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HOW TO: Revamp Your Old, Ugly Website

Do you have website shame?

Here's an answer to updating an architect's website (originally a reply to a LinkedIn post). It is TOO easy to get overwhelmed by the whole process of refining your firm’s online presence. It’s helpful to accept that by the time you have everything perfect the technology may have changed again. [cue sound effect: sad trombone]

One firm on the right track has a site that includes a blog and social media links as well as a homepage slider featuring gorgeous photographs from an online portfolio. Their website was created with WordPress and for around $1k a freelance tech nerd converted the existing site into a WordPress theme, set it up, and did some basic troubleshooting. The built-in image galleries are great for showcasing past projects and the WordPress platform makes editing easy for technology-challenged and time-strapped small firm owners.

CMS: WordPress vs. everybody else

Keep costs down by finding a great theme and customizing it for your own use. My favorite places for great low-cost themes are Themeforest and Elegant Themes.

If you don't want to go the WordPress route, you may also want to check out Square Space or Apostrophe Now  or Live Books, which have great portfolio features and pre-designed layouts with site builders created specifically for those who don't have an extensive web development background.

Perhaps you're making use of a homepage slider on your site with images and testimonials. Many of the themes from the sites I listed above include home page sliders so you won't lose that functionality.

Microsoft Frontpage

Finding support for Frontpage extensions is increasingly frustrating and compatible hosts are few and far between. Frontpage is now the ugly stepchild of Microsoft and is no longer supported. I'm a fan of the web hosting company FatCow. It's a funny name (and so are the graphics!) but the support is great and they offer (1) support for Frontpage (2) a secure server.

Invest in SSL: Secure Servers

The reason the secure server (httpS://www.YOUR_SITE.com) is so important is that Facebook is transitioning to having custom fan pages use secure URLs exclusively for apps. Some Facebook users have already opted-in to that feature.

If you choose to have a custom landing page on your Facebook wall, a secure server with httpS URL will make sure that content is displayed for ALL users and won't disappear with either the user opt-in or the Timeline change-over.

What about Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Pay-per-click, mobile website, blogging, tracking website visitors and more?

Overwhelming, right? Oh boy... Just wait until you start building a mailing list and have to deal the *that* whole headache! Email clients tend to be even less standards compliant and designer un-friendly than web browsers. Read my previous posts about Email Open Rates.

Search Engine Optimization

Wordpress is actually pretty good for SEO and there are numerous plug-ins you can use to optimize your meta tags, permalinks, keywords, tags, etc. Definitely look for a template that has a mobile friendly theme IF you've noticed many of your visitors are using mobile devices. Some themes come with a simple CSS file that reformats your content specifically for mobile devices.

Analytics & Tracking

Wordpress also has some built-in analytics, but your best bet is to install Google Analytics. I'm not as well-versed in the other tools (Squarespace, Livebooks) to give you specifics on their analytics dashboard, but I can tell you that most hosting services worth their spit can produce a report with basic traffic statistics.

I use bit.ly for tracking some links to get an overview of what people are clicking on. Bit.ly is a nice solution for tracking links on *print* material or PPC ads, but I wouldn't use it in your navigation as a replacement for a more robust tool. I'm a big fan of Google Analytics for small firms without a ton of resources or time to check their "statistics dashboard" everyday. There are some paid services out there that may be worth a look if you have the time and the inclination....most practicing architects have neither.

Pay-per-click Ads: Facebook vs. Google

Do you have an idea of what you'd like to create PPC ads for? The Google Keywords Tool and KeywordSpy are great tools for figuring out the relative competition for certain search terms. Facebook has a mind-blowing amount of data that you can use to determine age, interests, location, even marital status and level of education.

The cool thing about Facebook is you can get specific numbers of the amount of users you can target without having to pay for it. Simply begin to create an ad, select as many or as few targeted profile specs as you like, and...voila!

You'll have a nice big number letting you know the exact number of Facebook users who meet your ideal potential client profile. It will also give you an estimate of how much you'll be paying per click (super helpful for budgeting).

The difference?

Google tells you what people are searching for. Facebook tells you what people are already interested in. With a combination of both of these, you can narrow down your niche keywords so you can start to build PPC ad campaigns and blog articles from that info.

Here's a video from Ali Brown and James Roche that takes you step-by-step through the process of using the Google Keyword Tool. They throw in some motivational stuff and email marketing tips as well, but the tutorial aspect of James' presentation is really worth the watch: http://alibrown.com/ElevateYourIncomeVideoTwo.html

Real Life Examples

You might try Squarespace, Livebooks, or Wix where you simply upload pictures and text into premade templates. To give you an idea of what you can do with each, I found some sample pages of firms who use these services:

Wordpress (http://wordpress.org/)
Sample: Kevin L Harris, FAIA

Squarespace (http://www.squarespace.com)
Sample: JBit

Livebooks (http://www.livebooks.com)
Sample: Chipper Hatter Architectural Photography
Sample: Three sixty-one Architecture + Design Collaborative

Wix (http://www.wix.com)
Sample: Dawkins & Dodger Architecture 

Apostrophe Now (http://www.apostrophenow.com/ )
Sample: MGZA

Low-cost to no-cost Themes

If you want to try going the Wordpress route, for a cool $35 here's a theme aptly titled "The Architect" from Envato's Themeforest: The Architect Theme

For the same price ($35), MojoThemes has a clean and simple portfolio template that I could easily see transforming an architect's web presence: MinFolio Theme

WordPress Themes:

Tag, You're It!

Each of the above should have a manageable learning curve. None requires any knowledge of HTML or CSS coding and all allow for quick & easy updates to change text and images. Now it's your turn! Go make your website awesome. Rather, go empower your interns or a virtual assistant to make your website awesome. After all, you're busy running a business in a struggling economy.
Created By: Ann Harris On: Mon, May 21, 2012 12:09 PM

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