About Kathy Sullivan: Kathy comes to the web development arena from a 22-year career in advertising, print, publishing, and strategic communications. She’s been in web since 2001, and is known for her “spot on” thinking on behalf of clients who enjoy her upbeat, positive personality and clever recommendations that really work for their businesses. Kathy and the Six Degrees Studio team of designers and developers are focused, detailed, and organized and take pride in crafting contemporary, engaging, well-built websites that resonate with the audiences they are meant to serve.
Promotion: If you have a website that is less than stellar, you probably already know it but don’t know what to do about it. Meet with me for a website audit – specially priced at $149 for Live Blissed Out listeners ($400 value). We cover all the bases – from design to content to technical analysis and make recommendations on how best to transform the site into a showcase for your business.
In this episode we will cover:
Thanks so much for tuning in again this week. I appreciate you 🙂
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Special thanks to Kathy Sullivan for being on the show.
So long for now and remember to keep moving forward!
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About Kathy Sullivan: Kathy comes to the web development arena from a 22-year career in advertising, print, publishing, and strategic communications. She’s been in web since 2001, and is known for her “spot on” thinking on behalf of clients who enjoy her upbeat, positive personality and clever recommendations that really work for their businesses. Kathy and the Six Degrees Studio team of designers and developers are focused, detailed, and organized and take pride in crafting contemporary, engaging, well-built websites that resonate with the audiences they are meant to serve.
Promotion: If you have a website that is less than stellar, you probably already know it but don’t know what to do about it. Meet with me for a website audit – specially priced at $149 for Live Blissed Out listeners ($400 value). We cover all the bases – from design to content to technical analysis and make recommendations on how best to transform the site into a showcase for your business.
In this episode we will cover:
Thanks so much for tuning in again this week. I appreciate you 🙂
Have some feedback you’d like to share? Leave a note in the Feedback section.
Special thanks to Kathy Sullivan for being on the show.
So long for now and remember to keep moving forward!
Also, don’t forget to Subscribe for FREE: Apple Podcasts | Android
Today’s episode is sponsored by Audible, where you can find audio books and exclusive audible originals.
Just click on the link to receive your 30 day free trial, a free audio book of your choice and a commitment free guarantee.
Audible: www.audibletrial.com/liveblissedout
Free membership for 30 days with your choice of 1 audiobook + select Audible Originals.
✓ After trial, get 1 audiobook and free Audible Originals each month from a rotating selection.
✓ Exclusive guided wellness programs.
✓ You will get an email reminder 7 days before your trial ends.
Commitment-free guarantee
✓ You won’t be charged until after 30 days.
✓ Don’t like an audiobook? Swap it for free.
✓ Cancel anytime, no questions asked.
Check out Blogging Content Planning: How to Start a Blog for Profit on Wordpress and Others for Beginners.
Thanks to Audible for sponsoring this episode and allowing me to share this great offer with my listeners!
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
This is Episode 37 on The Live Blissed Out Podcast. Websites are a powerful tool for helping clients and prospects make informed decisions. Did you know that approximately 48% of website visitors believe that a website's design is an important factor in determining the credibility of a business? Hello Action Takers! Welcome to Live Blissed Out. A podcast where I have authentic conversations with business owners and subject matter experts to help us get the scoop, the 411 and the lowdown on a variety of topics. Tired of hesitating or making decisions without having the big picture? Wanna be in the know? Then this is the place to go! I'm your host Marisa Huston. Helping achieve bliss through awareness and action. Thanks for joining me. The information opinions and recommendations presented in this podcast are for general information only in any reliance on the information provided in this podcast is done at your own risk. This podcast should not be considered professional advice. Sending a coffee mug shot shout out to Kalia G in Broomfield, Colorado. Thanks for filling my coffee cup Kalia, and being such a cool bean. If you'd like to help keep me fueled head over to www.liveblissedout.com and click on the Caffeinate Me tab to give me a boost and redeem your bonus as a thank you for supporting the show. My guest is Kathy Sullivan, owner of Six Degrees Studio. Kathy comes to the web development arena for a 22 year career in advertising, print, publishing and strategic communications. She's been in web since 2001 and is known for her spot on thinking on behalf of clients who enjoy her upbeat positive personality and clever recommendations that really work for their business. Kathy and the Six Degrees Studio team of designers and developers are focused, detailed and organized and take pride in crafting contemporary engaging well built websites that resonate with the audience they are meant to serve. If you have a website that is less than stellar, you probably already know it but don't know what to do about it. Meet with Kathy for a website audit specially priced at $149 for Live Blissed Out listeners. This is a $400 value. They cover all the bases from design to content to technical analysis and make recommendations on how best to transform the site into a showcase for your business. For more information, visit Six Degrees studio.com This episode is sponsored by Audible, where you can find audiobooks and exclusive audible originals. Just head over to my personal link at www.audibletrial.com/liveblissedout to receive your 30 day free trial, a free audio book of your choice and a commitment free guarantee. Check out Blogging Content Planning: How to start a blog for profit on WordPress and others for beginners. You can also click on the link in the show notes to let audible know I sent you and help support the show. Thanks to Audible for sponsoring this episode and allowing me to share this great offer with myself. Hi, Cathy, welcome to the show. It's so great to have you here today.
Kathy Sullivan :Hi, Marisa, thanks for having me on.
Marisa Huston :As you know,this is a subject that is, I think, really going to be beneficial for a lot of business owners, because we're going to be talking about websites and websites or something that business people, no matter whether you're solopreneur, or big corporation, we all need to be online because that is how people find us. And that is how people get to know about us, our services, our company, it's basically the front lines. It's a window into our business and what we offer and it's also first impression, we all decide that we need a website. The thing that we don't start with is identifying exactly what the goals are for our website because different websites actually achieve different goals depending on the company and the services that are provided. I'd like to talk to you about how we set goals when we decide to create a website or work with a professional to build a website.
Kathy Sullivan :I often tell prospective clients and remind my existing clients that a website is probably the world's most powerful sales and marketing tool. Outside of a personal interaction with a business owner, the website represents the business, it creates the perception of the business, it lends a nod to the quality and the care that businesses take in producing their products or services. And it's really important to understand that when visitors come to the website, they are forming an impression about whether to continue on with a business or to move on to the next tab. When we approach a website at the beginning of a creative process, we want to learn what the intent of the website is and how that is of value and meaning to the business that we create it for. Every website is different. None are created equal. They're like snowflakes. And everyone has a different intent or motivation for their own business behind the website. Some people just need a brochure type of site, something that just is a presence on the worldwide web because they have marketing initiatives and efforts that they use outside of the website to really bolster who they are and what they do. They meet with a lot of people, maybe they speak or give workshops, and they are the primary representation of their business. So they just need something on the web that shows who they are, what they do, how to get in contact with them. These days, other websites are more educational and goal oriented in nature. They want to convert leads, they want people to come and read a little bit, click on a form, make an appointment, get a hold of them, call fill out the form for an appointment. So those websites are more involved. They have to do more heavy lifting on the marketing side of the house so that sales can take it from there. Marketing does its job to promote and attract leads into the business and sales then does their job to convert those leads into customers. So when we start with a website, initiative, we always want to know, what is it you're trying to accomplish? What are the results you're trying to achieve, and what's the best way of doing that for your distinct audience? What will resonate most with them?
Marisa Huston :I completely agree. And I would say that as a consumer websites are so critical because when I go visit them, if I find that they are too wordy, or too distracting, or perhaps you're unable to really read the words clearly or it's confusing in any way, in seconds, I click away. And so the color scheme, the wording that ease of maneuvering through the site is very important for me as a consumer, in order for me to stay and want to learn more about the business. How do you work with your clients to help them identify what they should be thinking about when a website is built for their business?
Kathy Sullivan :That's a great question. There are a variety of platforms out there for content management systems, most people want to have the ability, even if it's a limited ability to at least change words and pictures on their website. So content management systems are really brilliant for that, that they are not all created equal. I work in a WordPress world. Although I have worked in numerous other content management systems, I still work in Drupal Joomla, there's a huge variety of them out there and it can be confusing as to what to choose. I can distill it down to two different types of platforms, mostly the WordPress world these days and then there are the other platforms that are a different type of content management system. Both allow the users to go in and edit content and images. And in some cases, more sophisticated maneuvers, depending on the skill level. But the difference between the two is one is subscription based and the other is you own outright. So in the case of open source, which is Drupal or Joomla, or WordPress, you pay a developer such as me to design and develop the website, and then you own it outright for the long term. Some of the subscription based models, you pay a monthly fee, and then you get to create the site yourself or have someone who's familiar with the system do that. And those are very budget friendly platforms. So for people who are just starting out a business. They aren't sure yet if it's going to stand the test of time. or their bootstrapping. They have a very small budget and they're willing to put in the work themselves to create it. Those are a great opportunity to get a website live on the worldwide web quite easily. It just has to be understood that over the time of the website, you're paying month over month over month, and if you have that website for five years, that adds up to quite a lot.
Marisa Huston :It's almost like an installment package because you spread it out over a long period of time.
Kathy Sullivan :Yes. When you decide to create a more robust and rich website experience for visitors, it will cost you more, and that's when you would level up to something like the open source WordPress platform. With the subscription based models, if you decide to discontinue doing that type of model for your business, you can't take that website with you. When you stop your subscription, your website goes down. So all of the work that you've poured into that website over the weeks, months or years goes away and you start from scratch with models such as WordPress. So that's just the consequence of the Do It Yourself low cost model. It's very limiting. It doesn't allow you to have as many opportunities for things like forms, wonderful photo galleries, big homepage sliders, that type of thing. They're just more limiting in that regard. But they are very budget friendly. And as a result, they're popular.
Marisa Huston :Yes. And there are people that are just looking for a basic page, as you mentioned earlier, where they just want to be up there, and they just want to have a presence of some sort. And in that case, it would be a perfect fit for them. But for businesses and companies that need more robust systems, they need more personalization, and they need their website to do certain things that they require for their business, then the open source platform will probably be a better option for them.
Kathy Sullivan :Absolutely.
Marisa Huston :The question we should be asking ourselves is who is going to be visiting our website or who do we want to attract to see our website? So what are some considerations that we need to be thinking about, so that we can identify that type of individual and basically attract them to the website.
Kathy Sullivan :Because the website is such a powerful marketing tool, we have to be extremely cognizant of who will be viewing the site and how it will resonate with them. First and foremost, we want to remember that our website is actually for someone else to read. It's not about us, it's about them. It's a very solo selfish endeavor between a person and a computer. There's rarely a group of people hovered around looking at the screen to ascertain whether the product or service is something they want. We want to get into the mind of the person who will buy our product or service, who will attend our event, who will be attracted to our workshop. We start with the classic marketing demographic. Are they male or female? What is their age? Maybe there's an age range. It can be a very broad age range, but we at least need to be aware of who it is we are approaching via a computer, Where do they live? How do they live? What types of tendencies may they have? Are they health nuts? Are they into health and wellness? Are they into books and literature? Trying to deep dive into the mindset of our audience is paramount to the types of information that we put onto the website and the types of mechanisms that we use to get them to continue reading into another page and another page and eventually taking an action. So we start with those demographics and then we ask ourselves what is most meaningful and valuable to those people? We want to hit them where they're at where they're thinking of what their need his and resonate strongly with them in that place.
Marisa Huston :Are there certain elements in a website that are very impactful that people need to be thinking about when they create the website or administer the services like yours? What are some things that need to be accounted for so that the website has the basic bones or things that are going to help their website really shine?
Kathy Sullivan :Most people look at websites, and they tend to sort of see the bells and whistles, things like the photographs, things that move. I like to take it into a more elemental and foundational approach where we think about what we want the visitor to do when they're on the website. And as a result, over the years, I've really distilled down a small short list of things that need to be considered first and foremost, before bells and whistles. Those are things like core messaging or a very strong, compelling headline. It can be bolstered by a subhead, something that supports that headline. It needs to be short and sweet. We strive for concise and succinct wording on a website because we are such a soundbite society now. We like to just see things that are quick. Our brains can only consume so much in a day and actually process the information. So I'm a really strong advocate of powerful core messaging via the headline, I also advocate strong calls to action. What do we want the visitor to do after reading something or looking at a page and provide an engagement mechanism, some way for them to do that thing, visitors actually appreciate what to do next. So if you're on a homepage, and you've read a really strong headline with a supporting subhead, and then maybe a bit of education paragraph below that on a website, a paragraph is one to two sentences. So we have to really distill down our words into those that are most meaningful for the person reading it, so that we can grab their attention and then create a hook which is a call to action to contact us, to learn more, to meet our team, to follow a process, to understand how we work, to answer their most obvious questions. After that comes bells and whistles like a form, an appointment mechanism, images. I'm reaching a point where I don't use very many images on websites in favor of infographics which educate and inform and I don't like to use a lot of photographs because people see them especially stock photography as sort of white noise. We don't want the photograph to leave the impression of what we want to communicate. We want our words to leave that impression. So I'm pretty picky when it comes to photography on a website. It really has to be spot on, or it can give the wrong message.
Marisa Huston :What is your take on videos? Because I know that in certain applications, it can be very powerful. So for example, if you were going to shop for a car, you'd want to look at the car, you'd want to be able to go inside the car and have those visuals so you understand the options and the features that the car might have that you want. Is video across the board something that every website should have, or does it really apply specifically for a certain type of business that needs people to get a better sense of the product that they're offering?
Kathy Sullivan :I would like to see every website have a quality well done short video. Video is powerful way of storytelling, and as such it's very impactful on the visitor, on the viewer. But only if it's done well and it's brief. People do not want to sit and see a video for five, six, ten minutes. It's too much time. People are busy. They want to get the gist of something quickly. That's the well done quality and then take an action, whether that is to continue on with reading, scrolling down, to go to another page, pick up the phone, they want to take an action. But I think videos are a wonderful way of storytelling on a website. They can be cost prohibitive, and as such, there are other means of storytelling on websites. But yes, videos are a wonderful way of imparting really wonderful information and engaging audiences.
Marisa Huston :You know, Kathy, as business owners, our businesses evolve. And so what we get into in the beginning may not be where we're at in the middle or in the more mature lifecycle of our businesses. So obviously, websites will evolve as well. So when we've established a website, we created it just the way we want. There's a very large chance that at some point, it's going to need to be modified and updated and brought current. What are you seeing are the trends now that are taking place with websites that people are doing to make their websites a little more interesting and keep their visitors on the website longer, and perhaps even pick up the phone and actually take action?
Kathy Sullivan :I like to use an integrated marketing approach. The website is one piece of that marketing plan that a company can implement. Everything works together. So if you have a website that becomes stale, and you implement an email marketing campaign, for example, or a direct mail postcard that is meant to drive people to the website to learn more and take action. If those visitors come to a website that appears out of date, that leaves an impression on them about how the company operates. What else about the company might be out of date so that they don't have time to focus on all aspects of their sales and marketing components of their business? It does leave an impression.
Marisa Huston :Yeah, what you see on a website can be very telling about how the company operates, right?
Kathy Sullivan :Right. So I like to see companies update their websites on a very regular basis. It's not always realistic or reasonable to do it daily or weekly or even monthly. Quarterly certainly would be a great goal for website owners. It can be as simple as changing out photography, changing out messaging, tweaking some paragraphs. As you've learned more about your customers, you're able to provide them a greater focus on what you do and how that directly serves them or will benefit them. So you just kind of always want to be finessing the words, the photos, you want to add pages if you're doing an email campaign back to that example, that's driving people to the website to learn more. Create a unique landing page just for that so that they can get all of the information they might want on one page instead of having to flow through the whole website to get to it. A lot of people like to have a blog on their website. Most people use blogs these days as a news area. And that's a wonderful place to stay fresh and current and appear that way. All you have to do is throw on an article or two once or twice a month that's appropriately dated. So people can see that you are up to date, you're keeping up with the industry that you're in with the times that we are in and providing valuable information to your customers, just almost as an aside. People don't look at the news page first, typically, but eventually they get to it. And when they see that it's current and up to date, it leaves a strong impression that so is the company.
Marisa Huston :I think that's a wonderful suggestion. And going back to what you were saying about landing pages, I noticed for example, people use landing pages to offer free downloads. And what happens with that is the article sometimes gets so outdated and it's also another avenue for us to identify as business owners, What is an article that seems to be attracting people? So you might put one out there as a landing page and you don't get anybody interested in downloading it. And then you switch it up and you find that this particular download is very popular and people are very interested and it's allowing you to build your contact list. I think the blogs are absolutely important because you can share the latest news and you can also keep abreast of all the things that are taking place in the world and in the company and how they're helping and how they're serving you. So it's really again, another means to provide value on a consistent basis, then it also gives them the impression that you are looking at your website, you're wanting to stay in touch with your community and then that gives them the impression that you are on top of things and that you are relevant. At that point. I think one of the things that we tend to overlook when we're creating a website is that piece the maintenance keeping it current, but then also making it safe. The information in there if we're not being careful, and this happens more often than I'd like to hear. People are hacking into websites and there are no backups, you basically lose everything you've worked on. Of course, you also want everything to be secure for the visitors and all the data that it collects. I think that's one area that's overlooked. How does a service like yours help the clients make sure that that is all taken care of so that they can have peace of mind that their website is safe and that people that are visiting also feel like all the information that's being collected is safe as well?
Kathy Sullivan :It's the job of a good quality website developer to have their clients back in keeping the website safe and secure. We do that through a variety of mechanisms. Most websites today are encouraged to have an SSL certificate. That's a security certificate that one gets through their hosting company and that is setup by either the hosting company or the website developer. When you're in a closed system platform, the subscription based model they handle the security on your behalf, the system itself is meant to be secure. That's part of what you pay for every month. In open source, it is wide open and as a result, it's the darling of hackers, which is so unfortunate that that even exists in the world. We try to do things like monitor my clients sites on a weekly basis. Just go and have a look. Every site we build has a double backup system, we put a plugin into the site that we can set to automatically backup the website through a scheduled process. Most hosting environments also offer a third party backup software that's more robust. It backs up the website and the database again, automatically set on a scheduled timer to do that so that I can sleep at night and my clients can sleep at night. In the case of the open source platforms such as WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, and so on, we are issued updates from those companies. Those updates take two forms. There are maintenance updates, just little bugs were found things that need to be addressed that can cause little glitches. And then there are security updates. When any of the companies issue a security update, we consider it critical security and I laugh with my clients that what happens over here at Six Degrees Studio is we stop, drop and roll using that old what you do when there's a fire. All work stops and we immediately move into critical security mode where we make sure that the website is updated with the critical security code that's been provided by the platform and we also update all of the plugins as well. So we backup, then we update the plugins to make sure that they're compatible with the core platform and then we update the core platform. So it's a three part process so that the website shuts doors that were tweaked open by hackers so that they're not able to get in. We also make sure that we're using using super reputable hosting platforms. Most of the hosting platforms are just outstanding at what they do. But it's good to use a strong hosting platform because they also initiate security endeavors at the hosting level so that their servers don't get hacked or compromised. It's imperative to think about a budget each year for updates, maintenance and security updates to the website, like anything else. It's like an automobile or so many things in our lives that we just have to keep maintained. If we don't adhere to strict maintenance standards on this powerful, expensive tool that works day in and day out, 24/7 for our business, things can go wrong. And when things can go wrong, it can be devastating to a business. It's just essential to mind the house and keep it in good working order.
Marisa Huston :Once we build the website, we feel like okay, it's up, it's running and as long as it's on the web. We're done. And as you mentioned, the maintenance and the updates, keeping it current, making sure that the information is relevant. All those things are things you have to be always looking at so that your website is healthy and it works for you and it's doing the job. Because at the end of the day, that's the goal is we want a website that works for our business so that it drives prospects and supports our existing customers in the way that they need to be supported.
Kathy Sullivan :We want a website that works for our business and works for our prospective and existing customers. A website is a work in progress. It's never over, once it's over once we launch a website. Because our businesses our works in progress. We always want to keep ahead of the curve, we want to institute new products or services or interacting with our customers. One of the most compelling things that people can put on their websites, quarterly or half yearly, are case studies just describing who we've been working with with? What's the great work we've done on their behalf? How did that work out? What were the results? What were the outcomes? People love to read case studies or results based solutions because they see themselves in that and that gives them ideas for how they can expand and grow their businesses as well.
Marisa Huston :Yes, very important. We're looking for solutions to our problem and these case studies help us see that. We see okay, this other person had that exact same problem, and this company was able to help them so they must be able to help me too.
Kathy Sullivan :I advise clients to think about, What is the problem or challenge? What is the solution? And what is the outcome?
Marisa Huston :I really appreciate you pointing all these things out, Kathy, because I think that a lot of people just do not think of the big picture. They really look at the main goal, which is to put up a website and they're not really clear on all of the steps and considerations that we need to make as business owners in terms of how the website needs to look and feel and perform and be maintained and secure. So thank you so much, Kathy, for sharing this with us. I really, really appreciate you being here.
Kathy Sullivan :so pleased to be included. Thank you.
Marisa Huston :That's all for this episode of Live Blissed Out. Thanks for listening and thanks to Kathy Sullivan for being my guest. If you find value in our show, please visit www.liveblissedout.com to reach out, subscribe and share on social media. This show is made possible through listeners like you. Thank you. So long for now and remember to keep moving forward!