Phantom CTO

Tech Truth: No one cares about your business. Your website, as a business channel, matters when it solves your markets’ specific problems and needs.

When you’re looking for ways to make the most out of your website the first place you go is not to your designer. It’s your marketing arm who can tell you in detail about your buyers and client profiles. It’s the go to person is the person in your company or the part of you that can paint the picture of your best customers and what makes them tick. That’s where you start when you want your website to be a way to seriously grow your business. If you don’t know that much about your typical or ideal customer, answer these questions and you’re on your way.

The buyer profiles are made up of the answers to questions like:

1. What are your buyers looking for?
2. What do they do, what responsibilities do they face every day?
3. How do they find and process information and value that fit their needs?
4. What are their concerns and worries?
5. How do they like to be engaged and reached?

The reason why a buyer profile or buyer persona is the starting point for having a business website that matters is that a plan to make everyone happy makes no one happy. Into business terms, it means that if your website is meant to make bigger business improvements in sales, new clients, visibility and beat out competitors and you don’t have a strategy that breaks up that success into paths and roles, you won’t be successful.

Move Away From A One Size Fits All and Into the Divide and Conquer Business Website

A great example of a company that turned around their website into a business growth channel is RightNow Technologies. David Meerman Scott posted a great write up on what they did to create buyer personas, build their website and marketing around those and the results that came pouring in quickly. Results like quadrupled conversions inside three months.

Here’s a good video clip and some takeaways from Andrew Warner on Mashable who got some time with Robert Scoble to talk about how to build momentum and visibility through the web.

I’m not big on the title of the video clip: How to be internet famous. What I am into is the advice that Scoble gave out here.

He listed out some great advice that while answers the question how to be famous also relates to core questions and issues that every small business and start up faces.

Passion and Starring on Your Own Stage

You have to be passionate about what you’re doing and you have to be serving a unique audience. Scoble gave the example of Gary Vaynerchuck, who came in with his passion for wine and used internet tools to build visibility and grow his business. Before  winelibrary.tv  there was no person online working their passion for wine.  Don’t try and copy what he does instead you should step into your own space that motivates and pushes you.

This also reminds me of something I’ve read on Jack Welch’s management style for GE. He had said that he wanted to be number one in a market and if he couldn’t be the best, he’d cut that business center off. There’s no room to be number two in someone elses show. Don’t try and be the same guy that’s doing well. There’s no chance for copy cats to succeed. The tools that the internet gives small business owners are meant to support greatness — your business’ unique strengths. Create your own stage and limelight.

Reward and Respect Your Loyal Clients

Scoble then mentions to always keep in mind the 15 readers. As a small business, that metaphor can extend out to your best and most loyal customers who bring you in new business. They are the people who read your work, who sign up early for new services and the people who talk up your company to their friends. They are not the majority of your clients. Instead these handful are the motivation to keep trucking through hard times. Reward and respect their sense of belonging to you and your mission.

Bring on the Avalanche. It’s Your Snowflake.

Lastly, this has to be my favorite thing Scoble said.

All avalanches start with one snowflake.

This idea has so much merit. An avalanche of success, an avalanche of business growth both start out as one snowflake. Build up your momentum, put more content out there and be more accessible to your market. The interactions and engagement you have with your market are the winds of force. Your brand, your content and your business values are the snowflakes.

How to be internet famous from Andrew Warner on Vimeo.

I’ll end this post with a question about your snowflake, I mean, small business.

Are you building an avalanche?