messaging

The Value of Digital Simplicity

By Mark Evans in Startups No Comments Tags: , , ,

I’ve been spending a lot of time recently looking at Web site messaging and usability, spurred on by Steve Krug’s book, Rocket Surgery Made Easy, which provides terrific insight into DIY usability problem solving.

When you read about usability, it makes complete sense: the easier it is to do something, the more likely that someone will actually do it. That something could be making a purchase, completing a form, reading content or watching a video.

But the strange and fascinating thing is how difficult and challenging many companies make their Web sites. All the work that happens behind the scenes goes unfulfilled because the product isn’t accessible or user-friendly. The big question is: why? How does a good idea get developed but fail to take into account the end user’s ability to use them? As the famous usability expert Winston Churchill said: “It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma”.

My thesis is the people who develop Web sites don’t spend enough time getting perspective from the outside world. Many Web sites are built in a bubble, which means little or no feedback – constructive or otherwise – is allowed to seep in. And if there are alpha or beta users involved, many of them are friends or family, who are biased to provide positive feedback rather than the blunt truth. As a result, many Web sites have serious usability issues that could easily be resolved if there was real real-world testing.

The challenge is that getting people who build Web sites and online services are often reluctant to open the kimono before everything is ready for public consumption. There is a fear of competition or someone stealing their idea, or an unwillingness to launch something that is half-baked, which could attract criticism.

The reality, however, is if you want a user-friendly, accessible and intuitive Web site or online service, it’s better to get external perspective sooner rather than later. Some of the things that an outside might pick off immediately as a problem or issue could easily be missed by the people building the Web site or service because they’re so close to the fire, they lack any perspective.

While no one wants to be told their idea or Web site sucks, it’s better to get a hard dose of reality than launch something that fails to resonate – not because the service isn’t valuable or compelling but due to the fact the design, messaging and structure makes it difficult, if not impossible, for users to “get” what they’re supposed to do. If that happens, it’s lights out pretty quickly.

More: Another good read within this topic is Mark MacLeod’s blog post on clarity of vision.

The Bottom Line for Startups: Delight or Die

By Mark Evans in Startups 1 Comment Tags: , , ,

ImagesI spend a lot of time working with start-ups, particularly helping them with content, communications and, increasingly, their Web site usability needs. It involves a lot of focus on making sure they are telling the right stories to the right audiences, their messaging is clearly articulated and users quick “get” what they do, and their Web sites are accessible and easy to navigate.

But, in many ways, this work is irrelevant if the underlying service doesn’t delight the user. I like the word “delight” because it succinctly captures the essence of whether a start-up will “do or die”. We live in a multi-tasking, attention-deficit world so if a service fails to quickly strike someone as useful, valuable or compelling, it’s game over.

This may seem overly dramatic but, frankly, this is the challenging landscape in which start-ups operate. Most people don’t give themselves enough time to truly evaluate whether a service has merit or not. They want immediate gratification so it’s crucial for a start-up to provide users with a service that is easy to understand and does the job well.

If a start-up doesn’t delight, they’re dead in the water because a user will dismiss them in a heartbeat, and move on to the next service.

Now, delight consists of different components.

There’s the messaging that surrounds a service, providing users with information about the features and benefits, and answering the crucial question: what’s in it for me? There’s good design and a navigation structure that needs to be intuitive and dead simple to use – everything from the home page messaging and the FAQ to the About Us page and the registration process.

And then there’s the service itself, which has to meet a need or a perceived need the user may not think they have until someone points it out to them. The service doesn’t have to be complicated or particularly feature-rich, it just has to delight. A good example is Dropbox, which makes it easy to share files online. Dropbox isn’t oozing with features but it is useful and easy to use.

One of the biggest mistakes made by start-ups – aside from unclear messaging, bad story telling and incomplete business models – is the belief that more (features) is better. Rather than making their service useful, they make it so complicated that users don’t know where to start or they get so frustrated trying to figure out what they’re supposed to do, they walk away.

A key part of the problem is when a start-up has developers, creating more new features is seen as the obvious way to keep them busy. As a result, the feature line-up continues expand rather than ensuring that users enjoy, leverage and make better use of the existing features.

In other words, the service becomes un-delightful.

It means the focus must be on meeting the needs of the user in a way that’s accessible, easy to understand and a breeze to use. In other words, you need to delight them.

Of course, it’s easier said than done but if a start-up can crack this nut, their chances of success are greatly enhanced and you might even convince them to pay for the service, which is another tale for another day.

Social Media Needs to Embrace the Big Picture

By Mark Evans in Social Media 3 Comments Tags: , , ,

Gary Vaynerchuk is a savvy social media practitioner and a tremendous self-marketer but he does offer pearls of wisdom about how social media is being used or how it should be used.

Case in point is his assertion during an interview with TechCrunch that ”99.5 percent of the people that walk around and say they are a social media expert or guru are clowns”.

Now, “clowns” is a strong word (although it’s certainly good for capturing attention and headline writing) but I think Vaynerchuk is suggesting there is a problem with people who are focused on social media tools as opposed to how social media fits into the bigger scheme of things.

These are lots of “experts” or “gurus” well-versed in using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.. This is great if you want tactical help but many of these people have little knowledge or expertise about how social media needs to be aligned with a company’s marketing and sales goals and objectives.

Truth be told, social media is just another channel. It’s not the best thing since sliced bread, it’s not rocket science or a silver bullet. It’s a new and different way to reach target audiences with tools that allow engagement and conversations. At the same time, social media has to support and/or enhance the other things a company is doing, otherwise embracing social media is a waste of time.

Since I started my consulting business, I’ve taken a pragmatic approach to social media. While many clients are excited about social media and want to jump on the bandwagon, I’m more interested in discovering why they want to use social media and what they’re doing with their other marketing and sales activities, including their digital presence.

In many cases, a company doesn’t need to embrace social media but, instead, should focus on overhauling its Web site given it’s my belief social media doesn’t work if your “digital hub” fails to meet the needs and expectations of existing and potential customers.

Another pre-social media need could be messaging and branding. A lot of companies are terrible at clearly articulating who they are and why anyone should about their products and services. If a company does a bad job of messaging/telling its story, its social media efforts will be a lot like spinning your wheels on ice. Lots of activity but you’re not going anywhere.

I think too many social media “experts” are so focused on getting companies to use the tools, they have no sense about the bigger picture. It means companies jump into social media but don’t get the results they’re seeking because there is no strategic alignment.

Social media can be a powerful medium but without a clear idea of how it supports everything else a company does (and visa versa), it can’t succeed – no matter what a social media “expert” or “guru” would have you believe.

Actually, Most Web Sites Do Suck

By Mark Evans in Advertising/Marketing 2 Comments Tags: , , , ,

“Most websites suck because they came from hippos — that is an acronym I like — the Highest Paid Person’s Opinion. Online, you don’t have to rely just on how someone feels in their gut. You can collect data and use the data constantly to optimize it.”
- Google’s Avinash Kaushik in a recent interview with the Financial Post.

When I saw this headline in the Financial Post recently, it caught my attention – not only because it’s provocative but it’s also very true. While Kaushik is approaching Web sites from a data and analytics standpoint, my negative view of the landscape has more to do with bad messaging, design and navigation.

It amazes and puzzles me that despite the Web emerging as an important place to communicate, market and sell, many companies have Web sites that do them an injustice. Rather than telling the world who they are, what they do, and why anyone would care, many Web sites are confusing, disorganized and, frankly, ugly. It’s like inviting someone over for dinner, and then leaving the front yard strewn with garbage and dirty dishes in the living room.

Part of the problem is Web sites are far too often created by companies who want to use them to tell everyone what they do, rather than focusing on what potential visitors want to know and do. It may seem like a small difference but we’re talking about two different approaches. Too many Web sites take a “It’s all about me” approach, which does little to address the bigger question: “What’s in it for me (the customer)?”

On top of bad messaging, many companies also make it difficult, if not impossible, to easily find information. This is a combination of bad design and navigation. Given everyone scans online as opposed to reads, if you don’t make it easy for people to find what they need, they will quickly move on to the next Web site, including the competition.

Web site navigation is like supposed to be a puzzle or a maze, it should be intuitive and user-friendly. People should be able to quickly identify what they need and where they have to go. Again, it’s a matter of serving the needs of visitors as opposed to a company focusing on how to get all of its information on the Web.

Finally, design can’t be under-estimated. You can ruin a Web site with strong content and good navigation by applying a bad coat of paint. If a site looks ugly, it will turn people off even before they delve into the content.

Over the past year, my partner, Seth Singer, and I have spent as much time, if not more, working with clients to refresh their Web sites. On several occasions recently, I have talked potential clients into updating their Web sites rather than jumping into social media.

While Web sites aren’t as sexy as social media, they are the foundation of a company’s online presence so it makes complete sense to make them as good as possible.

More: Here’s an interesting chart from FormStack looking at the anatomy of the “perfect landing page”.

The Challenges of Being the New Kid on the Block

By Mark Evans in Social Media, Web 2.0 No Comments Tags: , ,

I have a confession to make. Despite all the fuss about RockMelt and Blekko recently, I haven’t spent much time on either service. Both seem interesting: RockMelt is a “social browser” that integrates your social media activity, while Blekko is a new search engine that takes a different approach than Google, including the ability to “tag” results.

The problem is a combination of not having enough time to check out RockMelt and Blekko and, as important, the challenge in changing hard-coded behaviour. When doing a search, the default is Google; when using a Web browser, it’s Chrome or Firefox. These are tools that are an engrained part of my Web toolbox, which makes it difficult to add new or different tools – even tools that could be more interesting or different.

This is likely something most Web users face. Once you start using particular services or software, it can be difficult to switch to something new. We are creatures of habit, and that extends to our use of the Web.

This makes it an significant challenge for new players to establish a foothold, even a modest one. Not only does a new service have to be significantly better and/or different, its benefits and features need to be clearly articulated, and it has to get the story distributed and told to as many people as possible to gain any kind of traction. Even then, people who learn about a new service may decide to ignore it or check it out later.

The question is what can a new service do to break into a market with a dominant player? Here are some thoughts:

1. It needs to be superior, different or provide a better user experience. I would argue a service that is easier and more intuitive to use has more of a chance to succeed than a new service that tries to compete by having more bells and whistles.

2. It needs to fill a need that has been solved properly or in an elegant way. Perhaps the best example is DropBox. While there have been lots of online storage options, DropBox has captured many users by offering a service that provides needed the functionality in a user-friendly way. The free offer of 2GB of storage provides an attractive option for many people, along with DropBox’s innovative and easy-to-use file-sharing technology.

3. The messaging has to be crystal clear. A new service must quickly articulate what it does and the benefits it offers, otherwise time-strapped consumers will move on. The message needs to be dead simple so people immediately say “Yes, I get it”. A good example is Freshbooks, whose Web site proclaims it is “The painless way to track time and invoice clients”. I’m also a big fan of a well-produced 60-to-90-second corporate video that tell people what a service does and why someone should care. These videos can be expensive to make but they are well worth the investment because they can be used for a variety of purposes.

4. The service needs to reach a wide audience based on the idea only a small percentage will pick up on it. This means a company has to craft stories that will resonate with the needs of particular target audiences. As well, opinion leaders have to be brought into the mix to take advantage of their influence and large audiences.

5. There has to be as little “grit” as possible. If the home page makes it difficult to understand what a company does, it will turn off a potential user. The same goes for a registration process that is too complex or time-consuming, an “About Us” page that isn’t short, sweet and clear about the benefits for the user, or a bad FAQ. Anything that could cause a potential user to walk away has to be eliminated.

The bottom line is it can be an enormous challenge being the new kid on the block. It’s not enough to be better or different. That said, it is not an impossible task to establish a foothold by taking the right approach. With some luck and enough people spreading the word, new services have a shot of making it even in the shadow of a large and dominant player.

How Messaging Drives Strategic Focus

By Mark Evans in Advertising/Marketing No Comments Tags: , , ,

Last week, I did a post looking at how companies shouldn’t underestimate the importance of messaging that clearly articulates who they are and why people/consumers should care about what they make or offer. At a time when the attention span of many consumers is shrinking, good messaging is a must to capture their attention.

Another important element of messaging is how it can play a significant role in helping a company establish their strategic focus, as well as the what needs to happen from a communications, marketing and sales perspective to attract business.

One of the things I have discovered in working with a growing number of companies on messaging recently is how it makes them examine who they are and how they have positioned their products or services to do business.

In some cases, the messaging process has exposed that a company’s strategic focus is misaligned. The target audience they thought made sense turns out to have less appeal because the service really wasn’t interesting to meet their needs.

Then what? Either the messaging has to change, or the company’s strategic focus needs to shift.

In many cases, companies that take messaging seriously recognize that once they really understand who they are and why people should care, it can have a dramatic and, hopefully, positive impact on what they sell and how they go to market.

Rather than trying to put a round peg (existing messaging) into a square hole (consumers who aren’t interested), companies make an adjustment strategically to embrace the realities that a messaging exercise can expose.

One of the realities of exploring messaging is it’s not an easy or straightforward process. Instead, it is a subjective exercise in which entrenched ideas may need to stripped away to provide a fresh start. It means accepting the fact a company’s identity may have been wrong or misaligned. It means embracing concepts that may seem foreign.

Messaging is also an iterative process. The initial ideas may have little ressemblance to the end result. It doesn’t mean the original ideas were bad. In fact, they’re important because you have to start somewhere, and having something is a lot better than nothing. In other words, you can’t get to point “C” without starting at point “A”.

Finally, messaging continues to evolve; it’s not static.

The market changes, consumers changes, new technologies are developed, and companies shift their strategic focus to take advantage of new opportunities. It means messaging must be refreshed from time to time, which is a good thing.

(Note: Messaging is part of the digital marketing and communications service offered by my company, ME Consulting)

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