You don’t need to know the web, you just need to know your web guys. It’s our job to work out what solution will best fit your business objectives. Some businesses just need a brochure website for branding and credibility, some require far more.

Most importantly, you need someone who knows where the website fits into your sales and marketing plan as a whole and therefore knows the hurdles BEFORE you start.  Understanding the website’s role is what makes Kook good at what we do.

We call ourselves a “full service web creative agency”. We don’t print business cards or brochures or make signage, but we do everything from registering a domain name through to programming complex online supply chain solutions and, most importantly, work with customers after we’ve developed their website to ensure it provides return on investment.

We are creative enough to know how the site aesthetic should be designed to create the right look and feel for your customers to want to contact you to find out more, or to buy your product or service.

Here’s an example of what we do. Just after Christmas we launched an online bathroom supply website.

The site has more than a than a thousand products online which automatically update from their internal stock management system. We programmed the solution so it exports from their system including any pricing changes, new images, updated stock levels and the website is up to date in less than a minute. Sales are also imported back into their internal systems for accounting and despatch processes.

Most importantly, we ensured the site ranked well in Search Engines, and began a paid marketing campaign via Google AdWords and other comparison sites such as GetPrice and MyShopping. In the first three months after launch it has turned over three times the build cost and we are still improving the conversion rates.

Great website? Absolutely. Did we just come into work one morning and “build it”? Of course not.

We had to learn about the business, understand where the website would fit in the overall business strategy and how to best position it to take advantage of the existing logistics and supply chain. Who were the target buyers? Why were they using the website to buy things? How would we advertise it to them? What was Plan B if Plan A didn’t work as great as we hoped?

And this leads us to perhaps THE most important things we do. Measure, analyse and refine.

One of the critical things people misunderstand is the importance of customising and refining your site AFTER it has been launched. There are a hundred ways you are feeding the sales funnel that is your website and you can’t expect one approach will appeal to all customers – especially the customers from one market segment to another if you sell a diverse range of products.

Something as small as changing the colour of your Add To Cart button can make a difference to sales conversion.

Talk to us today if you want to find out what else we know.

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The post Mobile-responsive websites – why you need one appeared first on Web Design & Development Sunshine Coast.

A better way of asking is “what’s your website worth to your business?”.

A website’s worth is severely limited if it’s not integrated with your online and offline business. So “building a website” is a somewhat futile process unless the people who build it “know” business well, especially your business.

Think about what you spend in marketing and advertising costs – how much does it cost you to get your print advertising message spot on? And yet so many people think a website costs a few thousand dollars and it will magically start pushing never-before-seen levels of sales inquiry to you. It just doesn’t work that way.

The “smarts” are in the approach and the strategy and the sales process – a beautiful site is useless if it misses its intended market.

And you need to understand this isn’t a “build it and they will come” exercise. After you’ve built the site you will need to continue to work on the business case and measure and refine just like any other ad/marketing medium.

Of course, using a professional firm like Kook means you will get to that end a lot faster than a cheaper solution, but nevertheless you should be prepared to roll up your sleeves for the long-term because there’s no silver bullet.

Hosting

This is something that is relatively easy to nail down. It will usually be somewhere between $200 and $600 per year and depends largely the amount of traffic your site has, technologies used and hardware. However the big difference between providers is the level, and type, of support you receive.

Do you have a human you can call when there is an issue? Or are you forced to log a support ticket with the hosting provider and wait for a response? What level of support is that ticket sent to? Why is this important? Because if you log a support ticket and it goes to Level 1 hosting support, which is normal practice, you may wait for hours (or even days with cheap solutions) just to have it escalated to level 2.

Do you have root level access to the server? Most hosting is “shared” hosting in order to keep costs down. Shared hosting very rarely has root level access. Why is this important? If your website requires any specific applications to run such as a plugin or additional software, you will be met with a plain and simple “no”. There is no flexibility around shared hosting as it means installing something may disrupt other clients’ hosting and the hosting provider will simply not take this risk. Root level access means you can apply additional software on an individual website and therefore there is far more flexibility in what your website can run. Having root level access costs more due to the type of hosting it requires.

Hosting versus IT

With your “hosting” you are getting things done on the server end of the internet cable that ultimately leads to your PC. If you require help with setting up email accounts on your computer, your hosting company has no responsibility to help. Usually hosting companies will give you a helpfile on how to do it, but any issues outside the norm of how that is set up and you are stepping outside the bounds of what is hosting (at their end of the cable) and into what is IT support (your end of the cable). Find out from your web provider where your hosting support ends and IT support begins.

Domain names

In much the same vein as hosting support, you can buy a super cheap domain and save yourself a six-pack of beer, and then lodge a ticket when you have a problem – and then wait. Invariably they will blame the hosting provider and you’ll go and lodge a job there only to be told it’s the domain provider’s problem. That six-pack may come in handy.

Platform queries

What software platform(s) will be considered for the project? How much experience have you had in dealing with those platforms? How flexible are they in being adapted to your business? As an example, a “simple shopping cart” is quite often not so simple when your business practices are applied to it. Customer price levels are usually quite complex for wholesalers for example. Applying volume discounts to larger customers’ pricing needs to be programmed unique to your business.

Off-the-shelf or “boxed” or “turn-key” systems usually cannot cope with any unique pricing structures and need to be modified. Similarly they are often hard to change if you need to alter the standard navigation or layout. A seemingly simple issue such as this could render the entire software solution useless.

It is paramount that the platform you choose has the ability to evolve as your business evolves. The import questions are: how scalable if the platform for growth, how easy is it to customise, does it have the ability to integrate with other business systems and what are the likely ongoing costs for the platform (eg security patches).

Balancing big ideas with technology and delivery

When you choose a web company, there are many types of businesses you will find offering web design as a service. At the extremes, you will probably find the creative ad agency or the technical geek.

At the internet’s infancy websites functioned as a glorified business card, designed to simple relay basic information to customers. Now your web presence should be not only this but be built to transfer core information to other internal business systems (CRM, Accounting, POS, etc), push marketing messages to clients (emails, Facebook, etc) and integrate with external marketing engines (eBay, Facebook, Google, comparison sites).

Thus your web company needs to be a creative, a geek and a business analyst.

A creative’s strength is usually in the presentation of your business. This is good for marketing / branding but are often not so strong on technical implementation and systems integration.  Technical specialists may give cutting edge solutions that don’t have any relevance to your business’s main sales objectives ie no calls to action, no defined structure and aesthetic design that resembles nothing like your brand or style guide.

What you need is a web company that has a broad range of in-house skills combining the best of the creative agency and the geek and a good dose of experience working with a multitude of business strategies, where they have direct experience in websites that convert to sales and produce the website themselves. They need to know web inside out: search marketing, sales conversion metrics, analytics, programming, design, branding and more. They should be able to rattle off several sites that do very similar things to what yours needs to, even if they aren’t in your specific field.

Some ballpark costings

Basic website: $3000-3500 is the standard five-page mobile-responsive website. Yes, yes we know, there is someone’s brother’s cousin who can do it for $1500, but if you’ve learned anything by reading this far it’s that you need strategy and support as well as “the website”. These are usually “template” sites with your logo and colours used but no specific custom design input.

CMS website (all the tools you’ll need to manage the site yourself) with moderate design and creative input: Rough guide $5000.

Full custom designed solution with heaps of bells and whistles like slideshows, email newletter marketing manager etc. $6500

eCommerce: Hard to nail down as things like freight calculations can be very complex for a broad product range to a wide brown land like Australia. Starting price $8000. You need to ensure you have this planned out by an expert. No use plugging in a WordPress or Business Catalyst site and getting right to the very end to find the Postage plugin cannot be modified to handle your freight rules. That could be a showstopper and you have blown your budget on a platform totally unmatched to your needs. And that’s only one possible showstopper among 100 more you need to consider.

So what’s that worth?

A well-planned website, backed up by great service, is what your business needs. Talk to us and we’ll tell exactly what that is worth to your business.

The post What does a website cost? appeared first on Web Design & Development Sunshine Coast.

Did you know more people have access to a mobile phone than they do to a toilet? Read for yourself if you don’t believe us.

More and more people are doing business on their mobile devices – perhaps even while they are searching for a loo, or while they are … erm … doing their business.

You can’t manage what you don’t measure – a saying that’s been around for a while – but do you measure your website’s success on mobiles in order to optimise sales results?

For decades businesses have tested adverts in newspapers, and radio and TV to see if they are successful. But with full statistics just clicks away on a website it’s amazing how many people don’t have the first clue.

If you don’t think it’s that important to review your stats, we recently changed the style of a client’s shopping cart menu to load more quickly on mobile and sales conversion on mobile increased 54%. We changed the menu after analysing the site’s metrics as part of their monthly SEO service and the results speak for themselves.

How many people are coming to your website via mobile device? And how many of those visitors convert to sales inquiries? Does your website automatically adapt to fit on a mobile device like an iPhone or iPad?

Kook can tailor any sort of website to fit on mobile devices, but more importantly, tell you exactly what your audience is using to view your site. Check out www.madfli.com.au or www.invogue.com.au as an example of mobile-responsive design.

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Brief

The design and development of an online store that sells quality brand name bathroom, kitchen and laundry products.

Solution

This involved a complete eCommerce solution and digital marketing campaign strategy. The online store was successfully integrated with existing point-of-sale and stock management software. This digital marketing strategy involved numerous elements, including:

• Search engine optimisation
• Search engine marketing
• Comparison shopping websites

Results

This solution exports the customer’s entire product range straight from their point-of-sale software to the web automatically, including stock levels, multi-level pricing and images. The website is was quickly indexed within search engines, and received (and continues to receive) a strong level of traffic and sales from various search engines (free of cost). The Bathroom Supplies Online website continues to maintain positive feedback for ease of navigation and creative website design.

The post Bathroom Supplies Online appeared first on Web Design & Development Sunshine Coast.

Brief

Complete website overhaul for a long-term customer
Discount Kitchenware and Cookware

Solution

Full eCommerce solution, email marketing campaign strategy, newsletters, social media strategy, comprehensive Search Engine Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation campaign.

Results

Significant boost in conversion rates to sales, great feedback from new and existing customers on the look and feel of the site. SEO results almost immediate return on investment.

The post Discount Kitchen Warehouse appeared first on Web Design & Development Sunshine Coast.

Brief

Major launch of skate and surf line of apparel and merchandise. Full eCommerce solution, social media campaign strategy.

Solution

MadFli is a super cool line of skate and surf apparel including skate shoes, caps, t-shirts and skateboards. It was decided very early that we didn’t want the normal grungy skate look to the website. The Home Page utilises a high quality video to position the brand but also show very quickly the high level of quality and thought put into their skate shoes. The shopping cart utilises a very slick product image zoom feature to keep users on the same page without the need to click away, critical in keeping conversion rates up. We leaned heavily on Facebook and other social media to help get eyeballs on the site, but also ranking well via Google Plus. Running competitions on Social Media resulted in significant increase to the database of email newsletter customers.

Results

The website is receiving incredibly positive feedback on its look and feel, ease of use and is already starting to rank well for key search phrases in search engines.

The post Mad Fli appeared first on Web Design & Development Sunshine Coast.

Glenn, tell us who you are and what role you play for KOOK?

I started the business and I was, and am still to this day, an all-rounder. I love solving problems for clients and I actually quite like taking up slack in the business wherever it is needed. I’ll make the coffee for everyone if that keeps us all happy and helps someone else get through their list of jobs for the day.

20 seconds or less to describe your average day?

Doing whatever I am told and constantly trying to keep up with the rest of the brilliant minds at Kook.

How you got started in web design? Why did you choose this direction?

In the nineties I was a newspaper journalist and Editor and I started looking at a wider career in publicity, which I realised was going to involve more and more of the web, so I did a course in multimedia, largely because I wanted to know more. I didn’t start the course thinking I wanted to build websites, I wanted to write for them and publish to them. That quickly changed when I realised I had a bit of a strategic and creative side and by the end of the course I began Kook and here we are…

Please, tell us about the trends that characterise the modern online world

I’m spending a lot of time trying to work out where traditional retail shopping is headed so I can work out where eCommerce is headed. Although I believe we’ve only just seen the start of the move to online in Australia, we have such a different, fragmented population it’s hard to look at the US or UK for answers for where it will end up . The big query for me is that traditional retail has existed on selling brand names, and the brands would not have had the following without the salesmanship in-store that has built their reputations. At present, online sales come predominantly from cheaper prices on branded items. If the “death of retail” ever comes true, how will online shoppers know what brands are reputable?

That must be a moving target?

I think a really big issue for most business owners is wrapping their heads around how fast the market is evolving. The barriers to entry are less and the start-up costs far lower for an online store. This means the margins are tighter and the product life cycle is accelerated because the market gets saturated far quicker. You have to live and breathe web to be responsive enough to hit certain market segments and be out and onto the next thing. And where traditional businesses usually move to another product within a segment, smart online sellers don’t care what segment, they just care what is popular and what has margin – they can adapt with a new domain name and logo for their shopping cart.

What are the main tools of your trade?

I swore I’d never get more than one computer screen, now I have three and I don’t know whether it makes me more productive but I feel less cluttered. A fast PC – I am so impatient it’s not funny. A good coffee machine. iPhone of course.

What tips would you give a potential client?

Don’t underestimate what you already know. Our clients think we are the geniuses, but it’s them that hold the key to knowing what makes their business work. We just know how to use that business structure and systems and adapt it quickly and effectively to online. We’re no different to an accountant, you do what you do well and we’ll make the web sing.

What do you do to un-wind?

Surfing, surfing and more surfing.

The post Founding director, Glenn Corbet appeared first on Web Design & Development Sunshine Coast.

Beware the false promises: Reserve the same skepticism for unsolicited email about search engine optimisation as you do for diet pills or requests to help transfer funds from some Nigerian prince who needs help claiming his dead father’s fortune. No-one can guarantee a Number 1 ranking in Google. There is no “priority submit” for Google. Google “SEO Fraud” or “SEO scams” – but as always, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Beware the “black hat”: Beware the SEO firms promising to get you on the home page for your favourite search terms. There is the right way to do it and the wrong way to do it. Things like hiding keywords in your site; submitting to link farms and the like are called “black hat SEO”. Do it the wrong way and get caught and Google will blacklist your domain name and you will have a long and arduous fight on your hands to explain your way into getting your site relisted. This is disastrous for any business.

Beware the illusionists: There are also many ways to “prove” to you your site is working for a particular search phrase, but have you considered: is anyone actually searching for that phrase?; what methods have they used to achieve that high ranking eg they may be able to show you the phrase ranking well, but the link you are given is specifically altered to show the results a person in a completely different geographical location would see; using certain SEO methods may gain you short-term spikes in rankings but these do not last. Be careful paying for results based on these short-term rankings.

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Kook manages all Babies Direct online advertising and Babies Direct has increased conversions and lowered cost-per-acquisition by 33% with Google Product Listing Ads.

You can see the full case study here >>

Product Listing Ads are paid search advertising that includes information such as product image, price, and merchant name, without requiring additional keywords or ad text. This makes the advertising more engaging for the user and increases conversions.

To learn more about Product Listing Ads, visit:

www.google.com/ads/innovations/productlistingads.html

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