In a recent Sales Caffeine email newsletter from Jeffrey Gitomer, there is an article by Michelle Joyce on Making Transactions Memorable. She had a pleasant experience at the McDonald’s drive thru in Huntersville, North Carolina, and summarized what made the transaction memorable.
These three simple steps can be considered website redesign tips to improve user experience at your eCommerce websites and in all your interactive marketing efforts.
1. Start with a smile and engage your prospect in a friendly manner. Would you do business with someone you didn’t like? Well, neither would your prospect. This guy made me like him – immediately. When he made that connection, the transaction became enjoyable and personal. It was all about me, not just my order.
2. Offer alternative solutions. People want choices. Don't assume that your customer is aware of them. Uncover their needs and help them make a choice. McDonald's already mastered the upsell technique with their famous line, “Do you want fries with that?” What kind of additional features and services can you upsell? What kind of additional revenue are you leaving on the table at every sale?
3. End the transaction with something memorable. When is the last time that a fast food worker told you to “drive safely”? Usually, it is the perfunctory "thank you” and “have a nice day”; but this guy made me feel like he was genuinely concerned about my personal safety. What are you saying to your customers that make them remember you personally?
Michelle ends by saying: The reality is that people are still buying products and services in this economy. The only question is "Will they buy them from you?"
Definition 6 is an interactive marketing agency that can help you make a connection to your users, whether customers or prospective ones. We are experts in website development and custom application development. Even though we are an Atlanta Ad Agency, we have clients across the US that we help differentiate themselves from their competition.
Believe The Hype: Open Source Web CMS
Friday, July 10, 2009 by
Mike Reese
If you were involved in a CMS (or WCM - Web Content Management) purchase decision 5 years ago, you likely heard about the "open source" phenomenon. And, you probably cringed at the thought of supporting your revenue-producing, lead-generation website with low cost alternative to the Interwoven and Vignette giants. Cringe no more, open source solutions not only provide very similar features, the good ones are now fully supported as well.
Here's a recent article written by JT Smith on Website Magazine. (Choosing An Open Source Web Content Management System) He successfully details the differences between closed and open source systems (without bashing the Big Guys). Ultimately, every company has their own decision to make, their own contstraints, processes and budget concerns. A WCMS solution has to adhere to these points, so open source may not be for everyone. But it's certainly worth taking a look at some of JT's points:
As your business grows, your needs will change. The open source model provides a mechanism for adapting to that change without relying on proprietary software to catch up to evolving trends and new technologies.
Budget...Budget. If budget is a concern, and likely it is these days, open source makes sense. Period. Save the budget for your other interactive marketing strategies.
Fully supported. Lack of support used to be a pitfall of open source solutions. That has changed. You'll find that well established, reputable solutions offer not only support, but also a vast community of developers and end users.
Somewhere in between. Open source CMS does not necesitate custom application development. Nor does it necesitate costly professional services contracts. It really falls in the middle. The benefit of open source becomes the ability to lean in either direction.
I love JT's quote: "Using closed source CMS can be likened to buying a new car with the hood welded shut, the wheels permanently attached, and your only maintenance option is a visit to the dealership."
Give open source a look. At Definition 6, we utilize one of the "good ones", Umbraco. We've been through several (> 20), successful implementations for a variety of clients. Including websites in the travel, telecommunications and online retail industries. I'm proud to say that we're also the first certified solutions developer in North America.
Here's a recent article written by JT Smith on Website Magazine. (Choosing An Open Source Web Content Management System) He successfully details the differences between closed and open source systems (without bashing the Big Guys). Ultimately, every company has their own decision to make, their own contstraints, processes and budget concerns. A WCMS solution has to adhere to these points, so open source may not be for everyone. But it's certainly worth taking a look at some of JT's points:
As your business grows, your needs will change. The open source model provides a mechanism for adapting to that change without relying on proprietary software to catch up to evolving trends and new technologies.
Budget...Budget. If budget is a concern, and likely it is these days, open source makes sense. Period. Save the budget for your other interactive marketing strategies.
Fully supported. Lack of support used to be a pitfall of open source solutions. That has changed. You'll find that well established, reputable solutions offer not only support, but also a vast community of developers and end users.
Somewhere in between. Open source CMS does not necesitate custom application development. Nor does it necesitate costly professional services contracts. It really falls in the middle. The benefit of open source becomes the ability to lean in either direction.
I love JT's quote: "Using closed source CMS can be likened to buying a new car with the hood welded shut, the wheels permanently attached, and your only maintenance option is a visit to the dealership."
Give open source a look. At Definition 6, we utilize one of the "good ones", Umbraco. We've been through several (> 20), successful implementations for a variety of clients. Including websites in the travel, telecommunications and online retail industries. I'm proud to say that we're also the first certified solutions developer in North America.
Onsite Search
Monday, March 16, 2009 by
Graham Street
Most of us have low expectation when it comes to site search. We use google.com to find something we're looking for and hopefully we find our way right to it. But sometimes you know you've been directed to the right website however you just cannot find the page you are looking for. And if you're a savvy searcher, you have some luck using Google's site scope feature to drill down to the page you need. If not, then you may need to turn to the website's own on-site search.
If you are looking for anything other than a very specific phrase or product code that only appears on the page you're looking for, your search experience is likely to be unpleasant. On-site search is known for offering slow, low relevance results.
This is unfortunate because site search affords your company the unique opportunity to know exactly what visitors are looking for. But, if your site cannot respond intelligently to these requests, it's a lost opportunity. And, when it comes to your visitors’ perception of relevance, the bar is set pretty high, thanks to Google. Google has transformed your visitors into discriminating searchers, expecting to find t just what they're looking for within the first page of results.
Search is often the last thing on the list when a company is evaluating its public website. As long as company executives are able to find their own biographies, site search gets a passing grade. Making site search truly useful to your visitors can be very challenging to address, particularly if you're approaching it with a custom software solution. Supporting features like spelling suggestions and stemming (making plurals out of singular keywords, and vice versa) require many thousands of lines of code.
More and more companies are looking for a better way, an intelligent search solution, to capture the attention of your visitors by serving up relevant results. Google themselves are leading the pack with their own line of enterprise search products. They're sold as search appliances, robust combination hardware/software solutions designed to meet all of your enterprise search needs.
While the machines are packed with search power and extensibility, configuration is not for the faint of heart. Their use of template patterns in XSLT is a work of art that any developer can appreciate. But it's not something most IT departments or web developers are equipped to manage. You'd be well served to partner up with someone with extensive experience in this line of business like Definition 6. With an experienced search integration specialist at your side, you can harness the power and innovation of Google enterprise search products.
If you are looking for anything other than a very specific phrase or product code that only appears on the page you're looking for, your search experience is likely to be unpleasant. On-site search is known for offering slow, low relevance results.
This is unfortunate because site search affords your company the unique opportunity to know exactly what visitors are looking for. But, if your site cannot respond intelligently to these requests, it's a lost opportunity. And, when it comes to your visitors’ perception of relevance, the bar is set pretty high, thanks to Google. Google has transformed your visitors into discriminating searchers, expecting to find t just what they're looking for within the first page of results.
Search is often the last thing on the list when a company is evaluating its public website. As long as company executives are able to find their own biographies, site search gets a passing grade. Making site search truly useful to your visitors can be very challenging to address, particularly if you're approaching it with a custom software solution. Supporting features like spelling suggestions and stemming (making plurals out of singular keywords, and vice versa) require many thousands of lines of code.
More and more companies are looking for a better way, an intelligent search solution, to capture the attention of your visitors by serving up relevant results. Google themselves are leading the pack with their own line of enterprise search products. They're sold as search appliances, robust combination hardware/software solutions designed to meet all of your enterprise search needs.
While the machines are packed with search power and extensibility, configuration is not for the faint of heart. Their use of template patterns in XSLT is a work of art that any developer can appreciate. But it's not something most IT departments or web developers are equipped to manage. You'd be well served to partner up with someone with extensive experience in this line of business like Definition 6. With an experienced search integration specialist at your side, you can harness the power and innovation of Google enterprise search products.
Process Driven Integration in Application Software Development
Sunday, November 16, 2008 by
Gary Braswell
Frequently, in larger-scale Custom Application Development, a good architectural approach is to model the processes for the application using Business Process Modeling (BPEL). and Business Process Execution Lanaguage (BPEL).
BPEL actually stands for BPEL4WS (BPEL for Web Services)
Other Business Process technology includes:
Workflow&Rules Engines
* Business Rules can dictate flow of control
* Long running transactions - where completion can take days or weeks (think telephone company)
Business Activity Monitoring (BAM)
* Alerts and information for management dashboards
* Allows management by exception
* Frequently integrated with portals and BPM
* Still in the Early adoption stages
Collaboration Software
* Examples: Groupware Portals, Web 2.0 collaboration, B2B exchanges
MS Project (Enterprise) & PM Tools
There are also:
Process Driven Integration (PDI) Best Practices
* Make an organizational commitment to continuous process improvement
* It is a discipline and a journey, and the highest rewards require the highest investment.
* Measure Process Performance.
* Time / Cost, Profitability, Customer Satisfaction.
* Reward Process Improvement.
* Provide Real-time Dashboards
* Promote Reuse
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