Towards the end of my last entry I said I thought you should have a website. You should have one for the same reason you should have a business card or be listed in the phone book; it legitimizes you and your practice.

The only person I know at present who is in the middle of creating a site is my sister.

My sister, Margaret, is a schmancy, smarty-pants speech and language pathologist. I won’t try to describe what she does exactly because she says I always get it wrong and I know she’ll flood my comment box with corrections (don’t deny it, Margie). It is a healing art, though, so there is relevance.

She has hired a web designer and someone to help create her logo, business name and marketing papers but she is writing the web content herself so she can stay within budget. Margaret doesn’t like writing so much and, as we all know, writing about yourself is tough.

I called her last night to see how she was doing with the web content and if she had any advice to share with you.

These were her challenges:

• Figuring out where to start.
• She is very attached to the identity of her business — her approach, education and philosophy — which makes it hard to write objectively.
• She was struck by how high the stakes really are. She finds it intimidating that she’s going to be compared to everyone else out there on a level playing field (the web).
• Summarizing everything a potential client should know makes her teeth hurt. And Marg’s not yet sure what people want to hear. Clients don’t want to know everything you’re doing and everything you’ve done. They just want to know enough to feel confident in your skills.

My sister is pretty methodical. She likes to make lists and research everything. So here are some things she did to tackle the challenges:

• She talked to several people (neighbors and acquaintances) who were the kind of people she would like to have as clients. She asked them what sort of information would motivate them to make an appointment with her.
• She looked at a lot of websites — both of competitors and small businesses — to see what grabbed her. She took a ton of notes.
• The big thing was taking her ego out of it a bit. Margaret said, “You can’t get your heart set on ‘purple’ or whatever. Even if purple was my favorite thing. Focusing on the kind of client I’m trying to attract has got to be at the forefront of my web design and content. My target audience is business executives, who are still mostly male, so lavender isn’t going to bring them in. I can have flowers elsewhere in my life.” (I love it when my sister talks like this.)

I asked her if there were some sort of writing or designing tool or class out there she wishes she had bought into. Or if she wishes some sort of tool would be created so she could use it … especially for writing content. Surprisingly, she said no.

Margaret says that everything you need to help design and write for your site is already out there, you just have to go looking for it. And take notes. Lots of notes. Find what grabs you and tweak it to match people you think should be interested in your business.

Marg recommends the U.S. Small Business Association as an excellent source of free information. A slight pothole with the SBA is that their offices are mostly in larger cities. If you’re in small town America it’s hard to take advantage of all the amazing amount of help they offer

She has been very happy with connections she’s made through MeetUp.com. I spent about three hours on it last night and I love it. (Okay, 30 minutes of those hours were spent watching the RSVPs on the home page come in. Simple things make me happy.) Marg says she found groups that helped her focus on business decisions and she liked being able to pick and choose before she attended a meeting.

To sum up you can write your own content. Research, take notes and have 37 people proof your text. And, above all, keep your targeted clients in mind as you write.

All my best,
Eileen

By the way, anyone have a web designer or web design program they recommend? I’d love to share it with everyone.

Forecast: I feel an entry about designing layouts for specific audiences coming on.