Simon Hendery: Seeking business online? Develop a web strategy

This week's Research International-TNS findings that New Zealanders are more wedded to the internet than ever and increasingly reliant on the web as a shopping-research tool probably come as no surprise.

What remains a mystery for many businesses, however, is how to harness the business potential of the web.

Click Here, a 178-page easy-to-read paperback by Australian marketer Rich Evans, is a good starting point for the confused small businessperson who suspects there's a dollar to be made taking their trade online but isn't sure how to do it.

The book isn't designed to be a comprehensive manual on how to get an effective website up and running. What it does provide is a good overview of what is involved, with emphasis on the bigger strategy the budding e-tailer needs to consider.

Looking at the quality of the majority of smaller sites out there in the ether - and many of the larger ones as well - the lack of early focus on basic strategic concepts such as simplicity of use and relevance of content is all too often overlooked.

Evans forces his readers to do what every website designer needs to do: look at their creation from the customer's perspective.

Another important piece of advice he offers is that unless you have particular skills, building an effective website is probably something to outsource to the experts rather than attempting to do yourself.

But deciding not to tackle the venture yourself doesn't mean Click Here isn't worth a read. The book provides enough of an overview of the process to give the reader an understanding of the various professionals they may have to call in, and what they can expect from them.

Being written by an Australian isn't a mark against Click Here as far as local readers go. As you may have noticed, the internet is a global phenomenon and the ideas behind building an attractive presence out there are pretty much universal.

THE TIMARU FACTOR

One of the New Zealand web trends identified by Research International-TNS was the growth in the number of people accessing the internet on their mobile phones - now up to 33 per cent of the connected population.

As Research International strategy director Jonathan Sinton pointed out at this week's Digital Now online marketing conference, improved technology and cheaper cellular data prices have combined to make the mobile surfing experience more practical.

Consumers now used their web-capable phones as a web "security blanket", he said. While most still preferred the experience of going online via a PC or laptop, phone access lets us stay up to date with email or our favourite social network when we're forced to be away from other technology.

As is always the case when a group of technology marketers gets together, there was a lot of discussion at Digital Now about the iPhone. It was a device that had "changed the game" as far as bringing web mobility to the masses goes, Sinton said.

But another speaker, Vaughn Davis, creative director of advertising agency Y&R, pointed out that the device remained a rather niche gadget. The number of iPhone owners in New Zealand is about on a par with the population of Timaru.

"I'm not saying it's not cool to develop an iPhone app [a downloadable application with a marketing message]. I've got some wonderful iPhone apps I'd like to get to market when there's an opportunity and a business case for it, but don't be fooled into thinking you're talking to more people than you are. You're actually talking to Timaru."

* Click Here, by Rich Evans
* Price: $33.99
* Published by Wiley
* Available at major bookstores