http://www.dind.com/blog/deep-thoughts/ en-us Fri, 18 May 2012 19:37:34 PDT Fri, 18 May 2012 19:37:34 PDT SiteCrafting.com GearBox 1.1 (beta) http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/we-build-stuff-scratch/ I had an interesting conversation with a potential client last Friday and it prompted me to think or at least explain our development rational.  He was looking to hire SiteCrafting to assemble a robust application for his client consisting of a design he came up with as well as some "open-source" technologies, and a few custom scripts generated by us. Long and the short of it...it seemed a disaster in the making. I mentioned to him that SiteCrafting builds our Web applications from the ground up, for each customer as an individual. We do not offer one-size fits all solutions, because just like anything one-size fits all it never fits anyone quite right.Using pre-built software in these instances can on the surface seem to be a cost-savings, but in fact it will most likely cost more money trying to piece technology together. A system built on workarounds from a variety of technologies will consistently need to be tweaked and modified. At SiteCrafting, we design our solutions to fit the organization perfectly, not just most of the time, all of the time. Our process is simple, we learn about a project, we design a solution, we build, test and deploy. The result is custom application built for you...not for the masses. Very few people utilize all of the features in an off the shelf solution like Microsoft Word or PowerPoint, but everyone pays for all of the features. Our model is different, establish a secure, scalable foundation, build what you need and will use, and pay for only that. When needs change in the future our flexible systems will be able to grow with you to adapt to your organizations needs. Mon, 30 Oct 2006 13:04:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/easy-to-web-tools/ Give a man a fish he eats for a day, teach a man to fish he eats for a lifetime. - Chinese ProverbAs a flyfisherman, I can say this proverb does not mean a lot to me. I've been taught, but rarely catch fish, and those I do catch, I release. However, this entry is not so much about fishing or learning to fish,  it is about sharing knowledge and giving customers tools for success.When we first started SiteCrafting, our plan was to create websites for customers, establish a maintenance contract whereby all their website changes needed to flow through us, and then bill them. The goal was: Build Website, Provide Maintenance, Invoice, Repeat. Keeping the Web mysterious in this way did not serve us or our customers well, not to mention we could never go on vacation.  In fact, we found that a customer's website budget often went toward tedious updates, for which very little value was added to their website.Charging an hourly rate to change a photo, add some body copy, update a Flash movie, served only to insure dependence upon us, but it was fake. We were the keepers of knowledge and we kept their website a secret from them, nothing could get onto their site without it first being converted from a Word document to HTML. A task only we, the experts, could perform. What a crock! What's sad is there are still TONS of people with this business model, and there are customers willing to pay for it. We made a conscious decision to move away from this model several years ago, however it did require a leap of faith and confidence in our customers. After all, if I give my client a tool they might just use it without me. What was funny though was the number of people who loved our tools so much they asked for more, and more  and more. The Moral: Give a man (or woman) powerful, easy-to-use tools to manage their website and they will create a vibrant, usable site for their business. Furthermore, they will ask you for more tools AND tell their friends all about you.As a disclaimer, I should mention that SiteCrafting does continue maintenance services for a select group of customers who prefer it this way. If you're one of those folks and are now ready to take the plunge into easy-to-use tools, let us know. Thu, 02 Nov 2006 13:45:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/web-field-dreams/ With apologies to the fine classic baseball movie?We can build it, but it doesn't mean "they" will come! I was having a conversation about this with a few people from SiteCrafting, who asked that I contribute my thoughts to the Blog. It's long struck me that many new businesses have an idea (maybe even a decent business plan) but have very little idea about how to get their business out into the public eye. (Often, that's where ad agencies and marketing consultants come in.) But the mentality that flipping the switch on an "open" sign is enough, and that marketing is an "extra" is bad enough with brick and mortar businesses. At least most of them realize that if you open a business on Main Street, you have to minimally let people know what kind of business is behind that glass door. Most put up a sign and/or some kind of window display. And for some, that's enough marketing and they do okay. But the internet is very different. A lot of entrepreneurs feel that if their product or service is good enough, and if they build a good website (with the right meta tags and content) they'll get good search engine placement, and paying customers will follow. In essence their search engine listing becomes their sign and window display. Even though the analogy is a little dated, the Internet really is more of a superhighway--it's sure not Main Street! Most users are speeding along looking for something specific. They're not cruising through your neighborhood reading the signs along the way, or reading beyond the first 4 or 5 listings on a Google results page. If you want to get noticed on the internet, good marketing is more important than ever. No matter if you've got the greatest breakthrough product or service of all time. You have to let your target market know you exist, tell them what makes you better than your competition, and tell them where to find you. Your business model and market should determine what kind of marketing you invest in. (And that's a whole different conversation). But the bottom line is this: building a website is just part of the journey toward success. Without a well thought out marketing plan, it's likely that success on the internet will just remain a dream. Thu, 02 Nov 2006 10:21:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/dollars/ Two dollars is a small amount, but two is a magical number. Despite it's seeming insignificance, two represents the difference between doing a job, and doing it right.One summer while I was still in college, I worked in a brewery in Colorado waiting tables. I recommend that everyone work in a restaurant at some time in their life. It teaches you a lot about life and service. While I was working there, I began to understand the value of such a small amount, and how much good work is worth.If you don't know, servers (at least in the US) rely on tips as their soruce of income. In Colorado, I earned a paltry $2.25 per hour, and that was only enough to cover the taxes on what I earned in tips. Washington is a little better, because retaurant owners are required to pay the minimum hourly wage, unlike Colorado where tips count towards that sum.Often, the difference between a great tip and an average tip is two dollars, and the same is true between average tips and poor tips. In a place like the one where I worked, the average customer bill was around $12 ($8 for dinner, $4 for a drink). When 3 or 4 people came into eat, they usually ended up ordering about $40 worth of food and drinks. On that total, a 10% tip is $4.00. A 15% tip is $6.00. That's a two dollar difference, but it makes a huge difference for the server. The actual value of $2 is small - sometimes I can find that much in the seats of my car, and it costs me more than that to do my laundry. The result of the extra $2 is huge. Your server is happier, and happy servers mean better service, increased patronage, and more satisfied customers.What it comes down to is that the $2 represents a willingness to go the extra mile,  or the difference between just doing something, and doing it right. Or the difference between doing something right, and getting it perfect. I've heard many stories about people that wanted to make a website - to help their business, to show off their talents, or just for fun - but they balk when they hear what their idea is going to cost. Many people miss the fact that it takes effort to do anything, and whether the cost of that effort is time, money, or blood and sweat, the difference between doing it right and not is huge.This happened to me last year. For every day for about two weeks, and when ever I wasn't in class or asleep, I was working in my studio on a piece for my senior art exhibition. Every day I'd get up at 8:00am, and work until around midnight. I hated the piece while I was working on it because it was so much work, and took so much effort. But, I realized that I had come up with something that could be really good. And so I put in the effort to make sure that it was perfect, that every component of it worked like it was supposed to. When I was done, the only words that I could use to describe it was 'Wow.'For all you developers out there, heed my words. If you take the time to do your projects right, it will only benefit you. Encourage clients that are willing to let you do your job the way you know how. And for anyone looking to hire someone to make a website, establish a level of trust with your developers and then let them do their job. It's ok to want proof of their abilities, but if you don't trust them they will only disappoint you. The $2 attention to detail ends up producing products that are much more valuable than you could ever imagine. From the client point of view, if save two minutes of work a thousand times, that adds up to two thousand minutes, or 33 and a third hours. Little by little, those small savings add up into something huge. And for developers, having a few really happy clients makes more clients that are willing to refer you to people they know. And that means better work, and continued success. Anybody can do this, but you have to actually work for it. And make sure to go that extra mile for the people that take care of you. Wed, 15 Nov 2006 10:39:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/going-to-boise/ Got up at 3:11 to drive through the ice to Sea-Tac for an early flight to Boise, Idaho. I was asked to present to the Idaho Pest Control Environmental Care Association at their annual conference on the need or non-need of a website for their businesses. The group was welcoming, the bagels fresh and the coffee warm. I think the presentation a success.Now I'm off to the Boise Airport for my return trip to Seattle. As promised to the group...the pdf of the presentation and a copy of the handout. Wed, 29 Nov 2006 10:35:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/service-in-storm/ With all the storm-induced power problems in the Puget Sound area a few of us were able to make it into the office today. The area is a patch work of service availability -- I know of houses with power and phone but no internet access, some with no power but the phones work, and yet others with power but no phones. A stroke of service my co-worker Ken displayed today was brilliant in its simplicity but it probably meant the world to one of our clients. The scenario was simple. A client with a small business was also open and working today but was unable to access their website where orders were still coming in. Being a food services company, timely filling of those orders is key. They made a phone connection with Ken who was able to access their site, grab a copy of the day's orders, and fax it off.For predictable reasons on a day like today, however, the fax didn't get through. Ken then opted to go the more manual route and read the order to our client aloud over the phone.I merely overheard this taking place but hope this made our client's day a little easier. After all, how do you feel when someone goes the extra mile for you? Fri, 15 Dec 2006 15:15:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/right-people-job/ I'm in a band. Well, two of them, but only one that matters for this discussion. I've noticed that the progression of a musical group that wants to be professional on some scale in many ways closely mirrors that of any product-based business.  You start out spending a certain amount of time in development. You come up with ideas, assemble the best team available to execute those ideas, and then do your level best to refine and perfect your product before you release it to the public.At this point we run into the same question as any business who is ready to put their product on the market: how do we sell this? Sure, I can tell my friends, and they can tell their friends, and eventually enough people will be convinced we're worth seeing before they've heard a single lick. But this only works on a small scale. I can't walk up to a venue and say "I promise I have enough friends to fill you up."  Even word of mouth works best when there's something to back it up. For a band, it's a demo recording. For a business, often it's a website. So how do you get out there? Sure, you can pick up Web Development for Dummies and figure a few things out. Heck, you could even slap something together in Word, output it as HTML, and you'll have a web presence. And you know what? I could tape a microphone to the ceiling in the middle of my basement, plug it into a tape player, and we'd have a demo. I've done that. But eventually you reach a point where competition comes into play. It doesn't matter how good your actual product is, if you can't make it look (or sound) professional, then how are you supposed to convince your clients that you are professional? In the end, the value of a front end produced by professionals makes it a more than worthwhile investment.So then how do you find the right person for the job? As much as this or that company may have a reputation for producing a quality product, one of the biggest issues (and one that not enough people consider) is finding the right person for your job. If you're lucky, a service-based company will have a list of clients and examples. I came across a Tacoma-based recording studio (convenient and cheap), but in my efforts to shop around, also talked to a few in Seattle. Frankly, from a glance at client lists, the Tacoma studio seemed the worst fit. The style was all wrong, whereas the (farther away, more expensive) Seattle studio appeared to be a much better fit.In this case, we got lucky. The proximity of the cheaper studio made it easy to go in and visit with them, and allowed them a chance to convince us that they were what we were looking for. They walked us through their process, showed off their equipment, and played a few samples that suited our style.A couple different things can be taken from this experience. First off, the studio themselves could benefit from these kinds of marketing steps. Sure, SiteCrafting has a giant master list of clients to show off. You can look all you want at that list and say "Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium? Well, we're not a zoo! Guess we better keep shopping." But to be perfectly honest, the fact that we made a site for a zoo isn't what we want to sell. It's the core quality of the product and the commitment to the process: making sure we're the right people for your job regardless of our past clients. That's why we've also got a few key case studies, demonstrating just exactly what we provide, focusing on breadth of products rather than the length of our list.Second: in the end nothing really beats just sitting down and talking things through. This goes for both sides: without that meeting, we would probably have been out a couple hundred more dollars for a product that most likely wouldn't have been any better. And obviously they would have been short one new client. Mon, 18 Dec 2006 10:37:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/best-advertising-just-be/ Last month, I was doing some major work on a house when I ran into a problem I couldn't handle. I needed a plumber, so I did what a lot of people do -- I turned to the nearest telephone directory. At the top of the PLUMBING section, I saw the name AAA++ Plumbing*, and promptly skipped right over it. (More about why I did that later).First, a short history of plumbing industry marketing? many service company names begin with A, or AA or AAA (often with symbols and/or numbers following the A's). Why? In the dark ages (before the internet), this marketing strategy was adopted to catapult the company with the most A's to the top of the telephone directory heap. It was like an alphabet arms race which, in our infinitely wise hind-sight, surely could only be won by the next guy who was reckless enough to put even more A's at the front of his company name. The madness could have led to AAAAAAAAAA Plumbing, but just in time the directories started offering display ads. Effectively moving the alphabet war mentality to a new front. Today, those same companies with names containing a bunch of AAs are pouring their marketing dollars into larger and larger space ads. Seemingly small companies are buying two-page spreads, while the larger conglomerates pay for a spread, the back cover, a magnet pasted on the cover AND are now buying billboards and television ads. Now as a marketing professional, I'm very supportive of companies spending money on advertising. But those ad dollars need to be spent well. You see, as a plumbing consumer, I shied away from calling the plumbers with the biggest ads, billboards or annoying television commercials. I just wanted to know which plumber could do the work quickly without charging me an arm and a leg. All the ads that I saw told me that these companies were spending a small fortune to get my attention but they weren't effective at differentiating themselves from their competition. So I closed the phone book, picked up my phone, and started calling friends and acquaintances instead of plumbers. I got mostly negative recommendations ? something you hear a lot when you ask people about their personal service experiences. In fact, I had a negative experience myself several years ago with the aforementioned AAA++ Plumbing. They may be the winner of the phone directory alphabet war ? but they've lost my business, and that of anyone with whom I've shared my negative experience. So, let's cut this long story short, and move on to the moral of the story. Through my word-of-mouth network, I did find a good, reasonably priced plumber who took care of my problem. He did great work, and I'll heartily recommend him even though his name is not at the top of the directory, and he doesn't have a display ad. As this plumber wrote up my paperwork, I got the chance to talk to him a little about marketing. He's planning to buy a phone directory ad, and he's hired a professional to build his website. Two good moves that I strongly believe are worthwhile. BUT I offered him some free advice, as I'll offer to anyone who's read this article through to the end: keep in mind that while word-of-mouth marketing is not glamorous, and there's nobody trying to sell it to you, it is still THE most effective advertising available, and it cuts through the clutter of the hundreds of marketing messages we're subjected to every single day. To sum it up, if you don't do good work and treat your customers right, you'll always be fighting an uphill battle to stay in business. But if you do exceptional work, and go out of your way to treat customers well, the free word-of-mouth generated on your behalf will be priceless.* Any company names used are hypothetical Thu, 04 Jan 2007 15:35:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/me-know-care/ One of my biggest soapboxes is the communication soapbox. Everyone has had times when communication broke down, and something went horribly wrong as a result. I don't mind saying I've had more than a few, but each time I took the effort to figure out why the breakdown occurrred so that I can fix it in the future. One of the biggest, most beneficial means of communication is meeting with people face to face. There is mountains of data, information, and communication that goes on with facial gestures alone, and body language and tone of voice are equally important. Unfortunately working in a consulting agency, I don't get to meet many of the people that I'm building software for. As a result, I have to fall back on more technical, yet less personal means of communication such as phone calls, email, and instant messaging. Here's some tips I've compiled about effectively communicating with out seeing the person you're talking to.PhoneSmile - I learned this one from doing phone interviews and planning gigs with my old band. Always smile when you're on the phone. It gives the person you're talking to a sense that you're a friendly person. Nearly everyone I've ever met is more comfortable working with friendly people than not.Be Confident - This one comes from talking with a few of my best friends. I really like them, but every phone conversation I've ever had with them has been akward, and I don't know why. My only guess is that we don't really know what to say, and that creates akward moments. So, know what you want to talk about before you make the call. Know what you need to ask for, determine, or confirm. Then get off the phone. 90% of my phone conversations last less than two minutes because I know what I need to do and I get it done.On the other hand, if the purpose of the conversation is to just chat have a couple things ready to talk about, to get things rolling. But I really prefer to do that kind of communication face to face.Introduce yourself - Years ago my dad taught me how to cold call people (Thanks, Dad!). Even if the person you're calling knows who they are talking to, it helps to introduce yourself to set the tone of the conversation and allow the other person to recall any previous details they need.EmailDon't joke around - Unless you know the person you are emailing, don't joke around in emails. It's nearly impossible to understand sarcasm, wit, irony or any other linguistic device without tone of voice or facial gestures. Often, failed jokes lead to arguements and destroy otherwise perfect lines of communication. It's happened to me a couple of times, and each time the personal relationship has been affected negatively.Keep it short - When emailing someone, don't write a short story. I get bored and gloss over the rest of it, and usually miss something important. Please just get to the point.Return emails quickly - This goes for phone calls as well. When I'm done with a part of a project, I let the client know. I do this because I want to keep them informed of what's going on in the process, but I also want to get their approval before I continue on with the rest of the project. When clients don't return my emails for days or weeks, it makes me think they don't care enough about their own project, and then that makes me not care about it as well. This is a bad situation. Just to be clear, no one that I've worked with at SiteCrafting is like this, but it has happened in a number of other jobs I've held.IMInstant Messaging is probably the least beneficial method of communication out of the lot. Don't believe me? Go over to the person next to you, and start writing on little slips of paper back and forth. It doesn't work. About the only thing that IM really works for is, "Hey, what do you want for lunch?"Keep it short. Real short. - It's nearly impossible to communicate complex ideas over IM, and forget about using diagrams or illustrations of any kind to explain yourself. Instead, stick to what IM is good at: short and pointed questions or comments. Stay on topic - Instant Messaging is also terrible for keeping on topic. At least with phone conversations you can always keep in the back of your mind where the conversation is going, but IM demands total focus on the immediate comment. It's too easy to get sidetracked and forget what was going on.Pay attention to what other people say - It's also too easy to ignore what other people are saying when using IM. Have you ever seen the McLaughlin Group on TV? The show where all the big-wig political types end up talking over one another to get their point across? Well, IM is like that, except worse. At least on that show, the guests have to listen to each other, but when messaging you only have to pay attention when you feel like it. Imagine what that show would be like if everyone just kept talking regardless of what the other guests said. Scary, that's what.And in general, it's always best to not take things too personally and always be straightforward when talking to someone over the phone, email, or chatting. I know that most web professionals don't like to have meetings but they are much more valuable than other kinds of communication. Meetings are just easier to point out and say 'waste of time'. Mon, 08 Jan 2007 14:44:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/dependability-challenge/ The gauntlet has been thrown down. We can't hide now...we must be exceptional. While it is nice that we were recently recognized for dependabilty, I see it as more of a challenge. A challenge for us to do more, perform better, and have more satisfied customers. So, what are we going to do? How will we respond? How can you respond to your customers in such as way as to be known for dependabilty? How can your business garner coveted word of mouth referrals?While not perfect...here's what I recommend...feel free to add comments below on other things you think are important.1. Focus on your business.Don't waste time looking over your shoulder at your competitors. Instead, focus on being the very best you can be at what you do.  Get your house in order. List everything you do well, and everything that needs improvement. Address issues, deal with them, and don't sweep anything under the rug. Take criticism as an opportunity for improvement, not as a personal attack, and be sure to thank the person who gave you that opportunity. 2. Establish systems.Make sure you have set systems for dealing with all situations. Make sure your people know what those systems are. If something falls outside of that system, create a new one. We have systems for simple tasks like setting up new hosting customers as well as complex systems to track complex projects. 3. Empower your people.Stay out of the way of your employees. Give them the tools (systems) to perform their tasks, let them solve problems creatively, and give them the responsibility and authority to satisfy customers. 4. Communicate.Make sure email is answered within a couple of hours and phone calls the same day if possible (I'm trying).  Keep communication  professional, get to the point, and archive your messages to make sure nothing falls through the cracks.5. Follow through.Do what you say you will do. Everytime.We will continue to work on improving in all these areas, while not perfect by any means, we've made it our New Year's resolution to continue focusing on improving and providing exceptional service. Wed, 10 Jan 2007 10:22:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/flexibility-in-foul-weather/ I'm working from home today mostly because Ma Nature dumped about six inches of snow on my house. In an area where an inch will shut down the city, this is a bit more serious. It really pays, however, to have a flexible employer so I don't have to brave the hills around town. The beauty of the web and digital communication is that it allows for these kinds of opportunities whether the weather, saving some fossil fuels, or even emergencies are concerned. Most of the web applications we create allow for access to manage your website from anywhere. When information needs to be available, especially on days like today when snow can effect your operations, it's just as easy for someone to make an update to their site from home. This kind of ease of access can really help your website or intranet become a resource others can rely on.One client I worked with a few weeks ago after a wind storm pelted the area was in need of posting an emergency-related notice on their website. We haven't yet helped them create a content managed system for their public website so while operating in their emergency center they didn't have the right software to get the job done.  They contacted me directly, and provided me with information to manually update their old site via FTP. Fortunately I was available, despite the weather, and made the change right away. If they had a web managed system, however, they would've been able to make this kind of change anytime on any internet-connected computer regardless of the software on it. If it can browse the web, it can be used to update a website.Clients should always be able to manage their site themselves without needing to ask a developer like me to do it for them. Putting content in the hands of the people who know it best -- it's a kind of "enabling" that makes my job so rewarding. And on days like these, it can make a lot of people's lives a little bit easier if the info they need is available when they need it. Thu, 11 Jan 2007 09:35:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/diary-developing-developer/ I never had any idea how complicated, confusing, and involved the development of web sites and web-based applications can truly be. When I was younger, every once in a while I would look at a web page and click the "view source" option and think, "Wow, that really doesn't look too difficult to learn."Little did I know there is so much more behind the code than what is seen in that one snapshot of HTML.Working for SiteCrafting has really been a great experience and has given me the chance to work in an area I've always been interested in and am starting to enjoy more every day. On-the-job training, however, can be both the easiest and hardest way to learning something that's very involved and complicated. It's easy because I have a wealth of knowledge sitting all around me at work that can answer my questions and give me one-on-one assistance when I get stuck. I never dreamed of getting a job where I can have 9 teachers to 1 student when usually the ratio is turned around with something like 1 teacher to 25 students or more. The hard thing is that I'm starting out by looking at, what to me are, very complicated applications and involved coding and working back towards the basics instead of starting with the basics and working towards more difficult applications. Although I've read through helpful tutorials for HTML, CSS, and PHP, that only goes so far. Actually coding, testing, finding it wrong, getting frustrated, re-doing, and having things re-explained is where the actual learning takes place. Fortunately, I am enjoying ( mostly :) ) every minute of it.Seeing what's involved in the development of web applications SiteCrafting produces has certainly given me a new appreciation for the expertise, hard work, and effort put into clients and their projects. I am certainly eager to keep learning as I get more and more involved in development work. Tue, 16 Jan 2007 11:23:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/little-thought-goes-long-way/ Here at SiteCrafting, we are quite busy with new projects. As such, we have realized that additional staff is necessary to meet the demands for our services. With the addition of new staff members comes the need for more furniture. We also decided that this would be a great time to rearrange the office, and create 3-4 person "pods" for team collaborative purposes. So, we headed off to the furniture store that supplied us with our current desks and chairs, hoping to place an order for 14 new tables. As we had suspected, the tables and legs were not in stock, and we were told that if we wanted them delivered we would need to call their business services line and place an order. So we acquired all the necessary stock numbers for the tables and legs (they come separate) and headed back to our office (note here that the salesperson did not offer to let us use their phone to place an order or go to some ordering desk). And here is where the breakdown in customer service reared its ugly head.Calling the business services line and placing the order went smoothly enough. We explained to the representative that we needed 14 tables and listed the type of legs we wanted (there are multiple styles of legs that go with this particular table). The representative explained to us the final cost which included a shipping and handling fee (which was very reasonable) and we paid by credit card on the spot. We patiently waited for the 2-3 weeks to pass so we could begin rearranging our office.The big day came on a Thursday. A large delivery truck pulled up to our office and brought in all of the tables and and legs. As they were leaving, we started taking inventory of the shipment. We counted the tables: 10 long tables, and 4 short tables. Great! However, the stack of legs looked a little sparse. So we counted ... and recounted. And sure enough: 14 legs! Unless this was going to be some new feng shui layout where each table is balanced on one leg, we had a bit of a problem. We checked the order sheet again to make sure we ordered correctly. The tables were listed as 1p. (meaning 1 per order). The legs were listed as 1pk. (meaning to us 1 pack per order).So lets go back to the phone call. We told the representative we needed 14 tables and legs to go along with it. We did not know that legs were sold as individuals. Nonetheless, should not the representative have made the connection that 14 tables require 56 legs? A very little amount of thought on the representative's side would have saved us a lot of time and wasted resources in trying to acquire the extra legs.Here's how the phone conversation could have gone that would have shown more exemplery customer service. "Sir, I see that those legs are sold individually. Do you require four legs per table, or would you like to simply order 14 legs?" That two-line sentence would have saved us the two extra weeks it is taking to get the additional legs to us, and the extra shipping fees incurred due to the double shipment (thankfully this furniture company agreed to cover that cost). Fri, 16 Feb 2007 11:02:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/design-art/ When I was back in school, I would often tell people how my combined Art and Computer Science majors did not mean that I was doing graphic design, web design, or any other kind of mix of computers and art. To them, it was obvious that I would combine two usually separate majors into the usual combination. To me, however, art and computer science are totally separate. The purpose of art is in my mind to either 1) evoke an emotional response in your viewer or 2) create something beautiful. Computers are a communication medium, and the purpose of communication is to deliver information. You can see examples of this every day - in websites of art schools that are impossible to divine information out of, or in strictly information websites that have no graphical content whatsoever. In the case of these two ideas, the graphic-less sites win out in function and usability, but the art school sites look better. The problem is, that the art school sites are impossible to use, and so it doesn't matter how good they look. The clear winner here is the plain, yet content centric site. And the lesson to learn is that content is king, and communicating that information well and effectively is the key to building a good website.For practical examples, let's take a look at two actual websites, craigslist.org and Seattle's School of Visual Concepts. Craigslist is a well known classified ads site, and very successful. They have thousands of posts everyday, and get all that information across to the users in a clear and effective means. But the site looks terrible. Even so, people all over the world use craigslist to buy everything from old couches to hot tubs to fill dirt. Craigslist works because the information is easy to find, and readily available.SVC, on the other hand, is a piece of digital art. It's got a downhome/street grunge design that's really appealing. When I first saw this site, I loved it. But today, I think differently of it. While it's not the worst site I've ever seen, it's pretty close to the worst. Trying to find any kind of useful information on the site is futile, because all the text looks the same, and the busy-ness of the design distracts from the information. Try looking class information from the homepage. The class schedule isn't too hard to find, but once you're there, finding information about a specific class, say something in Advertising is terribly difficult. It's hard to find the Advertising category in the first place because the text that denotes "advertising" is really small, has low contrast, and on top of that, isn't actually text - it's an image.Once you've found the class you are looking for, try clicking on the class name to get more information. You'll see a popup window that barely matches the rest of the site design. You can't scroll (at least, not on a Mac or with Firefox) down if the information is too long to fit in their pre-defined window, and if you've got an extension like FireBug on, you'll see that there's a continuous Javascript error.Once that window is open, click on the Course Outline link on top. I think that's supposed to open in a new window (how many windows, exactly, does this site want me to have?) but it opens in a tab that I can't read because I can't scroll the popup window. I'd expect more from a school that teaches web design classes, but I can't be too surprised because their intro course covers such topics as "Frames ? Advantages, disadvantages, how to create" and "HTML tables and how they can be used to create interesting layouts". Personally, I'd never want to hire or work with anyone that learned how to make websites from this school. They're only about 10 years behind current web technology. The moral of this story is that having a good design does not mean that you will have a good website, but taking time to insure that your content is easy to access goes a long way to establishing a great site. And to anyone at SVC - I didn't intent to be mean to you site; I love how it looks. But seriously, redo it. You can do better. I'd even manage the project in exchange for free tuition.Most people confuse design with art because it's visual, but design is more than just ink on a page or pixels on a screen. Design, or at least good design, is about the communication of information. Graphic design is not exempt from this. Many schools, including PLU, teach students how to use Photoshop or Illustrator to make pretty pictures, and largely those schools succeed. That's not design. What they are teaching is best described as digital art. Good design is something that few classes will teach you, and fewer people actually learn.That's partly why good designers are hard to find. To be a good designer, you have to have obvious eye for what looks good and what doesn't. You have to be able to communicate the important information to people using the website, and you also have to be able to communicate well with the people that are hiring you to design the site, and also the people that build the site. It's very frustrating when the designer gets second guessed by clients or users simply because said client or user has delusions of grandeur. At the end of the day, what makes websites successful? Good content, and information that is easy to access. Pretty images are not useless, but they can't be used in place of good information. But as sites like craigslist show, you can have an ugly design and still have a great website. All the best websites are the best because they have good functionality, information, and content. But it helps if your site looks good, too; it's just not vital. Thu, 15 Feb 2007 16:15:00 PST http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/exceptional-service-personified/ I know, I know. We all know how great Les Schwab is (which is ultimately the point of this entry). Where else do you pull into a parking lot and have a guy (or girl) throw their tools down and sprint to your car to see how they can help you? Before I begin, I should set the stage. I get home from work Wednesday, and my wife tells me that the check tire pressure light is still on in the car. I've been "solving" this problem by continually adding air to the tire - not a great long term solution, I'll admit. It's kinda like adding water to a lake with a leaking dam. Anyway, we are scheduled for a vacation tomorrow that involves driving, so I decide it's better to take care of it for real at this point.So, there's no real question about where to go. I decide to head over to the Lacey Les Schwab center. I pull in the lot, and notice it's 6:08pm. I am relieved to see that all the bays are open. A guy comes flying out of nowhere to see how he can help. After talking with him, I head into the customer service waiting area to check in and notice that the hours posted on the door show they're already closed.  I feel horrible, but decide to pay attention to the service I receive "after hours". In the lobby I see five people and an employee on the phone. I overhear her say, "Well, actually, we closed at 6:00, but we're still here and you need help so come on down". While I wait, I decide to settle in to watch and learn. I plan to pay very close attention to see what is going on around me, to see if I can detect any frustration from employees that are still taking customers 15 minutes after they closed. Below are a few quotes I heard while I was there:From the service bays - "Anyone needing something to do needs to jump on bay 1 for a flat repair, bay 2 needs rotation..." From the service bays - "Let's make sure we keep our areas clean"From the employee on the phone -"You need directions here,  take yada, yada yada...no, it's OK we're still here and glad to help".Not once -- not once, did I hear someone complain about the fact that they should already be closed or that they had already worked a full day.At 6:38, 30 minutes after I arrived, my car was ready. "No charge, just please consider us for tires next time you need them." All my cars have Les Schwab tires on them. If yours don't, they need to. I wonder if we should start giving away free beef with our websites? :)Service to me is paramount, and we at SiteCrafting continue to strive for service perfection. Les Schwab is a model to all of us seeking to earn a living in a service business. I'd love to hear about a great service experience, so please share. Thu, 24 May 2007 17:32:00 PDT http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/im-reading/ So, some people are interested in what others are reading at the current moment. So I thought I'd give you a view into the sorts of things that I focus on when I'm not working on conquering the web universe. The fact is, I am always looking for new books and new things to learn. I recently finished a book that was recommended by a client called Indomitable Spirit by Chuck Ferguson which calls itself "The essential guidebook for a lifelong journey of leadership  and the rewards of meeting them". While I'm not certain that it is the greatest book I have ever read on leadership, I believe that the message is very positive and one that reminds us in the service business that what we really are are "caregivers". People appreciate the extra mile and the little things. I don't mean to trivialize it, but it's pretty straightforward and basically tells us we need to take care of those that take care of us. I am in the middle of Now Discover Your Strengths, and Seth Godin's Small is the New Big. The bottom line is I like to read. I am always looking for a good book. If you have some suggestions, post away. Some of my recent favorites include:Zag : The Number One Strategy of High Performance BrandsBuilt to LastGood to GreatLet my People Go SurfingFeel free to share...thanks.b Tue, 17 Jul 2007 20:06:00 PDT http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/answer-adaptability-belief-connectedness-ideation/ So I mentioned earlier that I was reading the book Now Discover Your Strengths, and I have discovered mine, or at least mine as are determined by a 30 minute profile. What's strange is I never do well on these tests, I always find myself answering the questions the way I think they want me to and I wonder what that says about me...Anyway, this is what my profile tells me. I am adaptable, have strong beliefs, believe everything is connected, thrive on coming up with ideas, and value action. My strengths are below:AdaptabilityYou live in the moment. You don't see the future as a fixed destination. Instead, you see it as a place that you create out of the choices that you make right now. And so you discover your future one choice at a time. This doesn't mean that you don't have plans. You probably do. But this theme of Adaptability does enable you to respond willingly to the demands of the moment even if they pull you away from your plans. Unlike some, you don't resent sudden requests or unforeseen detours. You expect them. They are inevitable. Indeed, on some level you actually look forward to them. You are, at heart, a very flexible person who can stay productive when the demands of work are pulling you in many different directions at once.BeliefIf you possess a strong Belief theme, you have certain core values that are enduring. These values vary from one person to another, but ordinarily your Belief theme causes you to be family-oriented, altruistic, even spiritual, and to value responsibility and high ethics-both in yourself and others. These core values affect your behavior in many ways. They give your life meaning and satisfaction; in your view, success is more than money and prestige. They provide you with direction, guiding you through the temptations and distractions of life toward a consistent set of priorities. This consistency is the foundation for all your relationships. Your friends call you dependable. "I know where you stand," they say. Your Belief makes you easy to trust. It also demands that you find work that meshes with your values. Your work must be meaningful; it must matter to you. And guided by your Belief theme it will matter only if it gives you a chance to live out your values. ConnectednessThings happen for a reason. You are sure of it. You are sure of it because in your soul you know that we are all connected. Yes, we are individuals, responsible for our own judgments and in possession of our own free will, but nonetheless we are part of something larger. Some may call it the collective unconscious. Others may label it spirit or life force. But whatever your word of choice, you gain confidence from knowing that we are not isolated from one another or from the earth and the life on it. This feeling of Connectedness implies certain responsibilities. If we are all part of a larger picture, then we must not harm others because we will be harming ourselves. We must not exploit because we will be exploiting ourselves. Your awareness of these responsibilities creates your value system. You are considerate, caring, and accepting. Certain of the unity of humankind, you are a bridge builder for people of different cultures. Sensitive to the invisible hand, you can give others comfort that there is a purpose beyond our humdrum lives. The exact articles of your faith will depend on your upbringing and your culture, but your faith is strong. It sustains you and your close friends in the face of life's mysteries. IdeationYou are fascinated by ideas. What is an idea? An idea is a concept, the best explanation of the most events. You are delighted when you discover beneath the complex surface an elegantly simple concept to explain why things are the way they are. An idea is a connection. Yours is the kind of mind that is always looking for connections, and so you are intrigued when seemingly disparate phenomena can be linked by an obscure connection. An idea is a new perspective on familiar challenges. You revel in taking the world we all know and turning it around so we can view it from a strange but strangely enlightening angle. You love all these ideas because they are profound, because they are novel, because they are clarifying, because they are contrary, because they are bizarre. For all these reasons you derive a jolt of energy whenever a new idea occurs to you. Others may label you creative or original or conceptual or even smart. Perhaps you are all of these. Who can be sure? What you are sure of is that ideas are thrilling. And on most days this is enough. Activator"When can we start?" This is a recurring question in your life. You are impatient for action. You may concede that analysis has its uses or that debate and discussion can occasionally yield some valuable insights, but deep down you know that only action is real. Only action can make things happen. Only action leads to performance. Once a decision is made, you cannot not act. Others may worry that "there are still some things we don't know," but this doesn't seem to slow you. If the decision has been made to go across town, you know that the fastest way to get there is to go stoplight to stoplight. You are not going to sit around waiting until all the lights have turned green. Besides, in your view, action and thinking are not opposites. In fact, guided by your Activator theme, you believe that action is the best device for learning. You make a decision, you take action, you look at the result, and you learn. This learning informs your next action and your next. How can you grow if you have nothing to react to? Well, you believe you can't. You must put yourself out there. You must take the next step. It is the only way to keep your thinking fresh and informed. The bottom line is this: You know you will be judged not by what you say, not by what you think, but by what you get done. This does not frighten you. It pleases you. So, this is me. Brian Forth in 5 buckets out of 34 possible. See the others here. So, what one may say? The trick now is to identify your strengths and play to them. Don't waste time focusing on weaknesses, manage around those, and develop your strengths. They are what will make you great. As for me, I'm still working on it, but I believe I must be flexible, try new ideas, take strong action and know that my choices are connected somehow. :)What are your strengths? Tue, 07 Aug 2007 20:03:00 PDT http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/long-urls-create-interesting-wrap-1/ In the process of trying to figure out what in the world was wrong with my stylesheet, I went to W3 to validate it (and, although it is irrelevant to this post, I found my problem in a typo. Isn't it always a typo?) Since I am lazy about these kinds of things, I did the validation by direct input rather than finding and uploading the actual file, and something entirely odd happened: the URL bar contained something that looked like a solid black mess. After one forced shutdown due to being worried that something had gone wrong, I copied and pasted the content of the bar into a text document and lo and behold! It was the URL (a 34 000 word one, no less, due to the direct-input validation's method of incorporating all the CSS into the URL) and because of its length, it had wrapped over itself.Testing proceeded, and it turns out that Mozilla Firefox (currently 2.0.0.3)  wraps URLs at around 1800 chracters - and it wraps straight over itself. The result looks quite messy, but remains completely valid. Personally, I found it rather cool-looking, but it is obviously a problem as a big cloud of a mess in the URL bar would worry the unexperienced user (it worried me, initially) who unwittingly visits a page with a long URL. The bug has been reported, and I am sure it will eventually be remedied.  As for other browsers, Internet Explorer seems to solve the problem by not allowing URLs beyond a certain length to be copied into the URL bar, and  by not displaying long URLs of the generated variety. Safari simply allows the text to go on, sans wrap. More sensible. A little less nifty-looking.  Fri, 10 Aug 2007 14:19:00 PDT http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/if-datez-256-echoits-programmers-1/ For those that aren't aware, Programmers' Day is today and marks the 256th day of the year. If you just thought to yourself "wow, that's 1111 1111 in binary!" then consider today to be a day in your honor. In case you're wondering why this particular day was chosen, consider this: 1111 1111 is the last of the 256 possible values of a byte.While Programmers' Day is largely informal, it makes for an excellent opportunity to appreciate the programmers in your life. If you happen to be a developer yourself, you may want to start passing along hints about that binary clock you've been eyeing over at ThinkGeek.com.In the spirit of Programmers' Day, post a comment suggesting what you will be doing today in order to celebrate. If you're feeling particularly nerdy, feel free to make your post in ASCII binary. Thu, 13 Sep 2007 11:45:00 PDT http://www.sitecrafting.com/blog/interact/ We want to stay connected with our customers. We want customers to meet other customers.  We want our potential customers to see just how easy it is to take control of their website and make it more successful. We want to give you the chance to meet others that are using our tools, that is why we have created "Interact".We realize that people are busy. In fact, most people, when they get to the office, don't have time to even think about much of anything other than the hottest potato that has been thrown in their lap on that particular day. Rarely do they have time to get a few minutes to update their websites, even more rare, the time to strategize ways to make their website make their lives easier.  That is why we believe Interact is so important. Let me start by letting you know what Interact is not...it is not:A place to be sold something new...if you wanted that you'd check out a timeshare in Vegas (At least you'd get a FREE trip)A place to reveal how much or little you believe you know about the InternetInteract is:A place to learn new things and find practical ways to maximize the use of what you have right nowA quiet place to work without the distractions of your officeA place to get access to SiteCrafting web experts ("Gearus" or Gurus if you prefer) who will give you tips/pointers.A place to network with other web users looking to improve their websitesA place to meet and understand that programmers are people too :)Whether you can make it or not this month, we'd love to have you visit in the future. SiteCrafting's doors are always open. Remember, space is limited, so sign up now. Thu, 20 Sep 2007 21:32:00 PDT