Technology or Business?

After you’ve figured out that you really want and need a web site, you come to a very important crossroad. This fork has two different paths and usually people don’t even realize the existence of the other.

Let’s go back a bit. Imagine you walk to an advertising agency to do a print campaign. Do you care which Photoshop version the AD has on their computer or what color is the handle in the scissors the copywriter used to cut pieces of paper from a magazine? No you don’t. At least, hopefully you don’t ask these kinds of questions. You should naturally be more interested in the results and the cost and how it can help you. Right?

Then why are you even thinking about PHP and SQL as a client? Do you really care which content management system (CMS) you have? Can you honestly even say that you know what a content management system is and if we told you that “yes, this is it.” – would you know the difference?

The sad thing is, we, the industry are the reason the clients are scared. We wanted so hard to make ourselves irreplaceable that we scared our clients out of their minds while marking our territory and it will take a long time to fix this. Of course, this is also a result of incompetent people in our field – the blind are leading the blind. When the client or the provider both don’t understand what they’re selling, it becomes a vicious cycle of misplaced trust and “I-sure-hope-that-this-project-won’t-blow-up-in-our-faces” kind of tech thinking.

So, the other path? It’s very simple. It’s common sense. You’re doing a website for a reason – hopefully a business reason and it’s up to the agents of change to find the way to reach those goals. A CMS won’t solve your problems, it’s like buying a massive tool kit from your local hardware store every time you need a hammer.

I’d like to change the thinking from:

“I’d like to live in a house.” – “What kind of tools do you want us to use?”

to:

“I’d like to live in a house.” – “Could you tell us about your space requirements?”

Actually, if your builder – ever – asks you about which tools he should use, leave the project.

Concentrating on technology creates another problem: Micro-management. In the beginning of the project you should have a very broad look on the big picture, as soon as you start talking about the content management system, you’re already too deep – should you even know about a content management system apart from the simple risk-analysis delivered by the seller (which always seem to have no risks what-so-ever.)

So, if you’re a buyer – the next time someone tries to scare you with magic words, ask them about the business impact.

And if you work in the industry (.. you are reading a blog ..), teach your colleagues and yourself to stop scaring the client and spend a minute to research the business dilemma we’re here to solve.

Related posts:

1. How much to spend in a website?
2. Why do you need a website?
3. What should your website contain?
4. The Tao of unbiased consultation
5. Why you don’t need a community?