In today’s information overloaded, fast paced, digital lifestyle there can be little opportunity to pause and reflect. The mindset of “just have to keep up” can dominate one’s thinking if your are not careful. Every once and a while I get present to the fact that I spend too little time “reflecting” on things be they family, work, and life in general.

I’m soaking in it.

Like the image above, (I am showing my age and if you know ‘Madge’ you are too), sometimes you may find yourself “soaking in it” and not knowing what is going on, or the benefits of what you are in the middle of doing. Being a married, father of  3 boys, self employed business owner/pixel pusher can impose virtual blinders that, if I let it, will limit what I know, see, and what is possible.

So why am I rambling on about this? Recently I became aware of just how much I am soaking in it. My ‘inner Madge‘ woke up and reminded me of what was going on. And sharing this with others might remind them to stop, look around, and take stock.

I set some measurable goals at the end of 2009. These were goals I mentally planned on completing by the end of  the first quarter of 2010. Well guess what? Today is the start of the second quarter of 2010. And those three goals? Not met. I went through piles of paperwork over the weekend and found them written down. I got them out of my head not just as ideas and things to do, but completely out of my head. I was soaking in it so completely that I lost track of these goals.

What are, or were, the goals?

• Publish new WordPress/Thesis tutorials based on recently completed projects
• Design, develop, and publish a visual overhaul to berchman.com
• Release a free Thesis portfolio theme

I had planned on these three things to be completed yesterday.

So what’s the lesson in all this?

Two things:

1. Use your systems. These three goals were never put into project tracking systems I use and broken down into smaller, manageable tasks (basic productivity, duh). I am remedying that THIS quarter.
2. Reflect more often. I failed to check in with myself on personal projects. All things in the client and family world are moving along quite well. I dropped the ball on myself.

Reflection time is over. I will now return to my regularly scheduled program.

Get back to work.

I’ve been remiss in updating the blog. This is for various sorted reasons. Suffice it to say that I am back. Here is a video to help catch up.

Click here to view the embedded video.

There is a trend I have been noticing in doing business on the Internet lately and like any place of commerce you eventually see this. What I am referring to is the commodification of services. In other words, if you are looking for a programmer or designer to help you with an Internet based communication project; be it a website, email newsletter, SEO, etc., you know that one can find a variety of people that vary in skill set and professionalism with what services they provide. More people providing the same skill sets compete with others on price, thus making it a commodity.

Typically you want to work with a specialist, someone who does specifically what you need rather than a generalist, who dabbles in a little of everything. Specialists are who they are because they do a few things extremely well rather than many things mediocre. They are the experts with the right skills. Problem is what specialist to choose? How do you know quality and value? There are specialists who will provide you with a very cheap price for a project, and there are those that are more expensive that provide a great deal of value. This is the key to choosing wisely.

Who to choose?

The inexpensive specialist vs. the more expensive specialist. For some people the decision comes down to price. They want something as cheap as they can get it. The problem in this approach is in the quality of work you get usually correlates to what you pay for it. Both in quality of work, but in terms of service and timliness. This is related to two things:

1. Professionalism
2. Experience

I have a fair amount of experience so I know many tips/tricks of the trade that I throw into every project gratis. When someone hires me they are getting a very expereinced designer/developer that knows what they are doing, is courteous and fast in reply to questions, and delivers the final product commented and clean for future reference and use.

I cannot compete with someone who is coming in 25% of one of my estimates for the same project. If he is charging you $5-$10 an hour to get the job done I cannot compete with that, nor do I want to. That is not the business I am in. I don’t compete on price, I compete on value.

Value, where it’s at.

If you perceive greater value in a product or serivce and it matters to you, you are willing to pay more, its that simple.

Think of buying a car. You want luxury or economy. You want a Yugo or a Mercedes. It just depends on what matters to you and where your priorities are.

If having a well designed, smoothly functioning website is key to your success then spending more on the value of achieving success with your website is worth the investment.

As the saying goes you get what you pay for.

What has been your experience  with working with specialists who are inexpensive? Good? Bad? Tell me your experience below.

Also, stay tuned. More “Re-Alignment” posts coming (one tomorrow).

Over the past week I have been humbled and honored by two different websites.

The first is Alltop

Alltop is an “online magazine rack” of popular topics. They organize RSS feeds of the best websites by category. As they say “aggregate without the aggravate.” You create your own account and include the content that interests you. Here is MyAlltop.

Alltop is like Google Reader but better. You find content by topic—and the fact that the content has been vetted makes it much more valuable. Yesterday yours truly was included in the WordPress Alltop category. If you are into WordPress you must check it out—great content!

If you have never used Alltop here is a quick video explaining how the site works and how to use the service.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The second is DoubleMule

DoubleMule is a website run by The Mules and they cover all topics relating to Thesis. The Mules have a Thesis Designer Series where they review and highlight different Thesis designers. I was fortunate to get the DoubleMule Certification as at Thesis Designer.

What Else?

I have a new tutorial in the works that will come out in the next week or two and I have the next installment in A Website Realignment brewing as well.

As always I welcome your questions and feedback.

Today I was reflecting upon a common occurrence among people that I talk to with regard to their website(s).

The people I talk to either want a new website or they have one and want to update/add/delete a design or function of the site. These conversations either happen through email or in person and become a dialogue of  back-and-forth brain picking. They ask how they can do “X, Y, and Z” and I then ask questions relating to strategy, objectives, and outcomes. These are great conversations, and I love having them to figure out what it is people are doing, and how I can help them out.

How Much?

One thing all of these conversations have in common is the inevitability of talking about “how much?”

My favorite conversation starter is, “How much will it cost me for a new website?” That is like walking up and asking a housing contractor how much will it cost you for a new house? Without sufficient background, Q&A, and discovery process to understand what your goals are, you can’t get an estimate for a house that  meets your wants and needs. The same is true for websites.

Why can’t you give me an hourly rate?

No matter how menial the task I always approach projects from an estimate perspective. Each project and set of circumstances is different in the world of web design and development:

• different servers
• different programming languages
• different databases
• different strategies + objectives
• different desired outcomes

Different variables can and will produce different results and require varying expertise. So the question of “What is your hourly rate?” is a pointless exercise. How will giving someone who is not educated in the nuance of how I, or any seasoned web professional, approaches a particular solution give them the wisdom to say, “I know that the CSS work for this project will take ‘X’ hours and he charges $100.00 an hour so it should cost me $XXX.XX.”

The estimate is too much

At some point clients would like an estimate based on a set of tasks to be performed, to achieve a certain objective, and have it all done by a specific date. For good, honest, respectable work the world of web design and development it is not inexpensive.

There is an old saying I love to repeat whenever someone comes back to me on an estimate.

You can have it cheap, fast, or good—now pick 2.

Don’t get me wrong everyone wants a bargin. I want a bargain. But, if you are looking for expert work and consulting it is not inexpensive. However it is worth every penny!

But really? Is the estimate too much?

Some of the people that receive an estimate from me will decide to go another route and not work with me. That is their right, and I wish them all the best luck and good fortune in the world. I have not one drop of animosity towards anyone who choses another path.

However, I have had a few people come back to me a few months later for some of the following reasons:

• Your estimate was considered too costly so I went with the cheapest one, what a mistake. A complete unprofessional.
• I found out that my cousins kid, who is in high school, isn’t as good at computers as he claimed to be.
• I wanted to figure out how to do this all myself, what the hell was I thinking?

All of these are real experiences I have had with clients who have come back to me after my initial estimate and proposal to them. The one I find most interesting is the last one. Let me explain.

Many entrepreneurs are self-starters and do-it-yourselfers. They like to learn and do things themselves. Sometimes when they receive an estimate from me based on their needs and requirements, either there is a bit of sticker shock or their budget can’t bear the weight so they decide to take things on themselves. For the sake of argument I will use the following example to illustrate what I am talking about.

I produce an estimate based on the scope and objectives the client and I agree on. That estimate is $5,000.00. That price includes complete deliverables; all files, graphics, and coding. When I am done with the project it will work as intended and be set to meet the objectives we have outlined.

The prospective client, for whatever reason, decides not to work with me (as I said which is fine). This experience is not unique to me and happens to all web design/developers. The potential client decides that in order to save money they are going to do this themselves.

A project that may take me 50 hours to complete will take a prospect who knows nothing of designing or developing a website a factor of 5 times as long to achieve the same results (this is extremely optimistic because most people will take longer). So in this case we are talking 250 hours of their time.

That is 250 hours they can spend working on their business, the things they do well, and on making money.

For the continuation of illustration lets say that prospective client charges $50 an hour for their professional time.

250 hours x $50 = $12,500.00

Granted not all of those 250 may not be true billable hours so lets say that 60% of those hours are. The other 40% went to business development. That still provides you with $7,500.00 of income.

You have:

• made enough to pay for your website
• gained new clients that could provide additional business
• have moved your business along to meeting its objectives
• got your website done 200 hours sooner
• and made money!!

My final point

My final point is that when it comes to designing and developing your website, no matter what,  you are paying the price one way or another. In terms of being efficient and using your talent, time and money effectively you need to take a moment and think about your approach to your website.

Hope this helps.

I have a new headset (thanks Kristin!).  And I finally took some time to recite the hours of text into NaturallySpeaking.  So that I can sit with my headset, and now type out what I’m saying is I’m doing right now.  The beauty of this is that there are small typos and errors in the text.  This is not to to my mispronunciation, but rather to the misinterpretation via the software.

So, I have not posted to the blog in a while.  I’ve been a bit busy as of late.  I am starting a new enterprise with a like-minded businessman, and that has kept me pretty busy.  I also have continuing work with my web communications firm.  And most importantly, my family is the busiest thing in my life.   Life is very busy right now, plenty of work and projects and family activities.  I really would have it no other way.  And in light of the current economic climate in the United States and the world at large I am a lucky guy.

So it’s kind of cool now, to be able to sit here and speak and have the words show up on the screen so that I don’t have to type.  As is said, the hand is quicker than the eye, but the hand is not quicker than your mouth. who knows.  I’ve actually might be able to post more frequently as, and on more topics.  Now that I have the ability just to talk and have word show up on the screen.  I do have to work on the accuracy of some of the words ‘has’ and ‘is’ sometimes swapped out for each other. 

So I will be posting shortly about official announcement regarding the new business venture that looks quite promising. We are not reinventing the wheel, rather we are using current best practices and best technologies in a way that makes them affordable to people that want to tap in to their power. 2009 looks to be a busy working here, but the fruits of all labor should pan out in the years to come.

That’s enough rambling for now.  Time to turn the headset off and get back to work.

I just completed reading Seth Godin’s, “The Dip.” An interesting little read that presented mostly things that I already knew in various pieces from a variety of sources. However, it is all distilled into a simple, quick, and easy read.

What I got out of this book was some clarity. I suspected I was in a dip and reading this helped bring that into focus. I am in a dip with my business. My business is in a state of stagnation. That is the best I can describe it. It’s not dieing, but its not growing either. The level of work with my business could be sustained, for what feels like, almost indefinitely. How can that be bad? I have work, I am making money, but I am not happy with how things are. I know there is potential for more. This business has not reached its potential.

After reading “The Dip” I actually contemplated disassembling my business–quitting it. In the book there are many suggestions about quitting, and the process of why to quit something. There is a purpose to quitting. It is to free you up to focuses energy on getting through the dips that matter. Of course part of the process is identifying what matters, but that was easy–at least for me.
There are other outside factors I will not get into, but suffice it to say that the alternative to being an entrepreneur (going back to punching the clock for a paycheck) was seriously considered for a bit. However, in the thinking surrounding this one thing became clear when I read the sentence, “Never quit something with great long term potential just because of the stress of the moment.”

That sentence summed it up for me. There is great potential in owning a business. There is great stress owning a business–stress of the moment. Furthermore, I realized that there are things I have not done or tried with my business. To quit before at least trying would create a great deal of regret later down the road. So now I have a better perspective, a plan for action, someone to motivate me and keep me on track, and a timeframe by which to measure the efforts.

For now I will stick rather than quit.