In this slow economy people are spending their money wisely and are using websites even more to figure out if the investment is worth their hard-earned money. How’s your website?

* Has an open mind
* Looks for ways to save money (but not by cutting corners)
* Is willing to utilize new technology
* Desires simplicity
* Understands the concept and importance of a target audience
* Is comfortable with their limitations
* Loves a good story
* Is willing to trust
* Cares about their customers and employees / coworkers

It’s not a comprehensive list by any means, just characteristics that I’ve taken for granted in my current client base until now. How close does this list come to describing you?

Ya Gotta Believe!

Don’t think of me as just a designer, or a web developer, or a marketer. Think of me as a pinch-hitter for your team. I sincerely want what’s going to best help your company or product, and I’ll do my best to provide it. I won’t design you that email campaign, or website, or print piece until we are both convinced that it is the best option for the situation. Ultimately, I need to be able to believe in your company or product before presenting it to your target audience. Because if I can’t convince myself to believe in it, then I’m not the right person to convince others to believe either.

Look around, click some of the links below and let me know if I can help with anything you’re looking to accomplish online!

A lot of companies (HR Block, JetBlue, Dell, 37signals) are using Twitter to provide updates (product, service, company, etc.) as well as support for their customers. The cool thing about it, and why it’s different than say, subscribing to a company’s email list, is that the customer isn’t having to give any information to the company like they do when submitting a form with their email address. Seems to me this would make the customer more comfortable interacting with that company, without subjecting themselves to solicitations or spam.

Further Reading:

Related: Twitter Goes Beyond asking “What are you Doing?”

For the Customer: How to Get Customer Service via Twitter

For the Company: Monitoring Twitter without Going Insane

I thought I’d do a comparison of how a few of the web’s best-known companies have dealt with recent glitches that caused interruption in their service:

Apple iTunes Activation Server Status

GoogleApps & Gmail System Status

(Though Google provides status for their server issues, it’s difficult to find, and in somewhat of a convoluted format. Link here )

37signals System Status

(System status is always available at http://status.37signals.com )

Wrapping It Up

Aside from the issues mentioned above, Apple continues to have issues with their newly-launched MobileMe service. To their credit, they have apologized to their customers, awarded them with a free month of service, and added a status page to the MobileMe section of their website.

Which one looks like they’ve done the best job of keeping their customers in-the-know to you?

UPDATE: Apple has come forward with further apologies, hoping to make things right with their customers by giving them another extension on their MobileMe subscription.

UPDATE 2: Apple has now announced they are getting rid of their status page in the MobileMe section of their site, and replacing it with a status area in the upper right hand corner of their MobileMe support section, along with a MobileMe News page with the ability to chat with a live representative. (Nicely upping the ante for SaaS support!)

Google TVads is a revolutionary tool/service recently made public that allows anyone to plan, buy, and track their own campaigns for television. Touting an unsurprisingly intuitive interface, a vendor marketplace for finding local production studios to create your spots, and unheard of “next-day results,” this new product has many ad agencies scratching their heads in amazement.

Why This Is A Big Deal

The most popular way of advertising on television today follows a process similar to this:

1. You hire an ad agency.
2. They hire a production company to make your commercial(s).
3. They spend hours deciphering which networks and television shows match your target demographic to air your commercial alongside.
4. They take your budget and purchase the time-slots from the TV stations over the phone, then send your commercial to the stations on a DVD or via complicated satellite transmission.
5. The television stations air your commercials as close to the time slots you selected as they deem possible.
6. Your ad agency then receives the invoices from all the TV stations telling you which time slots were actually run (time slots are very rarely guaranteed) and your GRP’s achieved.
7. You then wait 3-6 mos. until the next media book comes out to do a “Post-buy Analysis” which helps you gauge the success of your television ad campaign, and to keep your TV stations honest with their projected GRP’s. (Media books are published quarterly by Nielsen, are only available to ad agencies, and give a very vague overview of “who watched what and when.”)
8. Rinse and repeat.

Google replaces this lengthy and difficult process with the following:

1. Select desired networks, dayparts, and programs.
2. Upload and select your ad.
3. Set a budget and bid the max CPM that you are willing to pay.
4. Track and optimize. (The next day!)

What This Means For Small Businesses:

If you have the time and manpower to do it in-house, Google has just increased your TV advertising budget by 15% (the minimum commission fee paid to an ad agency for media buys). What used to take many, many hours (and was money well earned for ad agencies) now takes only a fraction of the time with Google TVads, and costs only what you spend to create the commercial and place it on television networks.

What This Means For Ad Agencies:

You’re not out of a job - life just got easier! Dump your expensive media purchasing software, take this and present it to your clients with all its great features. It’s still going to take someone to maintain it, and the client may not have the time, manpower or the desire to do it in-house. You just scored a free, time-saving upgrade and look brilliant for doing it! (If you’re really aggressive, cut your media buy commission in half for them and they’ll never look for another ad agency again.)

What This Means For The Future Of Advertising

Television shows are already online: NBC, CBS, FOX. With TVads, Google is placing themselves to be at the forefront of the television revolution. Even if TVads doesn’t end up being the solution for the future, it will most likely be very similar to this.

1. Be Conversational
2. Make Life Easier (Provide Value)
3. Measure Your Efforts (ROI)

1. Using the Web to be Conversational

First, for a conversation to be successful, you have to care about the customer, their long-term needs, and what they are looking to accomplish at that moment. Then …

Listen to what your customers are already saying.
If you already have ways of receiving feedback from your customers (call logs, snail mail, support emails, etc.), read them. They’re conversations just waiting to begin.

Search the Blogosphere to manage what people are already saying about you and how you do business with tools such as:

• The Social Pipe
• Technorati
• Google Blog Search
• Twitter Search

Respond to the conversations you find.
By responding to the people who have contacted you directly (even just to thank them for their correspondence!) you’ve facilitated a conversation. As long as you solve their problem courteously and in a timely manner, you’re their hero (and now they are your customer evangelist).

Blogs – Publicly thank (and reward) the people who are saying nice things about you on their blog. Publicly apologize and request a more personal conversation method (phone call, email) to fix the problem for the people who are speaking badly of you.

Initiate new conversations (once you’ve got the other ones under control).
Every good marketer knows that one disappointed customer is worth ten delighted ones. It used to be that if you could get the disappointed customer to provide you with their thoughts and feedback, you could tailor your business practices to appease them. These days, the web-savvy customer not only wants to be involved in the tailoring process, they’d rather do it for you!

Feedback forms are a good way to invite conversations. Ask questions like:

• “How was your experience?”
• “What would you change?”
• “Frustrated? Let us have it!”

Surveys & Polls are another good way to spark conversations.

• On your website or another
• By email
• Using Facebook

Social Networking has proven to be viable time and again.

• Create a page, a group, or an application for Facebook
• Get a MySpace page up to allow for grassroots feedback
• Start a Google Group about a topic your company knows best
• Get on Twitter to allow people to contact you

Email is great for starting new conversations with existing customers who have already given you their email address.

• CampaignMonitor
• MailChimp

2. Using the Web to Make Life Easier

Start by making every interface (website, phone calls, mail, etc.) understandable! Don’t use long, difficult words and legal jargon. (Attorneys generally don’t write good public interface copy.)

Making It Easier for the Customer
Take what your customers are saying into account, then …

Allow them to do things from the comfort of their own home, such as:

• Managing their account online
• Filling out and submitting forms online
• Engage customer service and support online using web chat (or Twitter)

Allow them to do things from anywhere:

• Making payments or checking balances via SMS or mobile browsing (Bank of America has executed this nicely for the iPhone)
• Give them the option to receive SMS notifications for account events (e.g. “Your payment has been applied to your account”)

Making It Easier for You

There is an alternative to spending tens of thousands of dollars for IT solutions that integrate with your current workflow: Web Applications. A web application (webapp) is software that is online, and therefore available everywhere, 24/7/365, and is a solution that is quickly becoming the most efficient way of getting things done.

Webapps… • don't require a large IT staff to maintain - no software updates or patches.
• are cost-efficient - no more expensive servers or upgrades to buy.
• are platform independent - any moderately recent browser works.
• don’t lock you in - generally, you go monthly and can cancel any time.
• aren’t bloated with confusing and unnecessary features - generally, they are geared toward accomplishing one (or two) things, and doing it well.