A New Corporate Identity
Posted by Anthony
We've been undergoing a corporate identity refresh with DistiSuite over the summer, all culminating in the launch of our new sales site today!
Our Logo
First, we decided to get our logo re-designed. We vetted a lot of different designers for the task, but frankly, most didn't fit the bill. We wanted something clean, sleek modern, and professional. And to my surprise, most of the designers we spoke with didn't have the type of portfolio to suggest they could meet our unique requirements and were exorbitantly expensive, to boot. Then we learned about a website called LogoMyWay.com. LogoMyWay hosts a logo contest for you. You tell them exactly what you're looking for, set a fair price, and specify a timeline. From there, the contest is under way, and you rank submissions as they come in so designers get a feel for what you like and what you don't.
As we came to find, there are people out there - many professional designers - that detest these types of contest sites for many reasons. Frankly, I have no interest in debating the merits of those arguments. Capitalism is all about who can provide the best (legal!) goods & services at the most reasonable rate, and as far as I'm concerned, the contest strategy worked out great for us in that regard. We couldn't be happier with the results.
Our Website
Next up was the website. It was extremely outdated and desperately needed a refresh. While we are decent at web design, we are, by and large, web developers. Our focus is on functionality, not form. So we figured rather than spending a bunch of our time to come up with something "OK" ourselves, we'd instead seek out a proper designer for the job. It wasn't easy, but after a few weeks, we found somebody and were off to the races. The site launched today and we are very proud of our new home on the web. It's designed with only two goals in mind:
- Make it as obvious as possible to the visitor what we do
- Encourage them to contact us
That's it. Nothing more, nothing less. The old website had a lot of content. Useful content, but it detracted from the core message, nonetheless. At the end of the day, the sales website is supposed to bring in sales. So we tried as hard as possible to optimize it for that purpose.
A Sales/Marketing Video
We created a brand new video using some great audio recording equipment and a piece of software called Camtasia. It's at the top of our website's homepage and we are also able to pass it around on the web via email or any other medium we want. It's a great tool which will help potential clients understand what we do in less than 3 minutes. And oftentimes, that's half the battle.
The Catch-22 of Seeking Help During a Breaking Point
Posted by Anthony
When people are short on time, they tend to look for outside help in order to complete complicated projects as quickly and efficiently as possible. Money becomes less important than time. It's capitalism at its best.
In the past year, our business found and worked with a CPA, a lawyer, two freelance designers, one web hosting company, and a server administrator. That's a lot of time saved and tasks done right, without any nonsense... right?
Well, sometimes yes, sometimes no. I won't get into individual case studies (I'm sure none of the people who have helped us this past year would appreciate public report cards). But one thing I can say is that we've learned some lessons the hard way; a lot of time needs to be put into the vetting process in order to find a service provider that can truly save you time and make your life easier. This process should consist of a few different stages:
- Explore what you actually need done. You may think you know. But write it down. Discuss it with a business partner, peer, etc. Is it one time, or is it actually an ongoing need? You may find that what you ultimately need differs from your cursory assessment.
- Decide how you will seek these services. You can use your relationship network, a certain website, etc. The medium you use needs to match the type of individual/firm you are looking to find. Don't go on craigslist for a professional, and don't expect high profile contacts to link you up with value (read: cheap) providers.
- Spend a decent amount of time vetting a good number of service providers. Ask them relevant questions and try to determine if they're truly the right fit for your needs. This isn't a time to judge. It's time to write down the facts of your findings, thank the potential service providers for their time, and inform them you'll be getting back to them in the near future.
- Begin to formulate a decision. Don't fall in love with one and ignore the fact that another provider may be a better fit on paper. Don't get overwhelmed by all the options and pick one randomly.
- Realize that you usually pay for what you get. Generally speaking, a good rule of thumb is that if you can't figure out how a particular provider is able to stay in business at the rate being asked, there are probably a lot of corners being cut and quality being sacrificed to make it happen. Once you get over that hump, there are providers that are charging anywhere from fairly to exorbitantly. At that point it's a crapshoot and cost isn't necessarily indicative of how good of a match you have on your hands. You need to know what you want (see step 1), and choose a provider from this group that you trust will competently carry out your vision for you.
These steps may seem obvious. But they are counter to how most people decide to seek out professional services. Most people tend to seek help at some sort of breaking point. When there's absolutely no more time to do a task, your first inclination is to call a service provider who can do it more efficiently. The problem is you end up ignoring a majority of the steps above. You assume you know exactly what you need, you seek services via the simplest medium possible, you talk to two or three people, convince yourself one is perfect (and somehow extremely affordable!), and move forward.
Then comes the disappointment. Hundreds or thousands of dollars later, you realize you spent almost as much time managing & fixing the project as you would have just doing it yourself. You realize that not only did you waste time, but money as well. Completely counterintuitive.
I'm not a fan of over-optimizing or wasting time on non-issues. That can kill a small business. But the fact is, the most successful small businesses understand there's a fine balance between over-optimizing and waiting too long. You need to anticipate your need for help, and should be able to identify when you're close to a breaking point. When you are there, begin exploring and vetting immediately. Because by the time the breaking point comes, you will be in no place to be making sound decisions; you need to be on auto-pilot.