How to Create Great Websites Fast: Fire Your Webmaster
I’ve created a brand new product, from scratch. It’s based on the trouble I had creating small promotional websites quickly. The choices seemed to be:
- Build from scratch in HTML. Puh-lease. This is 2010. I knew there had to be something better.
- Hire someone else to do it. Overpay them, get crappy results, and whine to my wife that there has to be a better way. Been there, done that, annoyed the wife.
- Figure out how other people are learning how to slap together great-looking websites so fast. Bingo!
I took some expensive courses in internet marketing and found out everyone at stage 3 was using WordPress. If you’ve only heard vaguely about WordPress you know it’s a blog, but at this point in its career WordPress is a general purpose website builder made infinitely malleable through the use of plugins. You can change the site’s looks dramatically using free (or paid) themes. There are well over a thousand of them available at the WordPress site, and they can be used commercially too. Other, “premium” themes are available at a price elsewhere.
The problem with WordPress is that it’s a big piece of software. As with all such software, I knew that most of the time you only need 5% of its capabilities. I didn’t know what made up that 5%. When I finally learned it, I decided to create a detailed, lavishly illustrated step-by-step guide so that you don’t have to learn the other 95%. I now use that very guide to build complete websites quickly. They usually take much less than an hour to get up and running. My 11-year-old daughter did it in far under an hour.
More later but if you want to check out the sales page see On the Web in an Hour. You can get a free taste of it here. I will arrange a discount for eSnipe users during some as-yet-determined introductory period.
I’m interested in your reactions to the garish sales page, which internet marketers assure me is the best way to make sales to casual visitors. On the Web in an Hour took me a lot of time to create. I’m not sure it’s the best way to present a serious product.
Tom – I’ve followed your thoughts and comments regarding easyoneme.com and am interested – I signed up for your free minicourse. Actually, I’m ready to sign up – and pay – for the full information, but (of course) would like to do so at minimum exposure (read: cost).
I’ve used eSnipe for a long time; I certainly remember when you bought the company, and was a paid user then. What sort of discount do you envision for a long-time eSniper? I need to build a website for a new dog treat company we’re launching and have absolutely no background in web design.
By the way, the sales page is, indeed, garish. But if that’s what sells…
Thanks,
Bob Pulliam
Dude, too many words. People have a 5 second attention span on the web. Offer them the world in 5 seconds, then back off.
Hi Tom,
Great idea for a product, but I would not buy it based on the sales page alone. Garish is definitely the right word. It looks like just another scammy make-cash-fast type of ploy. It’s pushy, there’s the enormous buy now buttons everywhere, the red and blue color scheme is way too aggressive, and the layout is horrible (I looked at it in IE, Firerox, and Safari).
Key #1 to selling a good web design solution is making sure that your sales site itself is well-designed. This one fails on several fronts: the color and font scheme, too many words packed together in a small area, inconsistent spacing (the leading and kerning is all over the place), and there are random characters before your form field (?). I have noticed those on this site as well.
A sales web site that was a bit more elegant would make me much more interested in the solution. This one looks like it was made by and 11-year-old. (No offense to your daughter!)
Love eSnipe, best of luck with your new product.