It really isn't that hard...

The spawn of Satan or a saving grace?

Template websites, not exactly world crisis material but a subject that certainly can raise havoc in the world of small website designers. But why?

Personally I see no harm in using templates for a customers site if it seems like the correct way to go. Most start-up companies know they need an internet presence, a micro site, a small e-commerce outlet or a CMS (Content Management System). It is also common place that a new business may not necessarily have the capital to invest in a bespoke all singing all dancing site and are therefor faced with the ‘Chicken and the Egg’ scenario.

Does a new business invest money they cannot afford on a bespoke site or wait until they have the cash required and forego any web presence in the short term? A hard judgement call to make, especially as they will no doubt be investing startup capital in stationary such as invoices, letter heads, business cards and other solid state marketing such as magazine publications, Yellow Pages etc where they do not neccesarily have the option of adding a web address further down the road.

This is exactly where template sites come into play.

If a customer requires a website and they know in advance that the site is based on a template which may appear somewhere else on the vast internet but the cost is in the hundreds of pounds rather than the thousands. Surely the option is there for the customer to choose rather than the designer to enforce or fail to offer as an option?

I have always offered customers the choice and my open approach has always worked for me. Never have we provided a template site at a bespoke rate and passed it off as ‘unique’ and many customers have come back when funds permit to create a bespoke design more inline with their branding or to add additional server side functionality and features to enhance the visitors experience.

So why the resistance to template sites?

If I turn the angle away from the consumer and back to the web designer, I suddenly feel that as a small design house, I need to fill my bank account, I need to ensure I can pay my bills, I may not be able to find 10 customers this month but 1 or 2 paying for a bespoke site will enable me to pay my bills. All of a sudden I don’t like these ‘open’ designers coming in and advising my client that they can have a very professional looking site for a few hundred pounds. Suddenly templates seem as bad as the friend of a friend who lives down the street and can put together a full ERP solution in Access for £100!

I know that the customer will more than likely try the cheaper option and then invest further down the line, but that does not help my immediate cash flow. And this I feel is the main reason why smaller agencies who depend on these types of jobs do not like template sites. It is not that the templates themselves are poor, it is the loss of profit compared to a bigger bespoke job.

So I can see pro’s and con’s from both the business angle and the consumer’s angle, however I still believe that the choice should always remain in the customers hands and as professionals, we need to give our clients ‘all’ of the options that suit their situation and budgetary constraints backed up with clear information about what they are buying.

These are just my opinions.

It’s for life and not just for Christmas?

Is a business really for life and not just for Christmas?

OK, maybe a bit longer than Christmas, but in my honest opinion, an exit strategy is as important an aspect of your business plan as your projected cash flow, potential markets and even your product and service list!

When it comes to business, ‘Getting out’ can be so much harder than ‘Getting in’, and the exit strategy is a fundamental element that most business owners fail to address with the importance it deserves, if addressed at all.

An exit strategy is there to ensure you cash in for maximum return with minimum effort.

When speaking to other business owners, I tend to find that they are so focused on building their business that they feel hesitant or even ashamed to address the exit strategy as they see it as a negative process as it signals the end of their business and this equates in their eyes as a failure. Failure to exist.

Planning the exit strategy can be an incredibly powerful tool to enhance the building of any business. It can help focus realistic goals in your business plan and can act as a great yardstick when it comes to measuring the progress of your business.

Have you reached the expected turnover to enable you to delegate your role so that you can step away from the day to day operation and still draw a dividend?

Have you structured the business in a way that ensures it can be packaged up and is more appealing to a potential buyer?

You wouldn’t start a journey unless you knew your destination, so why start a business without setting your ultimate destination?

A director from Devon who didn’t get out when he should!:

A very good friend of mine ran an international business for roughly 21 years and despite making a great living from the company, he believed so much in building his business that he re-invested most of his profits back into the business to keep it growing. He never had a true exit strategy and believed that he would simply sell up when he wanted to stop.

Unfortunately, changes in his industry resulted in a reduced demand from consumers and the business quickly fell into trouble. In the space of 8 months, a very profitable business and appealing investment opportunity suddenly became almost worthless. Administration proceeded and the company ceased trading within the following 60 days!

The bitter pill was that the company attracted a great deal of interest from other companies wanting to expand over the 10 years preceeding the final year. Every time I meet this friend which is about twice a year, his only regret was not getting out when the going was good!

when our protection becomes our punishment

[First blog!]

We are quite a fortunate company, we are a ‘cash company’ ie we have no borrowings nor do we operate within credit facilities supplied by our bank, overdrafts, loans, credit cards etc.

As an IT company which mainly offers service based offerings on annual contracts paid monthly by BACS, we very rarely need to purchase hardware, software and nor do we have to invest heavily in stock. This is a brilliant position to be in as a business and this makes us a very nice customer for the banking world as we never ‘need’ anything but we provide regular, substantial deposits into the account(s).

Our current business bank (Barclays) has rapidly increased it’s ‘customer protection’ over the past 24 months with the introduction of the ‘PinSentry’ device and with the increased number of CNP debit card transactions (Customer / Card not present) the card fraud team have become as twitchy with their ‘suspend account’ button as a vietnam sniper!

I believe that I am a not too shabby businessman, I know how much revenue my company generates every month and what our monthly expenditure is. This is a basic, fundamental of running a business but also means that I do not have the urge or requirement to log into my online banking service every working day.

Due to the increased security measures, even logging into the online banking service is as challenging as the Krypton Factor as I need;

• User name (Long array of chars which is too bizarre to remember)
• Debit card
• PIN Sentry device

New payees have to be validated using the dreaded PIN Sentry even though I have already logged into the secure environment using the above. Surely this is too much security. My PIN Sentry protection now enforces me to carry my card, account details and PIN Sentry with me wherever I go so if someone does obtain my bag they have basically got everything they need to get into my account anyway.

I also have some company accounts held at LLoyds TSB who have a much better system that only requires a user name, password and selective characters from a memorable phrase, which even I can memorise!

Today we lost out on a business deal, and it hurts (Hence this post)..

This morning was one of those rare occasions where we actually needed to order in some hardware for a solution which had a very tight deadline due to the previous supplier ‘disappearing’ at the eleventh hour. Standing tall with reassurance and confidence I informed the client “Don’t worry, we can sort this for you. Trust me”

It is Friday morning and the challenge was set. Order some hardware online, wrap up some server side code and a small database to be installed by Monday morning. No problem and boy, what a margin!

We placed our orders on a secure site and even validated the transaction using the Barclays Visa Verification Scheme and dived into our coding environments only for the Barclays anti-fraud team with their ‘twitchy fingers’ to cancel our transaction and suspend the account due to ‘unusual behaviour’. What was this unusual behaviour? We used our card more than once this month!

After spending an eternity on the phone validating our identity by having to log in with PIN Sentry etc etc the cards were re-enabled. At this point we only have an hour left to get the items out for next day delivery (Sat am) so we replace the online order only for the card to be rejected again. Reason for this rejection… ‘unusual behaviour’, 2 transactions for the same amount, to the same supplier!

I know that the clever algorithms, silly plastic widgets and over protective portals are there for our protection but with Barclays there is simply too many levels of protection and they are just too severe and sensitive. In my opinion it is quite simply over the top!

How many times has my business account(s) been fraudulently accessed in the past 2 years?

• Barclays with their many tiers of security (Twice)
• LLoyds TSB simple security (None)

Interesting statistic based on my own experience..

Is the security really worth the hassle and potential loss of business such as today’s encounter and does it actually make a difference to professional fraudsters? In my experience the answer is certainly no.