile application developers, you can find dozens of regularly scheduled Meetups in the Chicago area.

If online social networking is more of your thing, become a member of Built in Chicago. With a mission of “promoting digital innovation in the world’s greatest city”, Built in Chicago has thousands of member profiles, aggregated news and forums, and more than 50 targeted interest groups. For original technology news, Technori and (shameless plug) the Chicago Sun-Times “Tech Matters” column are also valuable resources.

3) Technological innovation moves at lightning speed

A wise man once told me that continual and perpetual education is the key to success. This is especially true for anyone involved in a web-based operation. The business landscape can change at a moment’s notice and seemingly each day we are introduced to new tools and marketing platforms that can help us run our sites more efficiently and profitably.

Five years ago, Facebook was restricted to those who had a dot-edu email address. It now has more than 600 million active users. In 2008, mobile applications were far from mainstream. Today, there are more than 500,000 apps available for the iPhone, iPad and Android-based devices. Less than two years ago, Groupon was just starting to get some traction marketing deals to its Chicago-based email list. Today, the company is at the epicenter of the multi-billion dollar “deal of the day” industry.

While your business may not become the next Facebook, Apple or Groupon, you can draw more than inspiration from those and lesser-known companies. There are a lot of great tools you can use to plug into your business right away. You can create a Facebook Group, develop and iPhone or Android app, or become a Groupon affiliate to expand your business.

Now is the time to press go. What are you waiting for?

Brad Spirrison is the Managing Editor of Appolicious.com and AndroidApps.com, the leading discovery platform for mobile applications.

This is Brad. We love Brad. We think you should too.

First, let’s back up and talk about what a wireframe is. For those looking to build a web site of any size or shape, wireframes are the foundation on which to begin building. Wireframing usually comes after the site architecture has been determined by a site map or flow chart of the web-site’s pages and before the creative design phase.

There are 3 easy ways to describe a wireframe:

• Wireframes are simple black and white layouts that outline the specific size and placement of page elements, site features, conversion areas and navigation for your web site.
• They are devoid of color, font choices, logos or any real design elements that take away from purely focusing on a site’s structure. 
• We often say that they are much like a blue print to a home, where you can easily see the structural placement of your plumbing, electrical and other structural elements without any interior design treatments.

Here is an examples of what a wireframe looks like:

Simply overlooking this step in order to get to the look and feel is a huge mistake that would prove disastrous for any web site or any contractor building a home. To reinforce the importance of this phase in a web process, I have outlined seven extremely important reasons on why you need to wireframe.

1. Displays site architecture visually

A site map can be a bit abstract, especially ones that are very large. Taking the site map to wireframe starts the first real concrete visual process for a project. Wireframes turn the abstract nature of a flow chart into something real and tangible without distractions. This step ensures that all parties are on the same page.

2. Allows for clarification of web site features

In many instances, clients may not understand what you mean when you say “dynamic slide show,” “news feeds,” “google map integration,” “product filtering,” “light boxes” and hundreds of other types of features. Wire framing specific project features on a web site provides a clear communication to a client how these features will function, where they will live on the specific page and how useful they might actually be.

Sometimes you may decide to take out a feature once it is wireframed due to the fact that it just does’t work with what your site’s goals are. Seeing the features without any creative influence really allows a client to focus on other equally important aspects of the project and clarifies any expectations about how features will be executed.

3. Pushes usability to the forefront

This is the one of the most important points of the entire wire framing process. Creating wireframes pushes usability to the forefront in showcasing page layouts at their core. It forces everyone to look objectively at a web site’s ease of use, conversion paths, naming of links, navigation placement and feature placement. Wireframes can point out flaws in your site architecture or how a specific feature may work. And this is a great thing.

4. Identifies ease of updates

For clients who purchase a content managed web site this point is especially important. A wireframe will immediately identify how well your site will handle content growth.  For example, if you only have ten products offered right now, but in six months you may have 100, you will want your web site to accommodate this growth without impact to the website design, site architecture or usability. Wireframes will identify these important areas of content growth.

5. Helps make the design process iterative.

Instead of trying to combine the functionality/layout and creative/branding aspects of the website in one step, wireframes ensure that these elements are taken in one at a time. This allows clients (and other team members) to provide feedback earlier in the process. Skipping wireframes delays this feedback and increases the costs of making changes because full design mock-ups must be reworked, not just simplified wireframes.

6. Saves time on the entire project

Wireframing saves time in a multitude of ways. Your designs are more calculated. Your development team understands what they are building.  Content creation becomes much clearer. You avoid hacks later on in the process. Everyone from the web team, the agency and client are all on the same page about what the web site is supposed to do and how it is supposed to function.

7. Experience shows it works

Building a web site is a process. Wireframing is one of those parts of the web process that should not be skipped, just as you wouldn’t build a house without a blueprint, or live in it without decoration. Each step has an important place in a larger process.

Here are some additional links on this topic:

Smashing Magazine
Inspiration on wireframes
Wireframe Magazine, dedicated to all things wireframing
Web.without.words, site where designers take popular sites and reconstruct them in a wireframe