Transcript Episode 27

EPISODE 27 OF THE MARKETING SOLUTIONS PODCAST: WHAT TO LOOK FOR WHEN HAVING A WEBSITE CREATED (DON'T MAKE THESE BIG MISTAKES)

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Hi, guys, today I'm interviewing my web developer, Randy. So I'm so excited about this one because over the last 12 months or so, Randy and I have been working together, making some incredible websites. But we're seeing a lot of dodgy work happening from other companies, and we're fixing a lot of mistakes. So I thought it'd be great to have Randy on here today to actually talk about what you need to look for when you are having a website developed. And we're absolutely going to have a chat around the different platforms available, too, because I know there's a lot of people out there that think that WordPress is the be all and end all. So we're gonna debate that a little bit as well. Randy, thank you so much for coming on to the podcast today.

Randy:

No worries, thanks for having me, it's a pleasure.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

And I don't know if you guys have just picked up on the fact that Randy has a bit of an American accent. You've got an interesting past, Randy. In fact, I reckon you're one of my surprising people I know in that when I first met you, I thought you were going to be this super nerdy, computer guy, but you're actually a bit of a sporty guy. Got a lot of different interests. Tell me about your background with growing up in America and what you've done workwise.

Randy:

Yeah, to be honest, though, I am really a super nerdy guy, I just hide that from the world behind the beard. Yeah, I guess, growing up in the US, I really straddled the line, I guess you'd say, in your standard high school. I was a big jock, but also a bit of a nerd. So I played football, did freestyle collegiate wrestling, I ran track. I was also in band, I played a saxophone, I took art classes, I was just a bit of everywhere. And then I took some college prep courses as well, computer courses in general, a plus certification in high school. And then from there I guess I moved on and went to university, took some networking server courses, but eventually graduated with a degree in graphic and web design. And then from there, I did the sales and marketings and B to B sales, so business to business, and then I found myself landing at a role with SAP. So I was a functional consultant for SAP.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Okay, let's break this down, because I feel like you said SAP to me about 100 times before I finally stopped and said, what the heck do you mean, Randy? What are you on about, and what was that role, and what did it actually involve?

Randy:

So yeah, SAP is systems applications programming. It's basically a system that manages multiple aspects in the warehousing environment. So any WM consultant is responsible for the functionality delivered for configuring warehouse management applications. So it's mainly for big Fortune 500 clients that have a lot of warehousing systems and that really need to control and track their inventory and stock coming in and out of the system and everything. Basically, my job was to just apply the needs in the system that the business would be using on a day to day basis to help streamline the business and make it a bit more cost effective to run.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Yeah, so essentially, I remember having a beer with Randy and he was talking about how these big multinational corporations, essentially, their systems that you were coding and setting up were that a truck would drive in, it would scan the barcode, it would tell them which gate to go to, they'd reverse up, the door to the warehouse would automatically open, and then all of these forklifts would come out and unload, and unload into the spot that has sort of been pre-coded. So a lot of that manual processing and handling that happens in warehouses has been totally eliminated, which I think it's pretty incredible that you can actually code something to work on that level of automation. So that's, I think, a very unique skill set that you developed and that's something a lot of people wouldn't have really been exposed to.

Yeah, I mean, my role when I was in that field and such a complex system would be, I guess, you'd say very limited my specialty. Because when you really look at it, you got a lot of things happening in the background when it comes to these large warehousing systems such as Sony, their manufacturing plants and things like that. So there's a bunch of different teams that have a play in it, but yeah, my role was just coding in and setting up the functions required for the client to operate on a day to day basis. So basically Randy's a very, very clever guy, and we're very lucky to have him as part of the Kiss Marketing team, because he knows way more than me and has got me out of many sticky situations. So, you've gone from coding warehouse systems in the US, essentially, to living in Australia. How did that happen, and how did you then go and end up developing websites?

Randy:

Yeah, so my partner, Stacy, she got a scholarship to do her PhD at the University of Technology in Sydney. She had a couple of different options at the time. And one was Australia, and of course, growing up in the US we have all that cliche stuff, the Crocodile Hunter and everything, and you just see Australia and how it's supposed to be so beautiful, which it is. And yeah, we leaned to Australia, and moved here and she began her PhD. So yeah, it was a big life change, I'd say. Just packing up everything that you own, selling 90% of the stuff that you own and then moving to another country without any real set plan. So when I first got here, I got pretty lucky. Started out, I just took some cafe work and everything, because living in a new country, you don't have contacts or anything. And fortunately the company I started for was a really big, popular cafe in Sydney, and they needed a website. And I was chatting with one of the owners and was like, "Oh yeah, I know how to create websites and code." And they said, "Hey, look, get an ABN." And I asked, "What is this ABN?" And they explained the ins and outs, and I was like, wow, it's so simple to start your own sole trader company or something similar versus the US. Yeah, just got pretty lucky with a well known client, designed a website for them. And then started doing some graphic work for UCS in regards to figures and stuff to publish in papers through my partner and in her lab. And then it just kind of built from there, and now I'm working with you.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Okay, what makes you different to the randoms who think that they can build websites? Obviously now with WordPress you've got these site builders and things like that where it's sort of just drag and drop, plug and play. What are your thoughts around that, and can you explain the difference in your skill set versus someone who's just done an online course, maybe, and now they think that they can build websites.

Randy:

So WordPress, it does make it easier for people to get started in the website industry and if they don't know how to code or anything like that. As you mentioned, through the drag and drop interfaces, page builders and things like that. I guess what makes me different is I took an approach to each project as being unique and has different requirements for the client. So every new build, I tailor the website to the client's needs. And then I also leave room for future growth. I always like to do custom designs and build engaging websites versus other people, they may just find the thing that looks good, install the theme and then replace the text and images. Where I develop the site for the client and get a lot of their feedback and find out what they want from the site and how they want it to look. And I give my perspective and opinions on certain functions and aspects along the lines. And I also do a lot of custom functionality, like geolocation services, e-commerce, setup of analytics, things like that. And then I'm always on hand over the WordPress training, so I just take the client through the back end and show them exactly how to handle the website, make updates, create new pages and posts, things like that. And upon completion, I always offer ongoing website management if the client chooses, so they can relax, sit back and have a website that they know will function and continue to function as time goes on.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Okay, so let's touch on that quickly. So it's a little bit different between Squarespace and WordPress, but with WordPress in particular, it's not like you can just create a website and leave it to tick over. So talk to me about when these ongoing website management packages, the updates hosting domain, what are you actually doing to manage a website moving forward, and what do business owners need to look out for and make sure they're doing regularly if they are going to be managing their own website?

Randy:

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Randy:

So, I like to describe a website as just like a car. So you buy a new car and then you just drive it and you don't maintain it, it'll eventually break down. You gotta change the oil, change the tires, all the things like that. And it's just like a website. The web is constantly developing. So there's always updates to code and how the code interacts with different browsers and things like that. So if you just leave a website just sitting there and don't update it, as time goes on, it will lead to the site going down. It may be six months, it may be two years later, but it eventually will break and you'll have to bring someone in to fix that. So the difference is basically there's a lot of options out there when it comes to WordPress. And if a client really is insistent on managing their own site, I often will recommend managed hosting services. Which are just basically managed services on a server that your hosting company actually updates the plugins and the WordPress core automatically for you. And that's a good thing, but at the same time it can be a bad thing, because if you update something before it's been tested with a new build, it could always lead to problems. So I always recommend having somebody that you can reach out to, a web developer that you trust and that is reliable. And if you're insistent on managing it yourself, also find a friendly lightweight theme that's not too packed with a bunch of features that you're not gonna use, because that will slow down your website. And it has an effect on SEO and things like that. And I also recommend--

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Sorry, yeah, I was just gonna say with that, so you touched on before the fact that you build all of your websites from scratch, essentially. You're not working with these themes. And what we've come across is that when people are using these drag and drop kind of templates on WordPress, they're so heavy with the plugins and different bits and pieces that it's very hard to get your site speed up. So we really recommend that your site speed be as quick as possible. What would you say is ideal, Randy, like less than three seconds? - Less than three seconds. I'd recommend between six and seven seconds max of load time. - Okay, there you go. Cool, okay, sorry to interrupt, keep going.

Randy:

No, that's fine. So as you mentioned, thoughts on templated WordPress sites and things like that. So a lot of people are using a theme that they bought from some website online, like in embedded markets and stuff like that. And they're usually full of a lot of functions that you don't require. And when it's full of a lot of these functions, it causes more resource strain on your server. Therefore your site is gonna load slower. So what I recommend is, like I mentioned earlier, is usually a lightweight theme. And then what I say by lightweight theme is just like something that's coded to just perform the basic functions of WordPress. So as in a blog post, displaying images, your homepage and things like that. And then as you go forward, you can start to add certain features and aspects on the back end that you'll require such as e-commerce and things like that. So if you really keep it to the basics and barebone and don't add a lot of these fancy features, your website's gonna be a lot faster. And the reason why we want a website to load faster is because it plays a lot into your search engine rankings.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

And there's a few reasons to that, I mean, number one, Google does look at how big the site is and how fast it is to load, but they're also now looking at how people are interacting with your website. So if you've got a website that takes 15 seconds to even load like that first banner that's coming up, people aren't gonna sit there and wait for that to load. So that means that your bounce rate is super high. So when I'm talking about bounce rate, I'm talking about people that land on the first page and don't move past it, essentially, or they land and then they leave straight away. So, those things are really, really important. I think a lot of people go, oh, they focus so much on the aesthetics of the site without, I guess, taking into consideration these back end bits and pieces that are so, so important, and actually get results. And I think that's the same as all marketing. So often people focus on how something pretty is versus whether or not it actually works and if it's getting results. So, for me personally, I think I'd say probably like 50% of our web builds, you would do, Randy, working with WordPress or WooCommerce or something along those lines. But then if you're a really small business and you're not across updating, you're not particularly tech savvy, not across updating your plugins and whatnot with WordPress, I always recommend to those clients, look at something like Squarespace. So I know that a lot of people sort of poopoo alternate options to WordPress, but Squarespace, you don't have to worry about anything breaking, you don't have to worry about updating plugins. There's a whole heap of security components that are built in. You have total control over the site, so any time you wanna update something, it's super simple to do so. The only downside is that if something ever happens to Squarespace then your website will disappear, and you can't sort of do those backups that we can do with WordPress. But for most really small businesses, if you're just looking for an informational site, say you're a local chiropractor or an accountant, for example, Squarespace might be a solution for you. And that's the reason I love it so much. Once it's all set up and ready to go, it's really easy to manage. And I think a lot of people get carried away with all of these different plugins and functions and things that they think they might use down the track, when in reality they're not going to use them. So I always say to people, sit down and work out, the next two or three years, what are you gonna be doing with your website and what are you going to be using it for? Do you need to be selling products online, do you need an online booking service? What is it that you're actually going to require, and how are you going to be using the website? What are your thoughts, Randy? Now be honest, I'm so happy for you to push back and say that you hate it, but what are your thoughts on WordPress versus Squarespace?

Randy:

Hey, look, I don't have any really negative things to say, I guess, about the other options out there like Squarespace and Wix. They're really good for startups and new businesses that just wanna have some kind of online presence. And as you said, they're easy to set up with a low learning curve. But I guess from there, the only thing that I would say is they are kind of limited on designs and layouts, and the functionality further down the line if you require some extra e-commerce or something like that. I mean, Squarespace has recently entered e-commerce, but it will still be limited on what you can and cannot do. And then also they're not really the best for SEO and analytics and being able to track exactly what's going on in your site in detail. So, overall, they're really good to start with, but I believe eventually, if you're really looking to push your online sales, your e-commerce, or really get more people to connect with you, I believe funding setting up a WordPress site and then adding in those custom functions to be able to track certain things and increase your profitability or your users that reach out to you and contact you through online, I believe WordPress is the best way to go.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Yep, that's fair. Now, what are your thoughts on Shopify? Because personally, as a marketer, when it comes to Google ads and Facebook ads and email marketing, I bloody love Shopify. There are so many amazing integrations that just make tracking and setting up campaigns so easy. What are your thoughts on that versus, say, using WordPress and WooCommerce?

Randy:

So Shopify is great. It is a great platform for small to medium sized businesses to start selling online and everything, and there are a lot of functions and features in the background as well. I recommend to clients to use Shopify if they don't have somebody that they can go to or if they don't have an employee that knows the backend of WordPress and how to work e-commerce, such as WooCommerce. And the reason why I say that is because WordPress is a bit more in depth and complex when it comes to e-commerce, and there's so much more functionality that you can do. And then a lot of it is also managed by the user. So when an order comes in, the system sends you an email and everything, and then you have to actually track that on the back end, versus Shopify, it will handle that kind of stuff for you automatically without your input and everything.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Yeah, yeah, I will just say with Shopify, as well, if you are going to have it set up, I do recommend working with a developer to begin with, just to make sure you are getting all these bits and pieces set up properly. And also, they've got some basic limited themes, too, but I'm a big believer that customizing it to be exactly what you need is important. And looking at things like conversion rate, optimization, how can you help funnel people through the website in a way that generates sales. It's just, again, the theme keeps popping up, but it's just not enough anymore to just have a pretty looking website, I'm a big believer in actually generating results rather than focusing first and foremost on making it look pretty. Randy, we have come across quite a bit in the last 12 months, I'd say. We've probably had like three or four incidents where we've had people contact us, small business owners who really don't understand what they've purchased in terms of a website previously when working with a developer. And how can they, they're not to know. But we're seeing a lot of developers sort of almost block off and restrict parts of WordPress. So we get in there and we can't just update their website, essentially. We have to start from scratch again. What is happening there? And how do people, if they are going to go and have a new website created, what do they look for to avoid this and make sure they have total control?

Randy:

That's a very good question. So, WordPress is an open source platform. And what I mean by that is anyone is freely licensed to use, copy, change and edit the way the code works, source code is also openly shared so that people are encouraged to volunteer, improve the design of the software. And I guess when it comes to protecting yourself, you always wanna make sure that you're going to be given access to super admin roles and admin roles and things like that. And based on your question, developers will block off certain features and options for a number of reasons. I'd say the first one is to protect the client. Full admin access allows the users to access and edit core files and code which can break your website if you don't know what you're doing. And then this is where the default WordPress user privileges come into place. So I believe a client should always be supplied with, as I mentioned, a super admin or an admin access. And then on top of that, they should be given an editor role and a contributor role, and the difference between these is the editor and contributor are limited on some of the features such as adding plugins and new pages and things like that. And that's just for safety reasons so they don't go into the back end and edit anything they shouldn't, 'cause we don't want a website going down. Number one is always have the website up, and we wanna minimize all downtime. But unfortunately, as we've come across in the past 12 months, there are some developers or firms that do indeed limit sites and the functionality. So the client relies on them to make ongoing updates and changes to their site down the road. So this can be anywhere from just blocking access to the plugins option in WordPress so they can't add a plug in, or it could be basically creating a static site. And what I mean by static is the client's not actually to update certain pages and text within the page unless they contact the host or the developer.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Okay, so that's really important, so make sure that in your contract you're not paying for a static site.

Randy:

Yeah. And then you also wanna make sure that you have super admin and admin access as well. Because without these, you won't be able to do a lot of certain things like update plugins or add new plugins down the road.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

So, do you recommend as well, when it comes to website hosting, that you have your own hosting setup rather than being on, say, the developer's hosting? Because what we've found as well is that they'll put a number of websites on the same hosting plans, and then you don't have what's called cPanel access. What is cPanel access and why would we need it?

Randy:

So cPanel, it depends on the server, but cPanel, there's Plus, there's a couple of different systems, but that's basically what the server's running. And that's how the server communicates with your content management system, I.e. WordPress and your database. So WordPress is built off of PHP, and that communicates directly with your mySQL database, which is found in cPanel. And the reason why you want access to that, A, because you want to access to your database to be able to download a backup and everything. B, you'll wanna at some point be able to access your server via file transfer protocol, to be able to make backups of all your files. And then there's other options in the background as well such as editing or modifying your DNS settings, adding email addresses through cPanel and things like that.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Cool, so let's drill it down to just a couple of questions that people should ask their potential web development company. I think number one is, is this site going to be static or not? Number two is, will you provide me with cPanel access? Number three is, will you provide me with a super admin account? Any others that you think are important?

Randy:

Those are the main points, yeah, as long as you have access to those, you'll be fine going forward. And I believe it is a red flag if you do reach out and ask for these certain access privileges and everything. It is a red flag if the developer of the front end says no to you.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Yeah, we've had a lot of red flags in the last 12 months working with some of these websites, haven't we? It blows my mind. And do you know what, I actually get really passionately angry about it, because I feel like you're paying for this website, you should have control and access to it. And I get why they do it, and as you've outlined, in some cases it's so the business owner doesn't end up breaking the site and causing more work for the developer. But in most of cases, it's so you have to keep going back to them. So, yeah, just think, protect yourself, guys, know what you're paying for, ask those three questions. I will drop those three questions, as well, in the show notes also so you can refer back to them. But yeah, I think we've pretty much covered off on the key points that I wanted people to know. Oh, just one more thing as well. Something that you and I have experienced a lot as well in the last 12 months is business owners letting their hosting lapse or their SSL certificates lapse. What am I talking about when I say this, and how do people make sure they stay on top of this?

Randy:

First thing is make sure any emails getting sent from your hosting company are to an email that you check regularly. And you wanna make sure they're not going into your spam folder or anything like that. Because if you let your hosting lapse, that's essentially saying, okay, it's all right to take my website down. So if your hosting lapse, your hosting provider is going to give you usually like a five day grace period. And then after that, they just completely remove your server from their cloud service.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Which means that your website's no longer online.

Randy:

Exactly. So when somebody goes away and says, server errors, website can't be found, things like that. And then when it comes to SSL, this is also important because today, as you know, there's a lot of threats and things going on online. And a lot of our clients are actually taking personal details from users of their website. So whether it be an e-commerce site taking credit card details, or whether it just be somebody filling out a form that they're sending to whatever, date of birth and address and everything. And the reason why you wanna have an SSL is because this protects the data being sent from and to your server. And encrypts it so somebody can't steal that data. Now, if you let your SSL lapse, your server will go into a standard HTTP. And it will not show the little green lock in the corner, and then that's when somebody could, if they really wanted to, get access to these sensitive files and data that's being transmitted from your server. It's always important to keep that up to date.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Yeah, and not only that, but some browsers now, as well, if you don't have an SSL certificate on your website, what will happen is that when someone clicks on your web address, they will be taken to almost like this cover page that says this site is not secure, you may be in danger. And essentially redirect them away from your site unless they then click this tiny little text button down the bottom that expands more text, which then allows them to click proceed. So, the language is quite strong, as well, it's like, go back to safety. So it talks about danger, it says your information's not safe. So a lot of people will just look at that and go, oh, holy moly, I'm not even gonna bother with that and not really understand what's going on. So, yeah, if you've got a website and you don't have an SSL certificate, or you let that lapse, then essentially you're not gonna be having anyone visit your website.

Randy:

Yeah, exactly. You get a big warning and a bunch of red letters on any website that you go to nowadays, and you're like, uh oh, I don't wanna touch this. It might be a virus, it might be a trojan, so, yeah. It's not good for your business or online presence of someone who is interested in your services or your products, and get to a website that says, warning, you proceed with caution.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

So, three things to keep on top of with your website once it has been built. Number one is make sure you keep your hosting payments up to date. Number two is make sure you keep your domain name payments up to date, especially if you're in a space where people are constantly trying to buy your domain. Number three is make sure you keep your SSL certificate up to date, as well. So we've got three key points to ask when you're having a website built, and three key things to keep on top of once your website is built.

Randy:

Yeah, that's correct, and also you'll wanna keep on top of updates and making sure everything on the back end of your server, if you're running WordPress, is up to date, like the core plugins. Because those are often updated because of, as I mentioned earlier, security issues. Sometimes people find a backdoor into your website through an outdated plugin or something which causes vulnerabilities and your site could be hacked. So it's always a good practice to maintain backups of your website and keep everything up to date and secure.

Sonya McIntyre-Reid:

Fantastic, all right. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast, Randy, I feel like you've really helped simplify things for people. We've got all those key points now for people to remember. Hopefully protect themselves moving forward as they do spend money on their website. And hope they're informed now about the different options that are available. Thanks again.

Randy:

Thanks for having me, it was lovely.

EPISODE 27 OF THE MARKETING SOLUTIONS PODCAST: WHAT TO LOOK FOR WHEN HAVING A WEBSITE CREATED (DON'T MAKE THESE BIG MISTAKES)

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