Technology is changing so fast and, with it, every facet of our world, personal and business.  Let’s see.  Bet a few years ago you decided you needed a web site.  You found someone to design it, spent time talking about how it should look etc. and, after, a long time (much longer than you had anticipated), plus several thousands of dollars, you had a web site.  Whew, you thought, that’s one more thing I don’t have to worry about.

Not so fast.  Most often these first trials were not what was wanted or needed.  Most were just a listing of who and where you were. Phone, address, email address, and a bunch of pretty pictures of plants and containers.  Usually they were difficult for visitors to navigate, took too long, and just didn’t cut it.  And, as for driving business to you?  Well, fuggedaboudit.

What to do?  Well, lets see if this can be remedied.  First, have a good long hard look at what you want from your web site.  Is it your "Brochure"?  Do you want to drive leads?  Both?  Each of these strategies demands different designs and have different costs.

Most IP companies just need the "Brochure".  It has to be pretty, easy to navigate etc.  It is there for clients and prospects to log on and find out about your company and its credibility so, heres where you want to be brief and to the point, list accomplishments, awards, testamonials, and what services and products you offer.  Step 2 is to have photos of Products, plants and containers as well as Holiday.  For most small local companies, this is enough.  Warning: Stay away from the fancy morphing and fireworks.  Pretty, yes but this razzle dazzle takes too much time.  Keep it short and sweet.  And, please stay away from all the fancy fonts.  Easy to read is better.

If you want to go beyond the Brochure, the next step is to drive leads to you through the site.  Once upon a time you or your designer needed to insert into the program, Key Words.  These increased  the probability that web browsers would find you and direct traffic to your site over others.  Now there is GOOGLE.  Changed everything.  They do things differently and the secret key words are different too.  Now there is something called search engine optomization.  Bottom line, you can get with another web site expert and see this is done (more $$) or you can go pay by click.  The latter means you set up an account and a budget with Google and pay so many cents per click when people get directed to your site.  One way, though expensive, to corral people interested in a service in your area.  To keep costs down you can set up a not to go over budget.

My advice?  Find a good search engine optomization guru and have them critique your existing site.  Boy, will you get your eyes opened.