Digital Marketing, Social Media, Web 2.0, Web Analytics, Web Design

be more businesslike about your emotional life

be more emotional about your business life

“Life’s A Pitch”

by Dawser Al Hadidi

Great efforts and big budgets are being put into designing websites. More often than not, these polished looking expensive couture sites are doomed to fail because of the way the company and its stakeholders tend to think.

Generally when companies embark on designing or revamping their website, they are full of ideas, needs, and visions! These grand thoughts are almost always about the surface of things, the look and feel of the brand and how it can be reflected in the site, how it shows off their capabilities and how it sells their products and services, how shiny and glossy it all must look. And who can blame them? But somewhere in there the consumer, the user gets lost on them. Have we thought of the personas and the scenarios of who exactly accesses the site? Unfortunately, from what I have seen in the long time since I have started developing sites, almost none of the companies spend enough of an effort designing for the types of customers they want to attract.

The days of a website being “just” your brand’s reflection are over! Your website is now your digital sales tool, whose main job is to direct the customer to a sales path, and ensure conversions from most visits.

In studying the concept of creating “persona” to represent your customers and their different characters, I have found that it is an exercise essential to building a website that talks to your consumer and brings you the results you are expecting.

Persona creation is similar to TV character development for a series or a movie, however, the root of those characters is driven strictly from reality, they are existing people who you may have met and interacted with. They are types of people who represent a certain group of individuals. In Persona development for your website you will go further in analyzing these characters, their mindset and various behaviors as they decide to buy a product or service from you.

The result of this exercise will give you, several personas based on your existing and targeted customers, with names, photos, and description.

The following is an example of “persona” for a fashion-clothing site:

Mona: 35 years old, loves to look at new styles, adores fashion, and is ready to buy anything that makes her look unique. She is however conscience of her spending, but if she feels the item is worth the spend; she will go ahead with the purchase despite the fact that she might regret it later.

Dina: 29 years old, stay at home mom, with two kids, very keen on looking good when she’s out on the town with her husband, but when it comes to outing with the kids, she needs to be comfortable and look OK. She is always on a budget and never spends too much.

So, your fashion website will be catering to these two characters. In giving Mona the stylish pieces, which makes her, look unique. She will continue to come to your site looking for distinctive fashion items that will make her look and feel great. So for Mona, you present this to her using trigger word such as, “look different with these Harem pants from River Island”. For Dina, the trigger will differ, she will come looking for 2 different criteria one for comfort, another for a night out. Offer Dina two options, a category that says,Daytime Playtime, and one that reads Nighttime Glamour.

The conclusion is that you end up with a user centric site equipped with persuasive scenarios to achieve maximize conversions, a website that not only sells but also looks great and polished! Think from the outside to the inside and impress your customer.

What is Twitter?
It is a micro-blogging platform, allowing users to update their status by publishing 140 character message. It is one of the most power social network in my opinion it delivers messages short and simple!
Tweets refer to the message, so Tweeting is the act of messaging, and Tweeps, are the those who tweet!

Advice: You better write something that your followers is interested to hear from you!