Are you a sucker for packaging? I know I am. Bright colors, a pretty picture, a great design is enough to turn my head and make me pick something up off the shelf.

How about when it comes to books? Are you drawn into taking a chance on a new author from the cover alone? How about a bad cover on a favorite author’s book?

During my time in Chicago with Wendi, we spent an entire half day in a local bookstore. We weren’t there to buy anything; we were on a mission. With our novel in the editing/proofing stage it was time to consider a cover. For four or five hours we prowled the aisles soaking up our impressions of various paranormal romance, fantasy and fiction covers.

The romance section, as you might imagine, was full of plenty of bare torsos and seductive couples. Nearly all the paranormal (werewolves, vampires, etc.) had plenty of pretty men with intensely brooding stares. The fantasy novels all had gorgeous illustrative artwork and the fiction covers varied widely from abstract backgrounds to photographic compositions.

But how do you make your cover stand out from all the others?

A Picture Worth A Thousand Words (190,454 to be exact)

Your primary consideration when designing a book cover for any genre is what image, or set of images is going to represent what the book is about.

One way to decide this is to do a little brainstorming. Start with a list of words. Don’t think about them, just write them down as they come to mind. Maybe there’s a particular item that has significance to your main character, maybe it’s an image that keeps reoccurring throughout the story. Physical items are easiest to visualize; a rose, fire, rain, a broken cup or a pocket watch given to the character by a friend or family member. The abstracts like love, loyalty, or honor are more difficult, but write those abstracts down too.

When you’ve gotten this list together it’s time to go window shopping. What I like to do is take a little trip over to iStock* and just plug in those keywords to get ideas. Sometimes you get lucky and find a single image that has everything you want. Other times, you have to look at individual images and break them down into pieces you can use.

Even when you do find a single perfect image, it’s still a good idea to consider how you can embellish it a touch more.

If you’re an illustrator, or know one, you may decide to go the route of original artwork. My favorite cover illustrators growing up were The Brothers Hildebrant (The Sword of Shanara pictured at right), who did the poster for the original Star Wars movie, and Michael Whelan, who illustrated the Dragon Prince series by Melanie Rawn.

Both of these artists do what I consider “classic cover art”. Each of the covers painted by hand using traditional fine arts methods. These were the covers that lead me down my own path of illustration and many times I liked the covers more than I liked the stories.

Other books have a more contemporary look, like the whimsical illustrations on Charlaine Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse series (better known as the HBO adaptation True Blood).

There are two versions of some of the covers. One for the television tie-in of the Dead Club, with photos of the cast in a dark, moody setting and a version done in the original style you see at the left.

When you self publish, every decision about the cover belongs to you. If you’re going through a publishing house, as an author you may not have much say in who does your cover. Many times a publishing house has a stable of artists and they will match up an artist with a writer. The same applies to artists applying for work as a cover artist to a publisher.

If you are self publishing and looking for a designer to do your cover, shop around. Find one who fits both the book’s and your personality.

Font Considerations

Images are important, but so is the text you put on top of it. The wrong font will kill you. When you add your title you should treat the fonts with as much consideration as you do the main image. Primarily, the fonts you choose have to be legible. In fact, they have to be above and beyond legible.

Why? Consider this: You’ve got less than three seconds for someone to look at your book on the shelf. In that time they need to be able to read your title clearly. Both image and words have to work fast to make that first impression and speak to a future fan.

If they can’t read what your cover says they’ll do one of two things; take a closer look to see what the hell it says, or pass on by. Most of the time it’s the latter – no one wants reading a title to be work.

Clarity also applies to how those words look on top of the image. You could have a simple font like Times Roman, but if you have a busy background going on, that will obscure the title as much as an overly fancy font would.

Drumroll Please…

Now the moment our fans have been waiting for. What did we decide for the Bonds of Blood & Spirit: Loyalties cover? After way too much consideration and a “Stop being a perfectionist and give me twenty crappy covers!” from Wendi – which is a topic for another time – I nailed our look on the first shot. We like it alot, and we hope you do too.

If you think the cover’s hot, just wait until you read what’s inside. But you’re going to have to wait a few more months for that.

And here’s another special announcement: This Wednesday we will have a very special guest interview with Christine Feehan; author of over forty books in the paranormal genre, including Burning Wild and Wild Fire. Be sure to stop by, you don’t want to miss it.

*Note: you can use iStock images without an extended license for a book cover. There is a limit on how many copies you can reproduce for sale (499,999). Once you get above that an extended license is required.

When Britain unveiled their logo for the 2012 Olympic games I thought I’d seen the worst of design ever. Many people felt the same way I did. Obnoxious, unreadable, and sloppy are just a few of the words I’d use to describe it.

If you need a refresher, click here.

D’oh! They’ve Done It Again!

It’s been said that hindsight is 20/20. If so, London needs to get their eyes checked. Meet “Wenlock” and “Mandeville”, the mascots for the 2012 Olympics.

What are they, exactly? Your guess is as good as mine. Personally I find this cycloptic pair disturbing. It’s not even a case of “so ugly they’re cute”.

Yahoo! reports there’s a complex back story that explains the origins and symbolism of  Wenlock and Mandeville. There’s even an animated short (see above video) that’s supposed to give more insight.

None of this helps with branding London for these events.

What Makes a Good Mascot?

Mascots are like logos; they have to represent the essence of the team or company. When you take a look at some of the best Olympic mascots, what do you see? What is the one common thread?

Ok, maybe there’s more than one thread.

First, each of the mascots are recognizable as something. Whether it’s a rabbit, a Sasquatch, or a stylized owl, they still look familiar. You can relate to them in one way or another.

(On a side note, I don’t think the Sydney or Lake Placid mascots are all that bad)

Second, each of these mascots reflect something about the culture. When you look at the Beijing mascots they’re all fanciful, and maybe we can’t figure out exactly what all of them are, but they are clearly created in a style we associate with China and the far East.

The Vancouver Olympics took their inspiration from local folklore for their three mascots, and Salt Lake City’s trio was a tip of the hat to the local Native American tribes.

Super Bad – And Not In a Good Way

The only things that the 2012 Olympics mascots and logo have in common is they’re so bad no one is going to forget them anytime soon.

I suppose you could say there’s no such thing as bad publicity. If this is the case, the London Olympics will be getting a lot of attention. I bet you can still remember the worst commercial you ever saw, or the worst product you ever bought.

True, you may not find yourself swayed into rushing out to buy that poorly advertised product, or purchase that God-awful Worst Product On The Face of the Earth again, but the point is: You remembered it.

Sometimes that’s all it takes. I wouldn’t advise it as a standard practice by any means. Please, we really don’t need anymore moments like this where we’re left scratching our heads asking, “What were they thinking?”

How about you? What was the worst mascot/logo you ever saw? How about the best?

In short, his post was about a site called 99Designs and how this site was frowned upon by the graphics community because the designs are so cheap *ahem* pardon me, inexpensive.

Some designers even go so far as to say this is nothing more than a site that preys upon desperate young artists trying to make a name for themselves by doing free work in hopes of selling it.

At first glance one would think this site operates on spec. What is “on spec”?

A very bad six letter word in the design community.

On Spec is when you do a job on speculation, you work for free and hope that you beat out all the other designers also doing free work in hopes of landing the job.

This is how many fresh faced college students start out. And it’s not just in the design field.

This is also how many fresh faced college students get ripped off.

The spec work is often times disguised as a contest, or as a “let’s try you out and see what you’ve got” because an employer is reluctant to hire someone without experience. This can also happen if an potential employer is too stingy to go the route of hiring a more expensive experienced designer.

And, most importantly, it also happens in honest cases where individuals have an extremely tight budget, or have gotten rooked before by an unscrupulous designer who created the tight budget in the first place, and can’t afford to make another investment mistake.

With the first couple of cases, the contests and the lazy employer, there are even more dubious characters who will gather up as many spec jobs as they can and then run off like bandits with the design. Nobody wins, nobody gets the job, but the company’s designers allegedly use the fresh ideas to spark their own.

Get the picture? Spec = Ripped Off. Or so that’s what the term has come to represent. People see that and think instant scam.

It’s sad, really, this lack of trust.

Spec Work or Consignment?

Reading through 99Designs got me thinking; was this really spec work?

Let’s take a look at a couple of definitions:

con·sign·ment
n.
1. The act of consigning.
2. Something consigned.
Idiom:
on consignment
With the provision that payment is expected only on completed sales and that unsold items may be returned to the one consigning: The retailer accepted the shipment on consignment.

spec  Informal
n.
1. specs The specifications, as for a building to be constructed.
2. Speculation.
tr.v. spec’d or specced (spkt), spec’ing or spec·cing (spkng), specs
To write or supply specifications for.
adj.
1. Of or relating to specifications: a manufacturer’s spec sheet.
2. Done, constructed, produced, or purchased as a speculation: a spec job; a spec house.
Idiom:
on spec
On a speculation basis; with no assurance of profit: houses built on spec; writes TV commercials on spec.

If you look at 99Designs and the way it’s set up, it is not on spec. True, your design may or may not sell, BUT there is the potential that it will. Just like in a consignment shop. You bring down the retro leather couch that no longer fits in your decor because your spouse decided to go South West Rustic and it sits in the shop until someone else finds it and decides it’s a treasure they MUST have.

The new owner buys it, you get your money, and everyone is happy. You know that sooner or later IT WILL SELL.

On the other hand, with spec work, you have no such assurance that this couch is going to be chosen to sell at all. The shop owner puts out an all points bulletin for EVERYONE to bring their couches to the Retro Couch Warehouse – and you must bring it in person, in your own truck and do all the heavy lifting yourself – before they even decide whether or not they’ll pick it as the one and only to go out on the showroom floor.

With spec work, you’re nowhere near a chance of selling. Plus, if you’re not chosen as the lucky one you’ve got to haul that couch all the way back home. And that would suck. Big time.

Here’s Where Deb Gets Nasty Emails From Her Designer Colleagues

I’m going to take a stand here and speak as the 1% of designers who say there’s nothing wrong with a site like 99Designs. Like a consignment shop, they make their profits off of a percentage of what you sell, so you’d better believe it’s in their best interest to accept and sell as many good designs as possible.

On spec, the client can’t legally use or profit off your design if they don’t use it and you’re stuck with a tired feeling from all the work you’ve done and a logo you can’t use for anything other than another portfolio piece.

Or, if you wanted to, you could sell it on 99Designs.

Just sayin’.

The kind of monitor a person chooses and the way he or she uses it is as varied as the stars in the night sky. Seriously, what did you think I was talking about?

Tonight as Allison and I were working on a project I saw a scroll bar across the bottom of the site and she didn’t. Her browser window was fully expanded to take up the whole screen; mine was not. Since I like to see what’s going on on my desktop at any given moment, I usually tile and size my browser windows so I can see a little bit of everything behind it while I’m on the laptop.

When I’m on the BIG computer I have three different monitors and a lot of real estate. I still size the windows of the browsers and programs I’m using so I can see what I’m doing where while I multitask.

What’s With All The Monitors?

Many designers have dual, triple and in some cases, quadruple monitors splayed out across their desks. Why? Many of the programs we work with have a lot of menus and take up a lot of space, especially if you’re working with animation.

Monitors also vary in color display from brand to brand. While the designer may be working on a state of the art 28″ HD screen, the rest of the world isn’t. We as designers know this. In my case, not only do my extra monitors offer much needed real estate, they also give me a look at what designs look like for various people.

I have one cheapo 19″ Acer that has average resolution, a secondary Gateway 24″ which probably represents a good middle ground, and a 27″ HP monitor for doing most of my main work on.

Although I can’t account for every possible resolution or size out there, I still get some kind of idea how things will look.

Browsing Browsers

Browsers are the bane of every designer’s existence. Firefox is ideal and the most user friendly when it comes to displaying websites. Internet Explorer, in all of its incarnations, not so much. I’ll leave the specifics to our dear Allison to explore one day, but suffice it to say, IE causes a lot of problems with website viewing.

Also, the way in which individuals view their browsers on their monitors makes a difference. Some people like to expand the window the full width and height of the screen, while others like to tile and size each window.

With today’s wide screens there’s often a lot of space on either side of a standard 960 pixel width web page. I’ve had so many people ask me “Why is there so much space on the sides?”

Well, 960 pixels won’t fill up a typical wide screen. There’s nothing technically wrong with it, it’s just the standard width. Sure, I’d love to go wider, especially since larger screens are so much more affordable these days, but there are still pockets of web surfers who still have 17″ screens.

What Do You Prefer?

This brings me back to my original thought: What does the general public prefer? With all these variables, how do you view the web? Do you expand your browser windows full screen? Do you have a large monitor, or more than one? What do you think is the standard? Which browser is your favorite and why?

I can always tell when Dad’s checking his email. Usually once every couple of weeks I get machine gun spurts of forwarded jokes, political anecdotes and photos from around the web. This in turn prompts me to crawl out of the Cave and make my bi-monthly call home to see how things are.

I have to admit, Dad sends a lot of good stuff. I don’t usually share a lot of it because the political views expressed might be hilarious and thought provoking to me, but just downright provoking to the rest of the world. If it’s one thing I learned in all these years of blogging is never discuss politics or religion.

Animation, however, is a completely different story.

Cartoons Aren’t Just For Kids Anymore

And they haven’t been for a long time. Not since my generation grew up and started animating for themselves. How many of you remember Saturday Morning Cartoons? In the 70s, this time slot for kids is what I consider the Golden Age of Saturday morning cartoon. Much to Mom’s dismay, my Dad, brother and I would sit in front of that television from 7am to somewhere around noon.

When the 80s came along with first run syndication and home videos, the Saturday morning cartoons suffered. The biggest contributing factor to this was the cable channels like Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network. No one had to wait until Saturday anymore to get their animated fix.

Once my generation grew up (and I use the term loosely) many of us embraced computer aided design and became pioneers in the field of 3D animation. George Lucas paved the way for Industrial Light and Magic with the release of the first Star Wars movie back in 1977 and from there other animation studios like Pixar and Dreamworks sprang up.

I’m happy to say that for the past few years, animation is in it’s Renaissance period.

Not As Easy As It Looks

Any professional can make what they do look easy. I’m sure many of you designers out there have heard time and again, “How hard can it be to make a little (insert seemingly small, insignificant project here)?”

For example, take a logo. It’s small and easy to dismiss as one of those easy projects. Sit down and think about it, though; do you know how many hours went into coming up with that one perfect design that totally encompassed the entire essence of a company’s brand into an object you only look at for 3 seconds or less?

The same goes for many graphics projects. Even the most minimal of sites can take up to 6 hours to do. An ebook can take twice as long. And a 6 minute animation? Years.

Yes, that’s right. Years.

Lucas Martell, the creator of our video of the week, Pigeon Impossible, took 5 years to create the 6 minute short you’re viewing today. Why would anyone take that long to do a single project? Here’s what Lucas has to say about it:

“When the project started, it was mostly an excuse to learn 3D animation, but by the end of the project I had spent so much time reworking and polishing the story that I just wanted people to laugh.”

That’s it. Knowledge, laughter and a love of his craft.

Work Is Play

It’s easy to lose the joy in our work. Many creative people find themselves bending beneath the demands of the outside world to compromise their creative integrity. It doesn’t take much to lose that spark and when you lose that spark, it shows.

However, life doesn’t have to be that way. Your career doesn’t have to be that way (notice I didn’t call it a “job”). Every new project is an opportunity for you to learn something new, whether it’s a new technique, a new tool, or a new way of doing the same old, same old.

Knowledge is what keeps life fresh. And the beautiful part about learning? You’re never too old to do it.

What’s Your 6 Minutes?

Wendi is fond of saying that we all have a sock drawer full of old projects. And, as I remarked to her once before, mine is full of mis-matched socks. There’s a blue one here, a red one there, and we can’t forget the garishly colored holiday sock trying to look inconspicuous way back in the corner.

Eventually, all of these socks find a match and when they do, it turns into something spectacular.

What have you got tucked away? How long has it been there? Go take a look now and pull it out into the light and look at it with fresh eyes. Can’t do it all by yourself? That’s ok. In the end, Lucas Martell had over 100 people helping him finish his 6 minutes of fame.

Whether it’s a website, ebook, novel or business idea, if you love it enough that’s all you need to bring it to life – even if it does take five years.

Long Story Short

Ah, yes, I did have an ulterior motive to all this. In February Sirius will begin a series of articles on ebooks, covering everything from the initial planning stages up through design, marketing and publication. Like Pigeon Impossible, an ebook, or any book for that matter, is a labor of love.

We’ll also be having guest posts from folks who have been through the ebook experience writing for us on Special Edition Wednesdays.

As a bit of incentive to all of you future ebook authors out there, Sirius has also decided to offer 10% off all ebook services for the month of February. This includes cover designs, full layouts, writing, marketing, ads…whatever you need to make your ebook fly.

So, what are you waiting for? You don’t have any excuses left. Your own Pigeon Impossible is waiting for you.

Behold the unassuming bagel. Probably one of my most favorite foods – especially when combined with a healthy slathering of cream cheese and a few melt-in-your-mouth slices of smoked salmon.

I never considered the bagel as being a metaphor for anything in life until Saturday night when I was watching The Best Thing I Ever Ate. First, let me share a word of warning, never watch this show on an empty stomach. This show is all about Food Network chefs talking about the best foods they’ve ever eaten. By the time this show was over I wanted to go to on a cross country food tour extravaganza and not return until I’d tasted every item, from every state, from one coast to the other.

When the Bagel Speaks, Thou Shalt Listen

Now, back to the moment of Bagel Enlightenment. The topic on the show was breakfast. Amazing breakfast. Breakfast pizzas, French Toast stuffed with peanut butter and bananas, chicken fried steak and gravy… you name it, and even if you didn’t have a name for it yet, these chefs talked about it.

After a while my eyes just sort of glazed over. I really did need to change the channel. Nothing’s worse than watching the Food Network and knowing that you have none of what’s on the TV in your refrigerator.

With my finger poised on the remote’s button I started listening to one of the bakers at Einstein’s Bagels describe how to make the perfect bagel. After the dough was made, it had to rest a bit before going on to baking.

The little tidbit of enlightenment was this:

Everyone needs to relax before they can be the best that they can be.

The Meaning of Life Has A Hole In The Center

This is so true. In fact, I was mulling over that exact idea earlier in the day as I basked in the afterglow of yet another project well done.

For the past few weeks I have been utterly content with my place in the world. No stress, no major worries eating away at me, the holidays (for once) were very enjoyable, the bills were paid and 2010 was looking mighty good.

Without the stress, the creativity levels spiked. Not only with me, but with the rest of the team, too.

That’s the thing about enthusiasm. It’s contagious. So contagious it may just rival the H1N1. Only let’s hope they never find a vaccine for enthusiasm.

My mood spilled over onto everyone else. They in turn had a sudden burst of their own Big Ideas and ran with them. Before we knew it, we had January and February all blocked out with great stuff.

And yes, you all will get to see it. Soon.

What’s the Point, Deb?

If you haven’t gotten the point by now, you need to get thee to a Bagelery.

The point is this: If you want to do your absolute best work, whether it’s graphics, writing, or just cooking dinner for the family, relax. To paraphrase a common saying: Your work is the mirror of your soul.

So, go ahead, start your day with a bagel.

Right around this time of year I do my annual roundup of web design trends for the upcoming year. This year, I’m doing something a little different.

Design is fine, but what hasn’t been said already? The fine art of typography is still on the rise. Magazine layouts are starting to look more and more like magazines. Mixed media continues to evolve as people incorporate video, radio, and more interactivity.

What I’m going to look at instead is the web in general and how we’ve been using it to help our businesses grow.

The Writing on the Wall

“I need a pen.”

“A pen?” I asked.

“A pen and my journal.” Wendi said as we neared the end of one of our weekly phone calls.

“For what?”

“I need to do some real writing. By hand.”

Does this sound familiar? How long has it been since you’ve written anything by hand? If you’re like me, you probably don’t recognize your own handwriting anymore because it’s been neglected for so long. Makes me wonder if anyone bothers physically writing at all these days.

Even when I get Christmas cards or any kind of snail mail from friends and family, it’s all printed out on a computer. Ok, maybe not all. Allison always includes a handwritten note when she sends me cookies, and Wendi does the same when we exchange books.

There’s something special about receiving a handwritten note or letter. It tells me the sender took some time to add a personal touch and some thought to what they were sending.

Handwriting also tells a lot about a person. As with speaking on the phone or face to face, you get a sense of tone and personality that you can’t get through typed text. There’s a warmth to it.

Getting Personal

Now, although I don’t see small businesses in the upcoming year totally abandoning email, I do feel there’s going to be a shift towards more personal ways of communicating.

For the last several years we’ve all been chained to our computers. We’ve made friends we’ve never met face to face, yet we talk to them more often than we do our own families at times. We do business unseen, something that a little over twenty or thirty years ago would have made many nervous.

We brand ourselves with our own online personalities, for better or worse. We get caught up in the illusion of faux fame, and it’s so easy to think the whole world should recognize your merits on your name alone.

No, I’m not referring to any one person or situation. We’ve all seen how internet fame works with everything from the Star Wars Kid to the mom who gained enormous fame from writing a humorous eBay auction to sell a set of Pokeman cards her kid swiped on their way out of the checkout counter.

The ‘net is not the be all and end all source for clientele.

Did you know there’s actually a real world out there? There are shops and local business owners, people who may still need your services, all the while not realizing those services are right in their own back yard.

How many local businesses have you checked out? Have you gone to any of these local businesses and seen if they have a website of their own? Could they use a designer for *gasp* print ads, signage, business cards, or brochures? Maybe they already have a brochure, but their copy is horrible?

Get out there and look around. See what’s right in your backyard. There’s a whole market out there just waiting for you to discover.

The Art of Conversation

Some of my best clients were gained through simple conversation. No hard sale. In fact, business was never mentioned until late in the conversation.

When you take the time to get to know a person first and get them talking about themselves, a wonderful thing happens – they relax. And so do you. Before you know it, you’ve reached common ground and hey, look at that! They do need your services after all!

Without the pressure, everything flows and BAM, you have yourself another client.

I’m sure there are many people who are tired of long sales pages, obnoxious infomercials, everyone telling them what they need, how it will improve their lives and make them better people. In my opinion, it’s all junk. Just stuff that will sit in the closet collecting dust. Find out what people really need.

And the only way you’re going to do that is by getting to know them first.

What Does This All Mean For 2010?

It means going back to our roots. It means building real relationships with real people in a real world. After all this time we’re still “playing” with the internet. I think in 2010 the web is going to take on more maturity. People are really going to see how to incorporate the old-school methods of personal introduction with the technology we have now to take business on the internet to the next level.

If you haven’t set any goals yet for your online business, try this: Make a point to go out into your community and introduce yourself to the local vendors. Don’t go with making a sale in mind, just go and talk. I’ll bet you walk out of there with with a new client in your pocket.

Have you taken a good look at your site lately? Go ahead, do it now. What do you see? Are you still in love with the design? Does it still give you the same thrill as when you first launched it?

Or is it starting to look a little cluttered? Maybe a little worn around the edges and could use a new coat of paint?

Perhaps you know you need changes but you can’t put your finger on what’s wrong?

One of the most difficult things to do is a redesign of your own site. Don’t feel bad, I went through it too. I can design all day long for someone else, but when it comes to what I want, the old brain immediately decides to take a day off.

But I Like My Site!

I’m sure you do. We all like our sites to some degree. I’ll let you in on a little secret though; your site isn’t for you.

That’s right. You are not designing a site for yourself. And I’m not designing a site for you either. So, if neither one of us is designing a site for you, who exactly are we designing for?

Your visitors. That’s who.

Think about it, you’re trying to attract a specific audience (your ideal client), not other people who can do the same thing you can. You can already do what you do. You want to provide for people who can’t do what you do. They need you.

And while you may have all the latest widgets and flash galleries, and the sharpest code ever behind the scenes, none of that is going to help you much. When it comes right down to it, your visitors don’t care.

What *Do* Visitors Care About?

Information. Whether that information is in the content area, the navigation bar, the sidebars or the footer, it has to be so obvious a blind man could see it.

Not that visitors are stupid. Not by a long shot. On the contrary, your visitors are very intelligent, busy people. And it is for this reason that your information has to be clear and concise.

The moment a visitor has to start poking around trying to find what they need, they’re gone. They can’t be bothered. And admit it, you’ve done that too. I know I have. Frequently.

Provide your visitors with what they need right up front. Lay it all out before them like a buffet.

The Information Age

Nearly a decade ago information didn’t travel half as fast as it does now and it’s getting faster everyday. Do any of us really take the time anymore to leisurely sit and read a morning paper cover to cover? Or sit down and write with an actual pen?

If you do, you are in a declining minority. Who has the time? It’s so much faster to type or read our news on the web.

Your website has to function the same way. The days of splash pages and unnecessary bling are drawing to a close as audiences become more mature in their viewing tastes. Websites are are growing up and evolving right before our eyes, presenting information at record speed to keep up with busy lives. With so many sources available to find our information, audiences are becoming ever more selective in choosing where and how they utilize blogs and websites.

Complicated or disorganized layout? Too difficult to search through? Not enough well written content once you baited the hook?  The reader will be off and gone to the next provider of simple, easy to find information that can be handed to them on a silver platter ready to feast on.

Visit Your Own Front Door

Try this. Close your eyes for a second and pretend you have never been to your site before. Then open them and click on your home page and observe your site with fresh eyes as if you were a brand new visitor. How do the colors make you feel? Is the navigation easy to search through? Does the overall theme project the image you would like to convey? What are the benefits of your clients staying on your site more then a few minutes? What overall value are you providing to them?

If you find it hard to answer these questions, there is a good chance your clients can’t answer them either.

A Helping Hand is Easy to Find

If you can’t be objective and take that fresh eyed view, consider grabbing an honest friend who will tell you the truth. Or your Mom. If she can’t figure out your site, you might have a little work to do to simplify things. And of course, if you are looking for the professional team that can help take your website into the next generation of website functionality and design, look no further, Sirius is always here with a helping hand to get you where you need to go.

It’s a whole new world for sure. One you hope will open brand new vistas and get your business off the ground.

Wendi pointed out in her first post there are a lot of things a novice blogger has to know.

But what about the specialists involved in getting that site off the ground? Yes, there’s another side to the story, one that serves as more of a reminder how far you’ve come as a specialist.

Remember Your Roots

All of us start with nothing. We begin like Wendi did; with an idea and a goal, but little experience getting from Point A to Point B. Time moves on and with it our knowledge grows. We pick up bits of information and technique from reliable sources, and eventually establish our own individual mental library of skills.

What was once seemingly impossible becomes second nature. We’re able to complete the most complex tasks on auto-pilot. It’s easy.

It’s also easy to forget that not everyone else has reached the same level of expertise.

No matter what kind of service you provide you have to keep in mind that the people coming to you need you for one reason and one reason only: You’re the expert.

Virtual Sherpa

Not only are you the expert, you’re the guide as well. Your clients aren’t stupid, never forget that. Just because they don’t know the difference between a pixel and a png doesn’t mean they don’t know anything at all.

They’re on unfamiliar territory and you hold the map.

Start with the basics. Most people don’t care about the back end technicalities, so try to keep your explanations limited to layman’s terms. Use what people know, and if they want to know more then go right ahead and elaborate.

What you don’t want to do is overwhelm them with a lot of information they’ll never use.

Patience Is a Virtue

Patience. I’ve been blessed with it and believe me, I’m grateful for it – and so are the people I work with.

If patience is something you’re lacking, it’d be in your best interest to develop some. I know, it won’t be easy and it won’t happen over night, but in the long run both you and your clients will be grateful for it, too.

Nothing makes a client feel more secure when they feel that you’re taking the time to listen and offer viable solutions. They may think that neon pink and green are great colors, or blinking ads are the greatest thing since sliced bread, but it’s up to you to gently guide them towards what’s best for their visitors.

When you tell them what they have in mind isn’t a good idea, follow up with a reason why and a solution to make it better.

Seeing the World Through New Eyes

I often hear from parents how having children helped them experience the world all over again. I get that same feeling when I have friends come visit Las Vegas from out of town. This isn’t much different than dealing with a new client.

Each time you get a new client, try to see the virtual world through their eyes. See what you don’t see anymore and help guide them around the obstacles. In time, they’ll learn.

Sy Syms had it right when he said, “An educated consumer is our best customer.”

How do you educate your clients?

Having no idea what a crazy world I was about to enter, I clicked the button and fell down a long and adventuresome hole more colorful than Alice in wonderland. I was hooked. Soon, I was meeting new friends and writing every day and looking for ways to customize my new blog and make it my own. I tried my best not to drive my new friends crazy asking them questions about how to do this, and how to do that to get my blog to look as nice as many of the other ones I would visit.

Luv At First Sight?

I fell in love with comment luv and experienced my first heartbreak when I discovered I couldn’t have it on the free WordPress theme. It turned out to be the first of many no’s and disappointments and it soon became clear that in order to do what I visualized in my mind that I needed to graduate into a self-hosted website.

Except that I secretly had no idea what that actually meant. All around me other bloggers bandied about words like self-hosted and custom designed and choosing themes and plug ins ( Which sounded like air freshener) and I nodded my head and wondered how I would ever make the jump.

I started looking around for a web designer to help sort through the murky waters of changing my site. I knew it would be a good idea to interview a few different people and get a feel for what they could do, what they would charge and what kind of support they would provide but the problem was, I didn’t know enough to even feel like I could ask the most basic questions.

Comparison Shopping

I was intimidated by a technological world I knew nothing about. I decided to begin at the beginning. I started paying close attention to other websites that I liked. I started to ask simple questions. Who did your design? Were you happy with their work? Were they easy to talk to? Did they make you feel comfortable throughout the process or was it intimidating and confusing?

That narrowed down the field considerably. What I discovered from that round of conversations was that there were a lot of designers to choose from, but not a lot of designers that took the time and the patience to explain things carefully to technologically challenged clients who couldn’t speak the language.

Deciding What You Really Want

Next, I took the time to do some soul-searching. What was it that I was looking for? If I wasn’t going to be able to explain my needs to a designer in techie terms, how was I going to get my needs addressed? I made a wish list of what my dream website would be able to do, what kind of feeling it would have, how I wanted people to feel when they came there and what the absolute musts where. What was I willing to give in on? What was an absolute need?

I determined that for me, I wanted to choose a designer who was willing up front to be patient, explaining terms and reasons for why some things could be a certain way or not. I wanted to learn as I went along. I didn’t just want to send away for a new blog, have it plopped in and then have no idea what to do with it.

I realized that I was not going to be every designer’s idea of a dream client. Going into the project, I already felt bad about it, insecure about my lack of knowledge and my high degree of neediness. It was going to take a special designer to work through my inability to communicate, my need for simplistic instruction and hand-holding and my innate fear of all things technological.

Determination Pays Off

It took six months for me to find a designer that I trusted enough to get up the courage to work with. In the end, I was really glad I had taken the time to think through everything as much as I had and spent the time getting referrals. My designer was patient, knowledgeable, listened and was able to take my written list and explain what would work and give me alternatives (sometimes even better ones) from the items on my list what weren’t viable options.

The end result was my dream website brought to life better than I could have ever imagined it and the beginning of many many doorways that have opened up since. Having someone willing to hold my hand and walk me step by step through change allowed me to make my dreams come true.