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Will You Add? - Interactive Content - Blogs, Forums, and Feedback - What Does Your Web Site Need?
I am regularly amazed by brand new facilities that are obviously user-unfriendly. Huge investments of time and money...but who are they designing it for?!A new airport in the Middle East is an impressive and expensive building. It’s huge, packed with stainless steel and halogen lights and lots of fancy gold.But it takes six escalators, two moving sidewalks and 3,446 steps (I counted) to get from the aircraft door to the taxi door at curbside. And no baggage trolleys are provided.What were the architects thinking about? Size? Grandeur? Physical exercise? Who were they designing it for?!A sparkling new hotel opened in a major capital city. There is no clear signage directing guests from the ballrooms to the restrooms. The few signs that do exist are etched in muted gold on dark marble pillars.More obvious signage was considered inappropriate for such elegant decor. Very stylish, very chic. But who were they designing it for?!I received a business car
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a "comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create an account and post their comments to your blog. This is something to be careful of as you can get negative comments along with the positive.
Forums
While online forums are popular and the perfect method of relationship building, starting a fo
Six Sigma methodologies aim at improving overall quality by eliminating defects and achieving near perfection by restricting the number of possible defects to less than 3.4 defects per million. Six Sigma methodologies were originally developed for implementation in the manufacturing sector but with time their use has spread to the services sector as well. In the services sector, Six Sigma concepts are used mainly for eliminating transactional errors.Today, the concepts and methodologies of Six Sigma are increasingly being used in the healthcare industry for improving the quality of services rendered, increasing efficiency, and eliminating human errors that can often prove fatal. However, the use of Six Sigma in the healthcare industry is a relatively new phenomenon as compared to other service industries that have undergone some type of data-supported, systematic, quality-improvement process. With medical and technological advancements, the demand and expectations for improved medic
· You'll find out what type of content visitors want to see at your web site. This will attract your visitors to revisit and read the content.
· You'll find out how to improve existing products or services. This will attract new customers to buy from your business.
· You'll find out which products or services your customers would like to see you sell in the future. This will increase your back end product sales.
· You'll find out how to improve your customer service. This will cut down on customer complaints and how to better resolve problems.
· You'll find out how to improve your sales letters or adverts. This will increase your sales, traffic or subscribers.
· You'll find out how to design your web site to fit your visitors’ needs and wants. This will increase the time your visitors spend on your web site.
· You'll find out what kind of non-related products or services your customers would buy. This will help your business easily move into a different market.
· You'll find out how to better price your products. This will help you sell your products or services at a price that will pull the most orders.
· You'll find out the interests of your potential customers. This will inform you where to market and promote your products.
Getting Started
So where do you start? Do you need a blog, a forum, or a feedback form? All have different uses and your selection will depend on the needs of your particular business and your limitation with regard to time and/or budget. Below are some of the options and some ideas for adding interactive and fresh content to your web site.
For more information about how to establish and maintain online relationships with your viewers and customers, get a copy of our guide “Building Online Relationships” available here: http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
Weblogs or Blogs
A blog is basically a series of posts that appear by the date posted like an online journal. Setup is minimal and the interface is easy to learn- if you can use a word processing package, you can write a blog! Services like Moveable Type and Blogger make it incredibly easy for anyone to publish on the web.
Blogs can be integrated seamlessly into your site so that they have the same look and feel. You can use a blog to publish an events calendar or comment on developments and news from your industry. A blog can be strictly professional, announcing special offers or new product info or it can be casual and create a "personality" for your company.
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a "comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create an account and post their comments to your blog. This is something to be careful of as you can get negative comments along with the positive.
Forums
While online forums are popular and the perfect method of relationship building, starting a for
Direct mail marketing has been shown to be effective in reaching customers. This method is so effective that it's been around for centuries. And I'm sure you have experienced it personally since I'm sure you've gotten many direct mailing in your mail box. Direct mail is a powerful tool but it's only true, though, if your direct mail marketing plan is a good one. By keeping the following tips in mind, you can ensure that your direct mail marketing plan will result in success rather than just piles of letters in customer trash bins.First of all, your mail marketing should happen constantly. This means you need to be sending out mailings pretty often than just once a month. You should be sending your mailings with a large amount of frequency. This MAY sound like a way to annoy your customers, but it isn’t if you do it correctly. You need to make sure that you vary the format of your direct mail marketing letters. You can do this by sending catalogs, letters, and brochures etc, so that
· You'll find out which products or services your customers would like to see you sell in the future. This will increase your back end product sales.
· You'll find out how to improve your customer service. This will cut down on customer complaints and how to better resolve problems.
· You'll find out how to improve your sales letters or adverts. This will increase your sales, traffic or subscribers.
· You'll find out how to design your web site to fit your visitors’ needs and wants. This will increase the time your visitors spend on your web site.
· You'll find out what kind of non-related products or services your customers would buy. This will help your business easily move into a different market.
· You'll find out how to better price your products. This will help you sell your products or services at a price that will pull the most orders.
· You'll find out the interests of your potential customers. This will inform you where to market and promote your products.
Getting Started
So where do you start? Do you need a blog, a forum, or a feedback form? All have different uses and your selection will depend on the needs of your particular business and your limitation with regard to time and/or budget. Below are some of the options and some ideas for adding interactive and fresh content to your web site.
For more information about how to establish and maintain online relationships with your viewers and customers, get a copy of our guide “Building Online Relationships” available here: http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
Weblogs or Blogs
A blog is basically a series of posts that appear by the date posted like an online journal. Setup is minimal and the interface is easy to learn- if you can use a word processing package, you can write a blog! Services like Moveable Type and Blogger make it incredibly easy for anyone to publish on the web.
Blogs can be integrated seamlessly into your site so that they have the same look and feel. You can use a blog to publish an events calendar or comment on developments and news from your industry. A blog can be strictly professional, announcing special offers or new product info or it can be casual and create a "personality" for your company.
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a "comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create an account and post their comments to your blog. This is something to be careful of as you can get negative comments along with the positive.
Forums
While online forums are popular and the perfect method of relationship building, starting a fo
"Small firms often make the mistake of thinking matters such as corporate identity and branding are only for large companies," said George Kiely, head of EI's design unit. "But every company must project an identity if it is to succeed.""How companies see themselves is unimportant, how their market sees them is what matters. That's where design and branding and corporate identity come in."When a company is describing itself, whether in a brochure or on a website, it needs to do so in terms not of the givens, which customers take for granted, but the added value. Branding is the company's way of indicating those extras.""Smaller companies generally value design less than bigger companies," Meehan said. "They don't see it as an investment in the business.It is discretionary spend, something they will only undertake if they feel they have a layer of fat."The reason is simple. "With large firms, people are spending from a dedicated marketing budget. With smal
· You'll find out how to better price your products. This will help you sell your products or services at a price that will pull the most orders.
· You'll find out the interests of your potential customers. This will inform you where to market and promote your products.
Getting Started
So where do you start? Do you need a blog, a forum, or a feedback form? All have different uses and your selection will depend on the needs of your particular business and your limitation with regard to time and/or budget. Below are some of the options and some ideas for adding interactive and fresh content to your web site.
For more information about how to establish and maintain online relationships with your viewers and customers, get a copy of our guide “Building Online Relationships” available here: http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
Weblogs or Blogs
A blog is basically a series of posts that appear by the date posted like an online journal. Setup is minimal and the interface is easy to learn- if you can use a word processing package, you can write a blog! Services like Moveable Type and Blogger make it incredibly easy for anyone to publish on the web.
Blogs can be integrated seamlessly into your site so that they have the same look and feel. You can use a blog to publish an events calendar or comment on developments and news from your industry. A blog can be strictly professional, announcing special offers or new product info or it can be casual and create a "personality" for your company.
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a "comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create an account and post their comments to your blog. This is something to be careful of as you can get negative comments along with the positive.
Forums
While online forums are popular and the perfect method of relationship building, starting a fo
Every Franchise Opportunity comes with an Operators manual. This is the cornerstone of every franchise business. A well written and properly set out manual can easily make the difference between having a successful franchisee or a failure. Many franchisors do not dedicate as much time and effort in their operators manual as they should.I believe that a franchise business operator’s manual has to have the following:Detailed instructions on how to run and manage the business properly. Most franchisees do not come from business backgrounds and therefore need taught the basic skills of how to manage a business during their training programme. These guidelines should be laid down neatly and concisely in the operator’s manual.Every aspect of running a business should be covered and zero assumptions should be made of the franchisees existing knowledge. This might make the manual bulky but it is definitely the right way to go. The franchisees will come to regard the operator’s
For more information about how to establish and maintain online relationships with your viewers and customers, get a copy of our guide “Building Online Relationships” available here: http://www.enable-uk.co.uk/html/book_4.html
Weblogs or Blogs
A blog is basically a series of posts that appear by the date posted like an online journal. Setup is minimal and the interface is easy to learn- if you can use a word processing package, you can write a blog! Services like Moveable Type and Blogger make it incredibly easy for anyone to publish on the web.
Blogs can be integrated seamlessly into your site so that they have the same look and feel. You can use a blog to publish an events calendar or comment on developments and news from your industry. A blog can be strictly professional, announcing special offers or new product info or it can be casual and create a "personality" for your company.
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a "comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create an account and post their comments to your blog. This is something to be careful of as you can get negative comments along with the positive.
Forums
While online forums are popular and the perfect method of relationship building, starting a fo
Franchising companies, which specialize as part of their market mix commercial and industrial national and international accounts to be serviced bought a Mobile basis must consider how to control those accounts. Conflicts can arise between franchisee's accounts especially when such accounts are slightly outside the franchisee's designated territories. It is for this reason that in our franchising company we address this issue prior to the formation of the new franchise by inserting a clause into the franchise agreement. Below is a copy of the clauses that I put into our franchise agreements;3.27 National and International AccountsIf the franchisee has any National or International Account which have locations outside the Marketing Area, if any such locations is within the marketing area of another Franchisee of Franchisor, Franchisee shall offer such other Franchisee the right to service such account within such other Franchisee’s marketing area on such terms as Franchisee
What can a blog do for your business? Think about what your customers want to know.
To add interactivity, several blog programs come with a "comment" ability built in. This allows general users to create an account and post their comments to your blog. This is something to be careful of as you can get negative comments along with the positive.
Forums
While online forums are popular and the perfect method of relationship building, starting a forum and maintaining one can be challenging, especially in the beginning when members can be few and far between. The challenge for most new forum owners is to get beyond the initial start up phase and move onto a phase where the forum members themselves promote the forum simply by posting.
Forums have become a common feature in many websites. With good free scripts available, and paid scripts being relatively cheap, it seems that every new website has its own forum(s).
But is it wise to add forums to your website?
On the pro side, large, active forums generate content for your website. They add a "sticky" element as most people come back, at least to monitor developments on their threads. Some forum software allows members to opt to receive an email whenever someone replies to their thread. Most people use it and that automated email sends them right back to the forum and therefore, your web site.
However, forums can take a long time to pick up and an empty forum can actually drive new visitors away. You need to constantly monitor your forums to make sure that they are clean of spam, troll posts, and just keep everything in order. In addition, forums are database-type applications that generate web pages on the fly. Every time a user views a page, it's being created from scratch. As the forums become more active, this can take a heavy load on the web server's resources and ultimately increase your hosting costs.
A forum is an incredible tool for building content and a community but it's not a task to be undertaken lightly; it requires a lot of time and energy and some technical knowledge (or a tech budget!)
If your industry has a need, or your product has a loyal following, a forum is a great tool to build content while drawing like-minded individuals together. A forum is great for market research, technical support, building a fan base, trading ideas and knowledge, and many, many other benefits. Try to get a base of people from similar business or industry experts to post at your forum. It's exposure for them and helps to build a solid foundation for your information.
If you decide to start a forum, be sure to use one that is search-friendly, such as www.InvisionBoard.com or www.phpbb.com, and set aside a good chunk of time to promote it and administer it.
Feedback
Unsolicited feedback is a powerful and convincing tool! Let your customers tell other customers why they love you. It's much more compelling than your own claims. Unfortunately, customers normally need to be asked for their opinion. You can ask for feedback on any area of your business, your web site, your ordering process, your levels of customer service, your delivery service, etc.
The easiest way is to simply
HTTP = HTML link (for blogs, profiles,phorums):
<a href="http://www.atriclecheck.com/article/70199/atriclecheck-Interactive-Content--Blogs-Forums-and-Feedback--What-Does-Your-Web-Site-Need.html">Interactive Content - Blogs, Forums, and Feedback - What Does Your Web Site Need?</a>
BB link (for phorums):
[url=http://www.atriclecheck.com/article/70199/atriclecheck-Interactive-Content--Blogs-Forums-and-Feedback--What-Does-Your-Web-Site-Need.html]Interactive Content - Blogs, Forums, and Feedback - What Does Your Web Site Need?[/url]
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