I'll let you in on a secret I've known over the last ten years of developing websites for clients...


Successful website design, marketing and SEO heavily depend on a Web Developer's ability to create an organized, optimized and sustainable framework. But did you know that 100% of the success of any website rests in the client's hands?


 

  • Know Your Goal And Stick To It:

    What do you want to achieve by having a website? Are you providing a service? A product? Who is your target market? Are you wanting to make money?

    Does the platform you're using support your goals? Are you resistant to changing your current website? Why?

    When you make choices based on achieving your goal, you'll avoid disappointment at the end of the project. We all appreciate the value of saving money, however, skipping certain elements just to save a few bucks can actually prevent you from achieving your goal.

  • "Easy" and "Free" Are Not Always "easy" nor "free":

    Building your website with a WYSIWYG editor is easy (and sometimes free), however, unless you're using a WYSIWYG editor inside of a layout custom built with your content and goals in mind, the result is always messy due to limitations of WYSIWYG.

    I've rescued many clients from WYSIWYG editors who spent hundreds and thousands of dollars building what they thought would be a "free" and "easy" website. Don't let this happen to you! Hire a professional from the start, and you'll never have to worry about "settling" for a website you're never completely satisfied with.

  • I Invite You To Consider The Possibility That:

    Editing your own content may not be in alignment with your goals and it might restrict the way your website layout can look and function.

    "Needing more traffic" may not be your constraint. A simple conversation can determine what your constraint really is.

    Wordpress is a wonderful platform, but just because it's popular, easy and free doesn't mean it's right for you.

    If you've spent a lot of money trying to build your own website, and it isn't working - consider your time and money to be a great education in what doesn't work. This will free you up to take on a professional developer to build you a website that does work without feeling like you've wasted time and money.

    What you think "looks good" might not actually create a user friendly experience. Listen to your developer if they suggest eliminating certain elements from the plan. While you may be the one with the idea, you've hired the designer to make your vision and goals a reality. The designer has a responsibility to make sure that happens - even if it means discouraging you from adding elements that just don't fit your own vision.

  • Why Hire A Professional Developer Over Doing It Yourself?

    Bottom line - you'll get exactly what you need to maintain a successful website and obtain your goals. It will be done right the first time, and all you have to do is supply the content.

    When you hire a professional developer, stick to your goals and take what they suggest seriously, you will end up with a beautiful website custom tailored to fit every bit of your content perfectly. Building beautiful, professional websites involves more than just pasting a few snippets of code into HTML documents. An effective website will have just as much (or more) time put into the planning of the project as the actual design and programming.

    If you've hired a professional website developer, avoid asking them to teach you how to run your own PPC campaigns, and edit your HTML/CSS. While it may seem more effective and less expensive if you learn to do this yourself, in the long run it's not. Because the background and experience of a professional developer is often over a decade's worth, it's impossible for you to truly know what you are doing. And chances are you'll break something and have to hire your developer to fix it. Hiring your developer to fix your website takes much more time (and money) than just having them perform your updates for you. And as a side note, breaking your website and still insisting on doing your own updates is a surefire way to leave you without a developer.
 
 

  • Are You Passionate About Your Business?

    The "Winning Formula" to any business begins with PASSION. What business are you in? Does this business support your life's goals? Are you passionate about your business? Are you doing what you love?

    It's important to follow your heart and passions in life because when you do, everything flows effortlessly to you - including wealth. Wealth is something we all want to create for ourselves, and that includes more than just paper money. True wealth is intangible. True wealth is a mindset and way of Being that transcends circumstances. Wealth is what allows millionaires and billionaires to go bankrupt and rebuild in a short period of time.

    To create wealth in your life, your business must be in alignment with your passions. If you've created a business you're not passionate about, building a website to help that business succeed will be nearly impossible.

    The more passion you focus on your business, the more things will flow. If you're relying on your developer to create a website to make money for your business, you're placing your own success in someone else's hands. And that just doesn't work. When your business is your dream, you will be successful whether you have a website or not - and having a website will simply increase your success.

  • Are You In Communication?

    Communication is vital to the success of any website. While it's ideal to be able to work with your developer in person, sometimes that's not possible. In this case it's important to set times to go over the development process over the phone and have regular check-in meetings via Skype, or by phone. Being in communication and providing direct feedback will help your developer stay with your vision and complete the project by the deadline.

    Since the development process has many stages, it's important that communications be made as soon as possible, especially if there is a change in the project. For example, if your developer has already started building a database, and you decide to add more options to be included in the database, this can create a lot of extra work for your developer. While your developer will be more than happy to make these changes, if you wait too long to request these additions, it could cost you more money and time. Don't hold back on requests, even if you think it's just a "simple" change that can be added later because sometimes it's just not that simple. So to create a win-win situation, commit to being in communication with your developer - and they will commit to being in communication with you!



  • You Are Always Responsible For Your Results

    In this world, there may be outside circumstances which influence us, but in the end, our choices in life are directly responsible for our results. Who we are Being has more stake in our results than anything else.

    When hiring a developer to build your website, it is important to remember that regardless of the developer's skills and talent, the results you will experience will always be a direct reflection of your own way of Being. In other words, you could hire the #1 developer in the country and never see the amazing results they are known for producing if your way of Being is not in alignment with those results.

  • Are You Willing To Do The Work?

    What is your dream? How committed are you? What are you willing to do in order to make your dreams come true?

    While most of the technical work on a website is done by the developer, there is an equal amount of work for the client to do.

    Building a website is always a partnership between the client and the developer. The work required of the client depends on the specifics of the project, but it is never truly hands-off.
 
 
  • cal@orbitdesigns.com
  • Email me for more information, or to schedule a consultation for services.