Both online and offline marketing (such as email, blogging, direct mail, ads, etc) should all contain some sort of action item. In most cases, the action item will direct people to a website or landing page where they can learn more about a particular product, service, or promotion. This is very common practice and many of those channels can be utilized affordably. But this is where marketers often fail (or get hosed for that matter).

Take a short time to look at the diagram below. Each spoke represents some sort of marketing channel, or in my terms, a Website Chauffeur. These mechanisms capture the attention of their viewers and then chauffeur them to the website where the next step in the selling process begins.

Online chauffeurs are shown in blue and offline chauffeurs are shown in orange.

Website Chauffeurs are great at capturing attention and bringing individuals to the next step at the center of the spokes - the website (or the hub). But the problem is Website Chauffeurs don't convert visitors into customers. That is the job of your website. Wherever visitors land within your website your message should build value before attempting to make a sale.

This is why it is so important to have a simple and powerful Web content management system to help you adjust your message. Chances are you will not get that message quite right the first time, or the second time, or the third, fourth, fifth, or sixth time. Hopefully, you get the point. Having a tool that doesn't punish you for making changes is a necessity, unless you like to send cash to a developer at $100 per hour. A Web content management system gives you the capability to adjust the message yourself and save enormous amounts of time and money.

Often times I sit with my son and daughter and find educational websites, including videos on YouTube (usually of giraffes, zebras, elephants, etc). Today, my son asked to see talking couches.  He's four.  So, I looked for videos of talking couches and I was not surprised to find the first result below.  My son, on the other hand, was extremely excited to see a real live talking couch!

This goes to show one thing. If you are looking for something specific you can probably find it on the web. And if you sell talking couches I hope that you are shown on the first page of search results. How do you do that? By following search engine optimization techniques and updating your content frequently.  Using a web content management system that lets you do both is a great start.

Last night I went to Maggiano's with some friends. The pasta is very good. But isn't italian usually better on the second day? All the flavors have more time to work their way in so the next day when you take a bite it seems much more rich and sensual than the night before.

So, my question is .... does your company provide a product or service that tastes better the second day - when the customer is beyond their initial purchase high? 

I hope so.

With Internet marketing, just like in your personal life, you have to focus on fundamentals. Here is a picture of my son Ethan.  This is his first fish. That day, we focused on one of life's fundamental pleasures - a boy and his dad going fishing. The excitement of catching the fish was quickly trumped by the terror of the fish flipping around on the line which almost led to Ethan falling into the pond. That was immediately followed by nearly unstoppable laughing and giggling by us both. Excitement - Fright - Laughing. What emotions!

When you put together your online marketing initiatives, what sort of fundamental emotions will your visitors experience when they see and read your material? Getting search engine visibility is a wonderful thing but always remember that search engines are not reading your content, real people are. Real people with happy memories and sad memories, stressful memories and comforting memories. Learning how to engage these visitors with stories that touch their fundamental emotions is key to winning more customers and long term relationships.

Can the name of your company determine your level of success? Maybe. It depends on what you're selling.

If you're selling a service, your name should somehow convey the service you offer. If you're selling a product, your company name may not have as big an impact as the product name. Just remember it will still be tied to the product.

Look at this sign. Sure the name is probably pronounced "cray-poe," but when I first read it I thought "crappo" - a short "a". 

A company name is most important during two points in time - 1) when a prospect first sees the name; and 2) when a customer tells someone else about it. Beyond that, it's all based on the relationship you establish. Chances are the name will either have meaning to someone and they might remember it or it won't and they will completely ignore it. In the case of this insurance company, it made me laugh and think about crappy insurance.

What impression will your company name leave?

Jeff Bowe, blogger and author of INFOCUS Selling, writes about how to captivate attention in one sentence. Jeff discusses developing an effective framing statement, the quintessential elevator pitch, and that you should develop your statement around just one burning issue. Adding any more will simply confuse your contact about what you do.

Most of us have been cornered at one time or another by someone who can offer anything and everything and will spend an hour tellling you about them all. By the end of the conversation you have no clearer idea of what they do and how they can help you. Clear as mud.

Now let's take a peek into the mind of Malcolm Gladwell from his book "Blink."  One of the experiments that Gladwell discusses was carried out by a researcher named Sheena Iyengar. Iyengar setup an experiment that involved selling jam at an upscale grocery store. Sometimes she sold six different types of jam and other times she sold twenty-four. Shoppers were allowed to sample each jam. The natural thinking behind this would lead us to believe that the more choices shoppers had, the more likely they would be to find something that closely matched their tastes. As a result of the experiment, the opposite was true.

Iyengar found that 30% of the shoppers who sampled from the six choices ended up making a purchase and only 3% of shoppers with twenty-four choices made a purchase.  This is a huge discrepancy that certainly proves, in the case of buying jam, that the more choices a shopper has, the less likely they are to buy.

Marketers have heard this type of suggestion for years - "Don't try to be everything to everyone. Focus on just one product or service." Yes, we want people to know about everything we have to offer, but telling them about all of it (especially in our first meetings) will only confuse them and lead them to checkout quickly. 

Many of the world's most successful businesses focused on one product or service, delivered it extremely well, and dominated their market. Often, once they began spinning off brand-extensions of their highly successful core product or service (variations), they experienced declines in sales and market share. Too many choices.

Lately, I've had discussions at my office that ended with looks of confusion and information overload. My first question is "Too much jam?" The world's marketing, advertising, office conversations, dinner talk, and many other forms of communication suffer from the "too many choices" or "too much information" plague.

Let's keep it simple folks.

Just two days after I post about Microsoft IE8, I get an alert that Google has announced their new web browser, Google Chrome, will be available in beta for download September 2nd. If you're not familiar with the term 'beta', it is basically a testing release before the official '1.0' is added. Read the official notice from Google.

From a consumer perspective, hurray! I do like having a choice..... but not too many. Too many choices and I just get confused and easily cheated by imposters and me-toos (ok, I don't get cheated with software much because I am a developer by trade, but my Grandmother does... and my parents, and my sister, and my cousins.... I hope you get the point). So, now I can use Firefox (the champion of people who dislike Microsoft), or I can use Internet Explorer (the standard built-in browser for Microsoft Windows), or Safari (the Mac OS built-in), or Google Chome (a wonderfully simplistic, yet powerful browser - I'm sure). Of course, there are a couple others, but they barely register as a blip in the browser usage radar.

From a developer/marketer's perspective, I am a little annoyed. Building rich and dynamic cross-browser websites can be a challenge, even though development has improved a lot over the last 5 years. There are still inconsistencies, mostly with Javascript and CSS (style sheets). Developing cross-browser websites is sort of like putting up a billboard that can only be read by people in certain types of cars. If you drive a BMW it appears perfect.  If you drive an '84 Chevy Celebrity (like my first car) the billboard shows a big red X. It's challenging to get the message right for everyone.

If your website is not dynamic, i.e. contains no Javascript, then you will likely be fine. The challenge is with rich sites - those websites that have put a lot of time and effort into improving the user experience. There will most likely be compatibility issues and you will need to fix those as soon as you can.

Google has a huge following. To many people, they are still the underling that develops cutting edge software. Once Chrome is released in beta, you can count on a ton of people trying it out - if not adopting it entirely. This means you need to test your corporate websites, landing pages, micro-sites, and customer applications.

Google is pretty good at releasing quality software, but I have seen several applications in beta that were buggy. If Chrome gets adopted by a large number of consumers, I hope they have worked out most of the kinks.

Microsoft Internet Explorer is getting a face lift and tummy tuck with Internet Explorer 8 (IE8).  IE8 is currently in beta form and available to average users. A formal release date has yet to be set. One of the biggest new features receiving a lot of hoopla right now is InPrivateBlocking. 

InPrivateBlocking allows users to turn off browsing history, as well as the saving of temporary files and cookies. Browsing history and temporary files mostly affect just the user, however,not saving cookies affects the user and any company or organization tracking and recording information on their visitors. This has potentially big ramifications on organizations who rely on web-based advertising because there is a lot of tracking involved with web-based ads. It also affects companies who track and remember their visitors and display items based on their interests.

So, organizations are worried their ad revenues will dry up because of this end to tracking. I'm not worried, though. First of all, the ability to block cookies is built into the major browsers right now.  It's just a little harder to find. Second, I'm sure there are a good number of people that don't want to be tracked at all - the 'big brother is watching us' mentality. But how many people truly think that way? 

When I visit Amazon.com, I love the fact that it says 'Hello, Matt.  We have some recommendations for you.' And the recommendations are really things I'd be interested in. Or perhaps when I go to log into an email account, bank account or some other account that remembers who I am. The website doesn't store my password (unless you're silly enough to let your browser do that for you).  It just has my username - which I often forget because it varies from site to site if the traditional 'mzentz' is not available. It is really nice that these sites remember who I am and what my preferences and interests are.

My point is that I wouldn't worry too much about user's turning off their cookies because most don't do it now. What I would worry about is why people are turning off their browsing history and temporary Internet files, because if they work for you, how will you know what websites they are really viewing while on your dime.

Two of the biggest elements of marketing are focus and creativity.  Focus is important because you want to stayed focused on particular marketing tasks, but it is also important because your overall messages to prospects and customers need to stayed focused on your core product or service offering.  Creativity is important because it takes a creative mind to put out quality, relevant, and purposeful content that stays inline with your focus.

Get Sleep - Stay Focused

How do you stay focused, especially if you are a small business owner?  There are probably millions of topics related to this but I'm going mention only one.  I finished an article in Fortune Small Business Magazine titled "Make Sleep Work For You." The article talks about how important 7-8 hours of sleep each night is to everyone. Our society is based on this "burning the midnight oil" idea where we think if we put in more hours, we get more done.

Studies have proven otherwise.  When we consistently get too little sleep our bodies respond accordingly by losing our ability to focus.  This results in a subpar level of work and could even lead to fatal business decisions. The health disadvantages are also numerous. The World Health Organization has studied this so much that they have considered making sleep deprivation a carcinogen.  Studies show that a lack of sleep leads to an increased chance of diabetes and cancer and weakens your bodies immune system. Wow! 

Sleep is good. Get your rest and you'll be able to maintain a higher level of focus, make complex decisions easier, and even feel more energized throughout the day.  Some businesses actually put sleep rooms in the office so workers can take mini-naps throughout the day.

Generate Creativity

Being creative can be a huge challenge if you can't find your focus or inspiration. I don't remember where I read this but a simple trick you can use is to exercise for a short period of time just before you have to put your creative talents to work.  Exercising creates a higher level of activity in the brain and results in your ability to comprehend the bigger picture and piece together the fragments.  Sometimes I hit the stairwell and do a full flight or two to get the blood pumping. It really works so I encourage you to try it.

Being well rested and throwing in some exercise can help you produce higher quality marketing material in a shorter amount of time.  This helps me in my writing and planning activities. Now, if I can just find a better way to improve my visual creativity I'll be all set.

Today, I am at the blogINDIANA conference learning about different blogging topics and also promoting our product, Marketpath CMS.  It's interesting, even now, how many home-grown web content management systems there are.  We knew this when we began building our product.  We knew that home-grown CMS's would be our largest competitors. 

One benefit of the home-grown CMS is that the relationship to the developer, the company who built it, is very personal. It has tremendous value because the customer is working with a vendor they trust.

The disadvantages of the home-grown CMS are in system maturity, features and benefits. Every home-grown CMS I've seen is immature.  It lacks the full-scale development and quality assurance required to deliver a quality product from which end users derive their return on investment.  Additionally, most larger changes (like adding a new page) require intervention from the original developer. Keep your fingers crossed they are not on vacation or too busy on another large project to assist for another 6 weeks.  Believe it or not, that happens a lot.

What we are recommending is that instead of trying to build a home-grown application that is limited in functionality, become a reseller of a mature web content management system. We have a program in place that allows resellers to make a nice return on every new customer.  And the return is recurring every year. They get the benefit of a mature content management system that is always growing in features and benefits, and offers the expertise of the vendor behind it. Do it right, go with a pro.

I met with Scott Abel this past Tuesday and we briefly spoke about semantic search.  I'll admit, I've read about semantic search in the past but I wasn't very familiar with it.  So I did a little more research.

Semantic search is based on objects instead of just keywords, as traditional search is today. Today's search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc) find websites that contain the keywords you entered. Now, if I typed in "horn" I will get many different results.  I will get results for french horns, Cape Horn, Horn's Gaslight Bar & Restaurant on Mackinac Island, Hansen & Horn, and many other results.  But I will have to sort through all of those results to find what I'm really looking for, my grade school gym teacher "Mr. Horn." 

Semantic search would allow me to sort results by the type of object instead of just wether the pages included my keywords.  When I type "horn" I could also include "person."  So my query might be "person horn." A good semantic web search engine would also recognize that many different object types exist for the word horn and present those to me so I could easily narrow my selection.

We constantly hype about good keyword placement and strong search engine optimization but semantic web presents a different twist in search that could yield much more relevant results and get us to the information we want faster. Semantic search has a long way to go before being fully adopted but it is something to keep your eye on.

Legs are important to most people, animals, and tables.  Legs are not important to the Higgly Town Heroes.  I have asked my four year old son repeatedly, 'How do they get places?'  He doesn't understand the question.  He says they just do.  Good enough, I suppose, for an animation and a four year old. 

But what about your wine?  Does your wine have good legs?  Many people think legs are a great indicator of a great wine.

What about your Internet marketing initiatives.  Do they have good legs?  Here's another way to ask the same question.  Does your Internet marketing program have a solid foundation with which you can measure, analyze, and make adjustments as necessary?  Can you measure website ROI?  If you said 'no,' then you are like most businesses that are trying to leverage the web as a marketing tool. 

A good place to start is with a marketing firm that will help you plan and establish baseline goals.  Most website development or design firms are not marketing firms.  Sure, they can build a killer website, but when it comes to getting a true return on investment, you need to have a strategy, a game plan, or..... good legs.  Be sure to select a partner that can help you build a strong foundation so you can measure true ROI. 

In my last post I wrote about the downfalls of flash, search engine optimization, and direct linking.  Now it's time to talk about AJAX and web 2.0 and how search engines perceive the two.  First of alll, let's define AJAX and web 2.0.

AJAX is an achronym for Asynchronous Javascript And XML.  It provides web clients (e.g. Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari) a mechanism for delivering rich experiences for its users.  Google Suggest  is an example of an application that uses AJAX.  As you type, suggestions appear that you can click on to quickly select your topic.  Notice that the entire screen doesn't refresh.  Instead of the browser making a call back to the original web server for a whole new page (including suggestions) it only updates the list of suggestions by passing the typed characters to the server - using AJAX.  The amount of data is very small and the data returned is also very small.... thus very fast.

AJAX enables the concept of web 2.0 - the rich user experience.  It is a great idea to build in a rich experience that makes it easier and more inuitive for users to interact.  Our web content management system has an enormous amount of AJAX programming.  But the problem is with search engines.

AJAX is based on Javascript and Javascript is based on user events (e.g. mouse-up, mouse-down, click, etc).  Search engines don't have the capability to launch javascript events which means if your website's navigation is based on AJAX (which, again, uses Javascript) then search engines will not be able to index it.  This means the website pages you want people to find will not be found because they were never indexed. 

The moral of the story is to use AJAX sparingly if you want your website to be indexed by search engines and definitely do not setup your navigation with AJAX or Javascript.  Check with a knowledgeable software developer and SEO firm and ask them if your site is SEO friendly.

Using Adobe Flash within a website at one time was the bane of search engine visibility.  Although Flash sites were often dazzling, highly interactive, and dynamic, they were not adequately being indexed (if at all) by the big search engines.  Here's a flashback article from 2003 on this topic. 

Adobe has just announced a plug-in available to Google and Yahoo that allows their search engines to act like a user clicking thorugh a flash website.  This seems to be the latest effort at indexing Flash sites but some say that obtaining a high search position willl still be difficult because of the inability to provide direct links within the flash site. 

For example, if a blogger finds a page in a flash site that is several clicks deep she will not be able to link directly to that page in her blog.  Instead, she would have to link to the front page (the page that loads initially) and instruct the user how to get to the deeper level page.  Yuck!

So, if you want to build a highly interactive website, use AJAX and Web 2.0 technologies instead of Flash.  You can still use Flash movies embedded within your site but don't let the Flash handle your website navigation.  I'd like to caution, though, that AJAX and Web 2.0 have their own issues which I'll tackle in my next post.

We tell clients all the time that we will help initiate a program to improve search results and help find the right keywords to use throughout their website.  We also say that the rest is basically up to them.  And because they are using a web content management solution (Marketpath CMS... of course) ongoing SEO is about producing lots of relevant content that engages website visitors. 

In his blog entry Three SEO Myths Debunked, Mike Volpe wrote 'If I had $100,000 to invest in SEO, I would hire a journalist to create lots of articles and videos, not an SEO consultant.'

There is only so much code tweaking you can do to optimize a website for search.  Hiring a firm on retainer to provide SEO consulting is like hiring GM on retainer to fill your gas tank once a week.  You definitely need GM to build the car but it is cost prohibitive to have them filling your gas tank. 

Today I am leading a discussion on Stephen Covey's 4th habit - Think Win-Win (The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People).  The underlying idea of this habit is that instead of thinking there is only a certain amount of pie for all to share it is better to adopt the idea that there is plenty of pie to go around for everyone - everyone wins.  Now you can apply this to relationships, your work, and any issues that arise from either.  You can't have Win-Win every time but you can sure try.

So what about search results?  Can you adopt the Win-Win mentality (Abundance Mentality) with search results?  This is a little more tricky.  On the first page search engines show 10 organic results they think are relevant to your search.  So, in this sense, there are only 10 positions to secure on that first page (and you definitely want the first page).  The pie is very limited.

The great thing about keyword searches is that there are usually a great number of variations.  The most popular variations get used often.  These are highly competitive keywords and limit your chances of obtaining high search engine position.  This is a very small pie indeed and getting a slice can cost you a lot of money and time.

But then there are those keyword combinations that are used much less frequently and can be used throughout your site to obtain a higher search position with a lot less work.  This is where the pie is almost unlimited. 

Here's an example:  if I live in Indianapolis (which I do) and I'm looking for a divorce attorney (which I'm not) I would likely type in "divorce attorney indianapolis".  Our client, Hollingsworth, Cassman, and Zivitz (http://www.hczlaw.com/), specialize in divorce.  Winning the top search positions for "divorce attorney" is nearly impossible.  But winning the search for "indianapolis divorce attorney" is a little more achievable.  And since they are based in Carmel, IN they have an even better shot at winning "carmel divorce attorney" (which they do).  You can take that further and strive for the following less competitive keyword phrases:

• divorce attorney indianapolis
• divorce indiana
• divorce lawyer carmel
• divorce questions indiana
• marital divorce issues
• avoiding divorce
• divorce attorney fishers (a town near Carmel)
• divorce attorney westfield (another town near Carmel)

Those are just a few of the variations.  You should hire an experienced SEO firm to help you come up with the many related keyword combinations.

The point is that the pie for search is very small if you're going after highly competitive keywords but abundant if you go after the virtually unlimited keyword variations available.  So, I guess you can adopt the Win-Win habit for search engine results after all.  Just be sure to monitor your search results based on those keyrods and always provide fresh, updated, and relevant content to maintain those positions.

Sometimes it's nice to just get away for a while.....

Have you ever seen a faux balcony on a house?  Or perhaps some other fake feature that had no functional use whatsoever?  This really bugs me.  Being a programmer, I am all about functionality.  Luckily, our product interface isn't developed by me.  If it was, it would likely resemble an emacs editor. 

This picture causes strife in my life because I would insist on putting in real doors, not the appearance of doors.  I like real.  I like functional.

This goes for websites as well.  I often come across sites that have a list of services or products that don't link to further information.  I also see sites that have images that look like buttons but aren't linked to more information.  And of course, the worst is when sites have broken forms, broken links, or broken images. 

Now, I understand broken elements aren't planned like the ugly faux door above, but they are a product of the tools used, the individuals level of training using them, and the organizations commitment to the website.  These small faux issues cause immediate headaches and frustration with visitors and will likely turn them away.

So be sure to check your website for broken elements and don't try to trick your visitors with the appearance of something that should truly be functional.  Your website is not a Hollywood set.  It is a direct extension of your voice and your message to potentital and existing customers.

And just for the record, my #1 pet peeve is double doors where one door seems to always be locked.  Some even have a sign that says "Please use other door".  Can't the people who unlock the doors turn the little key for the second door too?  I don't get it.... but of course, I don't unlock doors for a living.

Probably not. So why would do so many marketers and business owners let their website visitors enjoy stale page content?  Visitors come for a reason.  They're evaluating whether or not there is something they want.  They arrive with questions or curiousity.  How well are their questions or curiosities answered?

If you look at a stale piece of bread from far off it is likely to appear normal.  But if you inspect it closely, or worse take a bite, you will certainly notice it is stale.

Website content is no different.  Visitors may, at first glance, think the content is fresh and updated, but with a closer look they will quickly get a sense that it is stagnant.  Everything from the design of the site to the copy contained within, a website needs to convey relevant, convincing, and updated information.

With stale bread you can always cut it up and make crostini.  But slicing stale website pages into little toasts isn't exactly an option.

My wife has a 10 year old car that is used soley to get to and from work.  It runs well, it still looks nice, and it gets great gas mileage.  The only negative factor is that is burns through a quart of oil each month.  Let a few months go by and I begin hearing the knocking sound of unlubed lifters in the engine.  At that point, it desperately needs oil.

Luckily, the engine did not lock up.  Isn't it nice, though, that our cars tell us when they need oil by flashing the oil light?  Unfortunately, your website doesn't have a warning light like this to tell you when it needs some maintenance.

Like a car, you must keep you website well oiled so it runs smoothly.  And by "running smoothly" I mean your website is engaging visitors so they either buy or move to the next step in the buying process.

Keeping your website oiled takes continuous effort.  You must make relevant updates frequently.  You must provide quality content to engage your visitors and keep them coming back.  And you must constantly measure the results.

To do this in a cost effective manner you need a proven web content management system.  A good web content management system will provide tools to update your website without the need to call in a programmer.  A good web content management system will also provide you measurement tools to help you guage your website's effect on your bottom line.

Marketpath CMS is also software-as-a-service.  More often than not, people ask about the difference between our content management solution and installed CMS software like Adobe Contribute or Ektron.  

• It's incredibly easy! Requires no knowledge of HTML
• Fast setup and implementation
• 100% browser based so it is accessible from anywhere
• No upgrades to install because software updates are applied automatically
• No IT staff required
• Unlimited, easily accessible support

• Usually requires some HTML coding
• Can only be used on the PC it is installed on
• Requires IT staff to install, implement, train, support, and install upates.
• Per seat license fees
• Limited support options from vendor

In the end, serious Internet marketers will choose a solution that frees them up for valuable Internet marketing and not software configuration. 

In our office we have a game of football that involves a cup at each end of the office sitting on a table.  The object of the game is to knock the cup off the table with the football.  Whoever knocks the cup off 5 times first, wins.
 
The fun part of this game is that we have a few rules that make it more challenging.  For example, the football has to hit the cup and knock it off to count as a point.  Therefore, you cannot hit the table really hard jarring the cup from its perch. 
 
Another rule is that if the football lands on top of the table and stays their at rest, it is an automatic win.  Or if the football lands in the space between the table-top and the lower shelf, it is also an automatic win.
 
Here's TJ, one of our account execs, with his second auto win.  TJ pretty much dominates the game and has the longest cumulative record holding the title belt.  He is the only one to have an auto win.

There is a point to this blog entry.... auto wins.  How can I get more auto wins with my Internet marketing strategy?  How can I setup an Internet marketing process that automatically performs certain tasks for me and produces measurable results? 
 
It all starts with your message.  What do you want your clients and prospects to know?  How do you want to communicate with them?  How often?  What will you say?  How will you segment your audience?  What activity do you want to track?  How do you want to respond to that activity?  What sort of results do you expect?
 
Once you know answers to those questions, you can choose the delivery and tracking methods.  The tools are not nearly as important as setting your goals and defining realistic expectations.  Although, with a solid strategy and a strong, reliable toolset, you are setting yourself up for a few auto wins.

Have you evear heard of people who paint their front door red when they pay off their mortgage?  Do you think this guy just paid off his car loan?

This may be fine for your house.  You are proclaiming to the neighborhood your independence from the bank.  But don't catch yourself making the same proclamations for your business in your Internet marketing conversations. 
 
I'm sure you're proud that you own your office building or have stayed debt-free for decades.  That can generate a wonderful sense of pride with you and your staff.  But keep it at that, inside company walls.  Don't waste your time telling prospects how well you've succeeded.  Instead, spend that precious energy engaging with their needs and showing the benefits and results of your product or service. 
 
It's not about you.  It's all about them.

Recently one of our prospects chose another firm to handle their website redesign.  Not only was our offer less expensive, we also included our content management solution so they could easily update their site and add new pages as needed.  Knowing we were up against a friend of the owner we offered to work together with them.  They would do the redesign and we would provide the CMS.  They decided to just redesign their site.
 
Their response for not choosing CMS was:  "If we didn't update our site before then I doubt we'll update it in the future". 
 
This was one of my "I don't get it" moments.  The company chose to pay a lot more for only a redesign and no means to keep the website fresh, updated and inline with their other marketing initiatives.  To me, this is the equivalent of having your company truck painted with your logo and website address then keeping it parked in a garage so no one can drive it or see it.  Why waste your money?

Using a content management solution would have given them the tools to edit site content, measure its effect, adjust as necessary, measure again, adjust..... and on and on.  They could have created landing pages for offline marketing initiatives and measured the direct impact those initiatives had.  They could have created microsites to target a particular niche.  The benefits are virtually endless.  Instead, they chose a road that leads to stagnation.
 
I guess the good news is that now we have a little more time to help another company that understands the bigger picture.