Why I Canned biplane’s Website

You probably didn’t notice that biplane’s website looks radically different than it did a month ago.

It’s okay.  If I weren’t in the process of replacing it, I wouldn’t have known, either.  Hardly anybody visited my old website, and I’m part of that anybody.  Outside of putting blackout dates on biplane’s public calendar or adding names to the “Who we’ve worked for” page, I didn’t really interact with the site.  So, I didn’t expect anyone else to be interacting with my company there, either.

The artist formerly known as biplaneproductions.com exemplified what some experts call a “brochure site” or “web 1.0.”  It was good-looking with its stock photos and Flash animation; but, unlike the auction-filled sites of my clients, it didn’t have new and regular reasons to visit.  While it was more than a giant PDF, it wasn’t much more than a company brochure—a brochure that my clients don’t need and that my prospects don’t have on their radar.

Within the last week, a couple of my buddies and I finished upgrading my blog to a custom WordPress site.  As soon as that went live, I pulled the plug on biplaneproductions.com and pointed its URL to my blog.  There is some biplane information on the site, but the emphasis is on my articles (like this one).  Oh, and there’s an ad next to every article that points to biplane’s Facebook page.

See, that’s where I’m interacting most with the auction industry that I serve.  biplane isn’t alone in that.  Watch TV, and tell me how many ads point you to the advertiser’s website and how many point to their Facebook page.  Even President Obama held his live town hall meeting yesterday—not on the networks or CSPAN but on Facebook.

Facebook is where we live.  At the least, it’s the new water cooler around which we congregate.

My website strategy is not for every company—probably not even for my clients.  What is for everyone is determining who comes to your site and why—and determining how to cater to the answers to those two questions.  My potential visitors are busy, mobile entrepreneurs who want to pull from my knowledge base.  They access my company news and articles through my biweekly emails and their social media streams.  I take my web content to them, so that they don’t have to remember to retrieve it.

How about you and your online content?  What could you do to tailor it to your clientele, and how could you make it easier for them to access it?
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Taking It Personally

One of the most challenging tasks of my spiritual journey is keeping tabs on newer believers.  My church—with scriptural precedence—asks every one of us to grab at least one hand belonging to someone ahead of us on the journey and at least one hand belonging to someone beside us or on the path behind us.  The underlying idea is that growing collectively (and individually) depends on us getting help and then giving help to others in the body.

From the feedback I hear, I do a satisfactory job of that on Sunday mornings and in other church environments.  I even land a few texts, emails, Facebook messages, and sometimes even written notes to my “little brothers” and “little sisters.”  I have healthy conversations with people who come to my house and those who hike with me.

What I need to do better as a “big brother” is to come alongside those with whom I have influence.  Coffee.  Lunch.  Double dates.  I need to take what I’ve been given—the Life I supposedly advertise—to people who could benefit from such.  I can’t wait for them to come to me.  That might not happen.

How about you?  Is there someone in your life you need to be more proactive in discipling or evangelizing?  What can you do this week to move toward that?

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Stock image purchased from iStockPhoto.com

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