New Media Honey

7 Mistakes Non-IT Companies Make When It Comes To Their Websites (Part 2)

Posted by Tania N. Arpa on January 30th, 2012

Get involved in building your corporate website.

Read part 1 of this article here.

Outsourcing your corporate website’s development? You can get a good corporate site and avoid common pitfalls if you do your homework and get involved in building it. You can do this even if you don’t have an extensive IT background, trust me.

Not visiting their websites every day. Even if the content doesn’t get updated that often, or there aren’t any changes, someone in the company should visit its website every day. Mainly to make sure it’s up. And also to randomly click on menu items to make sure there are no dead links, and to visit random pages to make sure everything looks okay (no broken links, typos, etc.). Yes, it’s your webmaster’s job to make sure everything is in place, but your webmaster does not have as much as stake in your company as you. In one company I used to work for, hundreds of people worked on the website, but the CEO would still occasionally send us reports of broken images and the like for us to fix. It wasn’t because we were bad at our jobs (I would like to think!) but because the website had thousands of pages, so broken images and links were inevitable due to human error. Despite the size of the website, our CEO took the time to check on it to make sure nothing was amiss.
Not checking on user comments or messages. There’s a reason why social networking has become such a powerful marketing tool: audience engagement. Companies shouldn’t just “sell” themselves to customers online the way they do with a billboard ad or a tv commercial, where they just put the message out there, they should take advantage of Web 2.0 (interactivity) and social networking by engaging their market. That means responding to user feedback and inquiries, at the very least. Websites aren’t just there to send out a message, they’re there to give customers and potential customers a way to communicate with your company.
Not exercising any kind of control over the message of their website. One of the first things your web developer should discuss with you before they start creating your website should be the site’s objective or purpose. This includes what kind of message your company would like to put out there. A good web developer should be able to offer you recommendations in this regard, and know how to put your ideas into action. A common mistake companies make is to merely concern themselves with whether the colors and fonts of their websites look good, or whether the design is pretty. That’s all well and good, but remember that your company’s message matters more.
Trusting their web developers and webmasters too much. I’m not saying companies should be suspicious of every little thing their web developers do. In most cases, they do know what they’re doing, and would like to do a good job for their clients. However, don’t leave everything in their hands. Do some homework. Read up on current trends in websites, SEO and social networking, and discuss all these with your developer or webmaster. As I mentioned in item no. 1, make sure you have control over your website. Sadly, there are still a few unscrupulous web developers out there who trick you into using domains that they own, or bad, hard-to-use proprietary software you will keep paying for forever in order not to lose your content. So pay attention to your contract, and be involved in the building of your website.

7 Mistakes Non-IT Companies Make When It Comes To Their Websites (Part 1)

Posted by Tania N. Arpa on January 18th, 2012

For IT and IT-related companies and Internet businesses, having a website is a no-brainer, if not the main part of the business model. However, for companies from other industries such as law, accounting, agriculture, etc., most people think a website is not that big a priority, especially if:

The company or business is small and only serves a small area or neighborhood
The company has been around for a very long time and has been doing very well without a website
The company serves only other businesses, which it gets through contacts and recommendations. This includes farms, which mostly sell their supplies to middlemen, factories and the like.

While I love the Internet and do a lot of website work, I don’t believe every company or business should maintain a website. Like assassins and terrorist organizations, for obvious reasons. However, when a non-IT company does decide to get a public website for itself, sometimes mistakes are made, especially if it doesn’t have anyone who knows enough about website development and new media in general. And especially when it hires an outside company to create and/or maintain its website for them. Here are seven mistakes I’ve seen companies make:

Anatomy of An E-book Cover (or How We Found Out Jean Reno Was Spanish)

Posted by Tania N. Arpa on January 6th, 2012

Last month, Mangojuiced.com‘s Readable Mangoes imprint launched “The Thrifty Mom’s Guide to Style” by fabulous columnist/blogger/author Katrina “Iggy” Ramos Atienza. Of course, we needed a fab cover to go with the book, so what better way than to have the author on the cover?

The Concept
Before committing resources to making a book cover, it’s important to first establish a concept. For TTMGTS, we discussed the concept with Iggy and decided on a cover that was urban, stylish and fun. And because it was a book on style, it was important that it showcased Iggy’s personal style. We were to take photographs of Iggy and create a cover design from them. I made mock-ups of the cover concept using photos Iggy had used in some of her MangoJuiced articles, and the cover copy our editors had approved.

Making the Blog: Design and Layout

Posted by Tania N. Arpa on November 26th, 2011

Once you’ve decided on what CMS to use for your blog and you’ve set it up, you need to figure out your blog design and layout. My philosophy when it comes to establishing a design for your blog is simple: Don’t be a hero.

Sure, who doesn’t want a kick-ass blog design? However, just because you think you’re going to make a good blogger doesn’t necessarily mean you’re an artist too. So don’t try too hard, at least in the beginning. I’ve found that for most of the popular CMSs like Blogger and WordPress, there are literally thousands of free designs (themes) available. Most of them are customizable, so even if you use a free theme, your blog doesn’t have to be a clone of other blogs, design-wise.

Blogs have to be more than just pretty, they have to have a functional and usable design. In short, you need to make sure it’s easy for your readers find what they need and they’re encouraged to keep reading and looking for more of your posts to read. Here are a few guidelines:

Making the Blog: What is CMS?

Posted by Tania N. Arpa on November 26th, 2011

CMS is one of those terms mostly used only by I.T. and new media practitioners. It stands for Content Management System. And, no, the average blogger doesn’t need to know what CMS means, even though, by definition, every blogger uses one.

Blogger is a CMS. So is WordPress. Livejournal, Multiply, Tumblr, MySpace — they’re all a kind of CMS. Each of them is a means by which online content is submitted, organized and presented in an automated (to a degree) and customizable way.

When you decide to start a blog, one of the first things you need to decide is what CMS to use. I say “one of” because, of course, there are other things you need to decide before deciding on a CMS. For instance, you need to ask yourself what the purpose of your blog is, and what you want to accomplish with it. As a matter of fact, the purpose of your blog should determine to an extent what CMS you use.