Has Your Website Kept Pace with Other Marketing Tactics?

Has your website kept pace with your other marketing tools such as advertising, newsletter or sales materials? If not, then you might want to take a look at determining how you can give it a refresh.

There are many ways to enhance and modify your website:

Update its design - This will have to be your first step in refreshing your site. Your new look must reflect your current branding. Also, keep in mind white space and easy navigation are crucial in designing for the web which is much different than designing for print. Our designers always make sure to follow a consistent feel with other marketing pieces.

Have current content - Copywriting is just as important as graphics. Keep to a consistent format that makes it easy for visitors to find what’s new. Add any news updates, customer testimonials or newsletters consistently. Another tip, fresh content attracts search engine spiders to a website which will increase your SEO.

Add or reduce “bells and whistles” – Incorporating Flash, animation, videos etc. can enhance your site and should be added to show innovation, but having too much can detract visitors. Be careful which and how much you use.

Refreshing your website can increase visitors looking for new content and give an overall perception that you are a thriving company.

Here is a sample of a website CMA refreshed for Lamanna, an electrical contractor who came to CMA several years ago for their first website and other branding initiatives. The CMA team applied our decades of knowledge of the electrical industry to create a functional and communicative representation of their business.

Getting Online on Time

An active and accurate web presence is essential in today’s market place. CMA’s website development team recently worked with the International Vitamin Corporation (IVC), a global private label and contract manufacturing company producing vitamins, minerals and supplements, to get their website up and running quickly.

Formerly a nutritional supplement division of a larger company, IVC found itself without a website after the division was spun off on its own. The leadership at IVC turned to CMA to develop the design, content, and programming for their new website.

The site (http://www.ivcinc.com/) was developed for ease of navigation and new brand design. The contemporary design utilizes white-space accented by images of health, wellness and nature. The copy stresses the company’s comprehensive concept-to-commercialization capabilities including its true integrated supply chain of global partners supplying raw materials for IVC contract and private label projects for national pharmacy chains and big box home stores.

CMA worked within a tight deadline to get the website up and running. Both the design and content helped the newly independent company define itself in the industry.

The result was a website that the company’s sales team could use as a business development tool to grow the company.

CMA Completes Extensive Website Projects

CMA recently completed website projects for several new clients including Pasquito Builders, Windsor Dermatology, Interior Image and Super Chic.



For the Hopewell, New Jersey based Pasquito Builders CMA helped to increase the company’s regional visibility and strengthen its new project development efforts through the creation of its new website: www.PasquitoBuilders.com. The website features a comprehensive services section, testimonial section, newsroom and gallery of recent projects.



For the 25 year old medical dermatology practice in East Windsor, New Jersey, Windsor Dermatology, CMA determined through its proprietary Marketecture™ process that one of the best ways to achieve greater regional visibility and an expanded patient base would be with a newly-designed website: www.WindsorDermatology.com. CMA expanded and streamlined the content, created and enhanced graphic design, and added Flash photos to the homepage. In addition, CMA provided a completely new brand campaign including logos, brochures, advertising, public relations and social media.



Serving New Jersey, the greater Philadelphia and metropolitan New York areas, Interior Image provides custom interior design/build solutions. CMA designed their website www.YourInteriorImage.com to include website copy with keywords to grab target audience attention and enhance search engine optimization (SEO), news and testimonials sections, a photo gallery with navigation as well as a featured projects section on the homepage.



Sailing from Barnegat Light Yacht Basin, Barnegat Light, New Jersey, the Super Chic is a 56 foot charter boat providing participants with a memorable fishing experience. CMA created a new website for Super Chic: www.SuperChicCharters.com, which features information on dates and fees for various trip opportunities, a monthly “When to Fish Chart,” allowing customers to view the best times during the season to book their trips, and trip details written by the ship’s captain.

Let CMA utilize our cutting edge digital communications to enhance the visibility of your business in the marketplace.

Erin Higgins
Director of Marketing Services
ehiggins@cmasolutions.com

Planting Seeds on the Internet

Erin Higgins, CMA Director of Marketing Services, recently sat down with us to discuss digital marketing for a recent issue of CMA Market Buzz. Among other interesting facts, Higgins reported an increased client focus on digital marketing strategies, not only through websites, but email marketing and social media such as blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Below are some excerpts from the Q&A.

“More clients are working with CMA to deepen their web conversations with customers and prospects,” says Higgins, who guides clients through the development and rejuvenation of websites as well as other digital marketing mediums.

“With all businesses, developing a website is typically the keystone to their initial marketing effort once we’ve worked with them to discover and establish a strategic and branding direction,” she says. “Website development or redesign also dovetails well with a public relations effort, which helps drive target audiences to the site.”

Higgins observes that in the past, companies established basic ‘brochureware’ websites, then updated them with animation. “Now it’s more of a hybrid. Websites are cleaner, there’s less Flash, more white space and brief, top of mind content. Depending on the client and target audiences, video is also being integrated more frequently.”

CMA advises clients to continually update their websites, not only to keep content fresh but as part of their search engine optimization (SEO) strategy. “Search spiders recognize and gravitate to updated content, resulting in a higher ranking for a company in search results,” she says.

Ask Erin yourself! Email her at ehiggins@cmasolutions.com and find out more about CMA’s web capabilities and how they can work for you!

Designing a Website Built to Last

If a website refresh is what your company needs to start anew in 2010, it’s imperative that you work with your designer to create something that is built to last. Using outdated techniques can force a prospective customer to click the “x” in the corner and cross you off the list of potential business partners as quick as the click of a mouse.

We’ve seen so many website trends come and go. Consider these points while you’re in the planning stage.

Put yourself in the website visitors’ shoes. Your website is now almost the equivalent of the first greeting, handshake and business card exchange in the early stages of a real, live meeting. Within the first few seconds, the visitor needs to feel engaged but also in control. While the organization of your website is important to share information, the design elements must make them feel comfortable enough to want to stay.

A website should accurately represent your brand. Since your website might be the first place a customer is introduced to your brand, make sure visitors are able to immediately understand who the business is and what you do. A cluttered homepage with disorganized photos and clickables can be confusing, so keep it simple.

Utilize white space for a more professional feel. Dated websites are easy to spot—they have bright colors, perhaps a patterned background and lots of text to scroll through. According to Business Week, 62% of those online are researching products and services. Maintaining a good ratio of white space to images and text allows the visitor to concentrate better on the information they are seeking.

Websites are an essential piece of a company’s full brand. Before you decide to launch a website project, spend some time shopping around to other websites to browse for ideas and accurately gauge the trends in your own industry. Let CMA apply our expertise to deliver a website that truly represents you.

Diane Webster,
Associate Creative Director
Dwebster@cmasolutions.com