Your Web site IS your company. It is a critical customer touch point.  Before you allocate your budget to techniques to drive traffic to your site, make sure it’s the site you want visitors to experience. What does your Web site say about what it’s like to do business with you? Your marketing materials say you’re experts and provide great customer service---does your Web site pay this off? For first-time visitors discovering your company through a Google search or an ad link, what will their first impression of your company be?

Ask yourself these questions:

Is the organization and structure of your site intuitive to people outside your company, or does it just align with your business organization?

Do you have the information people expect and need presented in a web-friendly format, or is your site just an online brochure with a bunch of PDFs?

Can visitors find what they need quickly? Do you have useful tools to help with
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I've been neglecting my blog. And it's not a content issue, it’s a time issue. For most of the clients I work with, when it comes to their web sites it’s a time AND a content issue. They understand how important it is to have fresh, relevant content, but it’s hard to dedicate resources and thought power to producing it. But everyone still wants to be at the top of organic search results. Which is like saying you want to win the race but you aren’t willing to put on sneakers or break a sweat.

I recently had a conversation with someone who wanted to optimize their site for search but didn’t really want to have to do anything with the content. He said, "I’m happy with my site. It’s pretty much done. I just need to be at the top of Google."

My issues with that statement could feed several blogs (if I had time and a new pair of sneakers) but I’ll keep it to a short reminder. Search is hugely important.
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I am not a patient woman. But what I lack in patience, I make up for in persistence. When interacting with Web sites, these traits often result in my getting easily irritated with a process that’s not user-friendly, but I refuse to give up until I accomplish my task. Take this example:

My prescription drug plan recently changed, requiring that everything I set up in the interactive world of one medication provider be re-created according to the rules of a new drug czar, who I'll call DrugMart. Dutifully, I handed over my identity to my new ruler and created an online account. I now had ANOTHER new password to remember and with my brain already jammed with several other bizarre combinations of letters, numbers and pet names, the latest browser statistics, the ins-and-outs of the CAN-SPAM laws, and an impressive knowledge of Simpsons trivia, I just couldn't remember my login information when I went back to use DrugMart's system and place an order.

It's
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I like ice cream. Okay, I really like ice cream. Luckily, I also really enjoy exercise, so my raging sweet tooth is kept in check by my cardio program.

As a regular ice cream consumer, I also happen to be brand loyal, visiting the same dairy case during every grocery store trip. On my most recent trip, my predictable dessert routine was suddenly upset when I encountered a cleaned out shelf where my brand usually sits. (Okay, there were some flavors, but not my flavors.) Unable to face the prospect of not having a sweet treat after hours of burning calories, I surveyed the surrounding cases and selected another brand, "Brand B."

The ice cream was okay. Passable. But the packaging was terrible. My initial opening of the container was an ugly, sticky fight ending with my tending to the cardboard's wounds with plastic wrap and duck tape. I won't go into the details of the battle, but it was bad enough for me to decide to visit Brand B's web site and
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