What has your website done for you lately? If it’s not supporting your bottom line, a simple mind shift can make a world of difference.

Regardless of the industry, most business owners fail to take full advantage of the Web. It’s unfortunate when you consider a website’s ability to cost-effectively promote a business 365, 24/7.

Hiring employees at $30 an hour to market your business every hour in the year would equate to 8,760 hours or $262,800. Alternatively, a well written, properly designed and fully optimized website costs just a fraction of that. Additionally, you don’t have to deal with several other human resources costs and issues.    

That’s why Webcopyplus encourages business owners to revisit fundamental views of websites. They’re not merely tools, but rather virtual ambassadors.

Accordingly, if you arm your virtual ambassador with the right information, direction and tools, it’ll deliver your message across the street or around the globe. It’ll connect with prospects, help turn them into customers and provide after sale support. To be sure, when properly equipped, websites have the means to relentlessly build your brand, your business and your bottom line.

What’s your purpose?

Most businesses don’t provide their virtual ambassadors the right direction and information to do the job. Ironically, it’s often because business owners don’t even know what they want from their websites.

I often ask clients and workshop participants: “Why did you launch your site?” It’s a simple question, but almost always triggers perplexed expressions.

After a few seconds of contemplation, the answer is usually: “Because my competitors have them” or “Because my clients expect me to have one.” Bad answers. And these responses aren’t limited to small business. Mid-size companies with executives discussing $150,000 websites sometimes provide the same ill reasons.

Good answers include, but are not limited to:

• Sell products online
• Produce leads
• Create awareness
• Build a brand
• Attract members
• Generate feedback

If you haven’t defined your site’s objective, chances are you’re wasting time and money. It’s like dressing up an employee in company colours and getting him to aimlessly roam the streets. No purpose. No message. No results. A pointless action that’s regrettably carried out time and time again on the Web.

If you’re a consultant, for example, your website’s main objective might be to generate leads. That’s a good start. As simplistic as it sounds, many business owners fail to establish such fundamental elements.

Next, determine what action your visitors must take to fulfill your objective. This naturally shapes your call to action. Again, as a consultant, perhaps it’s to subscribe to your newsletter to establish yourself as an industry leader and build rapport with prospects. Or it might be to request an information package, or simply to get your visitors to pick up the phone for a free initial consultation.

Whatever the case, identifying exactly what you want potential clients to do allows you to plan, write and design for an action. And if you focus all your resources and messaging toward achieving that action, you will significantly improve your conversion rate and overall success.

The right tools for the job

Gear your virtual ambassador with the proper information and tools to accomplish its mission, including:

Your message
Your web copy needs to speak directly to your audience’s needs. Frankly, what can you do for them, and how and why can you do it better than the competition?

Your preference
Speak to your ideal client to attract your ideal client. Moreover, when you focus on a specific audience, you can more effectively recognize and target their psychological trigger points (what makes them take action).

Your manners
Stay classy if you want to appeal to mature business types. Get an edge if you’re looking to tap into a younger crowd. Establish a personality and keep it consistent.

Your pitch
The most effective way to entice people is through their emotions, so cater to their needs and wants by bringing benefits to light.

Your reason
Provide your visitors relevant information to logically justify their decisions. Does anybody really need a $127,000 convertible Jaguar? Probably not. But providing specs on horsepower, rain-sensing windshield wipers and new lighting technology helps consumers rationalize desires.

Your direction
Guide visitors, making it easy for them to take the preferred steps. Many website owners expect visitors to wade through layers of complex and irrelevant content. People are impatient on the Web. Waste their time and they’ll jump to your competitor.

Your close
Ask for the sale. Be straight forward, and respectful.

Don’t keep your virtual ambassador in the dark

Equip your virtual ambassador with a clear mission, and the right information and tools. It’ll put you in a better light and reflect well on your bottom line.

Web design and development firm Raincity Studios today acquired Bryght. 

The companies, both based in Vancouver, B.C., Canada, are pioneers of “Web 2.0” and open-source software communities. In fact, this acquisition is hailed as another success story from Vancouver B.C.’s new media technology industry, which has launched companies like Flickr, Dabbledb, Now Public and nitobi. 

“This announcement is exciting for the local tech industry as Raincity Studios and Bryght are perfect examples of the rapid success achievable in the Vancouver new media sector with a good plan, talented team and hard work,” said Adam Gooch of New Media BC. 

The expanded company will continue to create custom web applications and community websites, and offer hosting and infrastructure support and services to clients globally. 

Kris Krug, renowned Web 2.0 expert and former head of Bryght, is the newly appointed President of Raincity Studios.

Google accounted for 64.49 per cent of all U.S. searches in the four weeks ended October 27, 2007, while Yahoo Search, MSN Search and Ask.com accounted for 21.65 per cent, 7.42 per cent and 4.76 per cent of searches, respectively, reported Hitwise.  

The remaining 49 search engines in the Hitwise Search Engine Analysis Tool accounted for 1.68 per cent.

IT search engine start-up Paglo launched beta software Nov. 19 that’s designed to help IT personnel stay on top of their companies’ computer, network and security systems.

The Paglo search engine, which the company is billing as “Google for IT,” is said to be an answer to increasingly complex hardware devices, software programs and other technologies.

The Web-based Paglo application will crawl a company’s IT infrastructure and report on a wide range of queries about the hardware and software within the systems. It will run on IE7, Firefox and Safari browsers.

The platform includes the Paglo Crawler, an open-source discovery spider that businesses download on one computer to gather IT information from all devices and software.

Users can register for Paglo’s private beta, which is slated to go live later this month.

I just finished editing a media advisory for an IT firm, and had to strike out a few lines of hyped-up, unsubstantiated statements followed by exclamation marks.

The U.S.-based company is reputable and there was no intention to mislead. The in-house marketing team simply meant to create excitement within the industry.

The problem is when you overstate, online visitors instantly become wary of your web copy. That doesn’t do you any favours when you consider most people are already suspect about the Internet.

The same goes for the use of exclamation marks. Used tactfully, it can be an effective instrument in your message. But more often than not, it makes web copy smell like spam. It’s best to avoid marketing hype, unless you want to be labeled a spammer and join the bottom feeders of the Internet.

Compelling quotes, and verified facts and figures will go a lot further to promote your enthusiasm and cause. Leave the hype to the spammers.  

Traditional media can’t simply emulate their products onscreen. 

That reflects the message put forth by Times Online editor Anne Spackman at a Society of Editors conference in Manchester this month.  

“Digital evolves extremely fast, it wasn’t that long ago that our websites represented our newspapers on the computer screen,” said Spackman, who was appointed to her position last year and has expedited Times Online’s integration of print and website operations.

In fact, she likened the current pace of change to the Wild West. Indeed, given the fact that newspapers compete with thousands of websites around the globe, they need to progress with the rapidly evolving digital world.

The pressure is intensified by the content-driven nature of Web 2.0, which creates armies of public reporters. To stay relevant, major media groups need to deliver quality news that’s accurate, objective and up to date – and fully embrace the power of the Web.

Otherwise this new wave of “citizen journalists” will make today’s media giants obsolete.  

The Globe and Mail’s Small Business Report recently featured an article on Webcopyplus, which discusses how we take an active approach to networking and resource sharing.

One of the many benefits Webcopyplus provides clients is direct access to an extensive network of talented and dependable web types. Ironically, the article prompted several new potential partners to reach out, possibly expanding our already broad range of contacts.

That’s valuable for clients, plus it helps our business. As the article mentioned, it’s unrealistic to stay on top of every emerging Internet and software technology. Hence, we lean on various web experts when called for and they call on us when the issues surround web copy.

Special thanks to Business consultant Mark Wardell and the Globe.

When considering the best font for your website, look at the two most common options:

• Serif – they have cross-lines at the tips of each letter.
• Sans serif — no lines, they’re plain.

While studies show people read serif text faster in print, people actually read sans serif quicker onscreen.

Hence, the best fonts for your website content are probably Arial and Verdana.

Arial is modern and professional – always a safe bet with all ages. Meanwhile, Verdana is also modern and professional, but more stylish – perhaps making it more appealing to younger audiences.

Either way, keep your fonts and colours consistent, and try not to go smaller than 10 point. Otherwise you’ll strain users’ eyes and hinder usability.
 
Many designers look at web copy as something that gets in the way of beautiful designs. The fonts are shrunk in a bid to make them all but disappear. Don’t let this happen to your site.

Typographic quality has been evolving for hundreds of years, starting by hand, and then progressing to mechanical, machine, electric and electronic. But onscreen fonts still have a way to go.

High-gloss magazines boast more than 2,400 dots per inch (DPI). Meanwhile, current monitors display about 100 DPI. When monitors reach the typographic quality of paper, there’ll be more flexibility with fonts and sizes.
 
Until then, it’s a good bet to go with Arial or Verdana.