Company Overview

Many companies are frustrated with their websites. My company is dedicated to providing educational articles, classes, and site analysis to help frustrated companies learn how to improve website performance.

Personal Background

Prior to starting Ayo's Website Design, I was a Program Manager at Microsoft Corporation in Redmond, Washington. Prior to Microsoft, I was CTO of Digital Self Corporation a technology startup in Cambridge, MA. My experience is primarily in technology strategy, business development, software design, and software development.

Some Personal Information

The origin of my name, Ayodele Ijidakinro, is probably the most common question I receive. If you're wondering where my name comes from, it is Nigerian. My father is from Idanre, Nigeria in Ondo State. My mother is from Phoenix, Arizona. I grew up in Phoenix, so you can probably guess which parent made the big move.

Being from the Arizona desert, I enjoy hot weather, sunshine, and Phoenix Suns basketball! Besides watching and playing basketball, I'm always reading or researching, and I like to spend time on projects that help others.

Contact Information

Address: P.O. Box 3533, Redmond, WA 98073-3533
Phone: 425.770.5533 / Mobile: 857.222.5582

What is Web Strategy? 10 Questions to Help Explain

I'll start with a rather pithy definition: Web strategy is about looking at root causes of online success or failure and coming up with solutions to address those root causes instead of superficial solutions.

What does the above mean?

Put simply, web strategy is like a business plan, but it is the plan for your website. In it you outline a road map for your website. You outline obstacles and challenges you expect to face, your plan to overcome those obstacles, and goals that will determine whether you've been successful.

You may ask, 'Why is planning important?' An ancient proverb states, "The plans of the diligent one surely make for advantage, but everyone that is hasty surely heads for want." Good planning ultimately leads to business advantages. Similarly, good website planning ultimately leads to advantages for your website versus competing websites.

But what types of questions are answered as a part of a web strategy?

Let me provide some examples of web strategy questions and see if this helps you to understand what web strategy is about:

1. What are the categories of customers who use your website? Thinking of all your customers in one big group is an example of having no website strategy because customers are not all the same. For example, a website selling books might group their customers into categories like the following:
   
   
   
   
2. Does your website address the needs of each category of customer in a satisfactory way? Many website owners think primarily about their own needs, for instance getting a sale, and thus the website reflects this. Just as we hate salesman that are only out for their commission people hate websites that only sell and otherwise aren't helpful at sincerely answering questions or concerns the potential buyer might have.
   
3. What are the top 10 questions customers ask when they reach your website? How do you answer each of those top 10 questions? Websites that fail to answer the most important customer questions won't get sales because it is guaranteed you have a competitor on the internet that does answer his questions. Since this is the case, why would he buy from your website?
   
4. On each page of your website, what is the desired action you want the user to take on that page? If you don't know this, how can you tell your customer what to do? If you can't tell your customer what to do, how will he know what to do next? If he doesn't know what to do next, he will just leave your website.
   
5. What is considered a successful visit on your website? What are you doing to ensure that each visit to your website is successful? Are you trying to get a phone call, a newsletter subscription, a purchase? The answer to this question should greatly affect your entire website's layout and design.
   
6. What is the average conversion rate for your industry and what is the target conversion rate for your website? If you don't know your industry conversion rate, then how can you set a target for your own conversion rate? You can't just pull these numbers out of the air. If this data is not available, you need some other logical way of determining a reasonable conversion rate.
   
7. Besides relying on search engines, directories, and advertising, what is your six month plan for increasing the number of visitors to your website? Millions of websites are competing to get on Google Search, Yahoo Directory, etc. If you do the same thing everyone else is doing, you're going to get the same results. The average website fails. So what will you do differently than those failing websites did?
   
8. What are the goals for your website in the next 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and 1 year? Your goals should guide your activity every day. Without goals you are like a runner running without a destination. How will he know which direction to take his next step?
   
9. What lessons have you learned from your competitors in the last 6 months and how do you plan to apply those lessons in the next 6 months? Your competitors are trying thousands of different things to find success. The smart entrepreneur learns from his competitors. Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart and Sam's Club, started Sam's Club after he visited Sol Price's Price Club (now named Costco). He way always learning. You should be doing the same by using your competitor's websites regularly.
   
10. What reason does a visitor have to tell others about your website? The best marketing is word-of-mouth. Is there anything about your website that a customer would have reason to tell his friends and colleagues about? To get an honest answer, you may need to ask someone else for their opinion. This is probably the most important question you can ask.
    

I could continue to list questions, but hopefully you get the point. Web strategy is about formulating answers to questions like the above. To put it another way, a successful web strategy can be a formal document, just like a business plan, that outlines your plan for the growth and development of your website and sets clear goals that will allow you to determine whether you were successful or not.

So when I say, I am a web strategy consultant, what I mean is that I help you to formulate a plan for your website that will help you to stay focused and to build a website that customers want to use and want to tell their friends about. Then I help you execute that plan.

If you don't have a web strategy, then you're like a traveler on a road trip without a map and without a route. You might stumble upon your destination, but your journey is going to be long and difficult full of wrong turns and dead ends. However, by developing a web strategy you're going to be like the traveler that has both a map, and a well planned route. You will reach your destination, and you will reach it quickly and you will enjoy the scenery along the way.

Why Am I Qualified to Be A Consultant?

Even though the term consultant is the commonly used title for my services, it comes with some baggage I need to dispel. People often consider consultants to be aloof. I'm not that type of consultant. I just answer your questions with down-to-earth advice. I am someone you can put in your speed dial and just call real quick to pass a question by me. I don't count each second we talk or charge for phone calls. I'm not trying to turn something simple into rocket science. Nor do I try to push my paid services on interested customers who give me a call.

But having said that, what exactly makes me qualified to be a consultant?

There are four reasons I am qualified to be a consultant:

1. Previous and Current Clients Have Always Been Happy. I don't think any piece of evidence can really be more important than what my clients think. For example, would you discuss your problems with a consultant with unhappy clients? Of course not! Fortunately, all of my clients, like the Holiday Group for example, have been very happy with my work. (References are Available Upon Request)
2. I've Built my own Business. After college I built Digital Self, an enterprise software company, to about a quarter million sales as the CTO along with a team of about eight others. For personal reasons we shut the company down, and I went to work for several years at Microsoft Corporation as a Program Manager. It's hard to give business advice of any type without having experienced what it feels like to build a business. To endure the pain of slow sales and the pleasure of closing a large contract helps me understand the challenges you're trying to explain to me.
3. Related Professional Experience. My experience at Microsoft Corporation was in their Internet Division which was called Windows Live when I left. At Microsoft my responsibility was to study the user experience and identify areas of improvement. I had access to millions of pieces of statistical data, which allowed me to observe what customer's loved and what they hated. This experience is valuable in being able to discuss problems with small companies as well as companies looking to one day have millions of customers like a Microsoft.
4. I Enjoy Listening and Talking Through Business Problems. There is a proverb, "When anyone is replying to a matter before he hears [it], that is foolishness on his part." Have you ever tried to have a discussion with someone who doesn't listen? Are those discussions generally successful? Rarely. Thus, when discussing a problem with a client, I always start by listening and asking a dozen questions to draw out key points I need to understand.

So wouldn't you agree; the qualifications I've listed are critical for someone you're going to discuss your problems with? Don't you want someone with happy clients, with experience, and who is a good listener? However, probably the most important qualification, I didn't list, is someone you enjoy working with. A good working relationship is indispensable. Nevertheless, only you can decide whether you enjoy working with me.

How Can You Benefit From My Services?

Summary: A lot of times all you need to solve your business problems is an educated ear to listen to your problems and to give you a fresh perspective on what you can do to address those problems. This is exactly what I do. I bring another set of ears, and my personal experiences, to the conversation to help you see alternatives you may never have thought of to grow your business using the internet.

There are two very frustrating situations a website owner or executive can experience. Probably the most painful is when your site is getting traffic, but not getting sales. This scenario is distressing because the visitors are there they just aren't purchasing. But equally maddening is a website that offers a quality, valuable product or service but doesn't get the traffic needed to generate sales. When facing such frustration, two heads are better than one. Imagine having an adviser to work through these problems with you.

In short, I act as an adviser who can help you discover ideas you may not have thought of to address your business problem. Further, if you like the idea, I can also implement it.

Think about my services this way. If you had the resources to hire a full time employee to plan changes to your website and oversee its development would you look for the following requirements?

• Someone that has a business mindset and is technically proficient.
• Someone with technology experience at an industry leader like Microsoft.
• Someone that is good at planning and hitting clearly defined goals.
• Someone that has built a business from $0 in revenues to a quarter million after two years.
• Someone who can work rapidly and successfully once given a business problem to solve.

For many, the above traits would be desirable. Now, why wouldn't those same traits be desirable in someone who would give you advice, someone who would talk with you to think through frustrating problems and identify potential solutions? I can help you by talking with you and giving you ideas you may not have thought of.

If now is good for you, give me a call. When I answer, tell me what your name is and what your business does. Tell me what problem you're experiencing that you want help with and, if you have one, give me your website address. I will ask you to let me think about your problem and offer to call you back the next day if I need more time. When I call you back, I will tell you how serious I think your problem is and I will suggest what you should do next to start addressing your problem.

What are My Strengths and Weaknesses as a Consultant?

I'm going to focus on strengths and weaknesses that are applicable to my role as a web strategy consultant and website designer. Also, I'm not going to list these in any order, but I'll start with my strengths because those are more fun to talk about.

I would say the following are my relevant strengths:

1. I am an Analytical thinker. When given a business problem to solve, I start by breaking the problem into its smallest parts. For example, if an owner asks me, "Only 2% of my visitors are purchasing, what do you think is the problem?" I rarely start giving answers right away. Typically, I start asking questions to understand all of the variables that could affect the website's success. Then, once I understand the variables and the competitive environment, I start offering ideas. I think this is a strength, because I notice that many consultants start answering questions before they could possibly have enough information to answer intelligently.
2. I have always enjoyed business strategy. When I say "always," I really mean always. Sadly, I think I wrote my first business plan at the age of six. Although this didn't help me win any popularity contests, the fact that I have enjoyed business from such an early age, has been a strength during my professional life. I've found that a successful website has to apply the same lessons executives like Sam Walton, Ray Kroc; investors like Warren Buffet, Peter Lynch; and consultants like Peter Drucker applied. Because I have always enjoyed thinking about business, I have the same joy helping others solve their business problems.
3. I enjoy helping others. It doesn't matter how much I think I know, or how great I think my skills are; if I'm not willing to help others, they're not going to get my best. Fortunately, I really enjoy helping others; so I try to always give my best, and I'm excited to see those I help experience business success as a result of my help. That's also why I give away as much information as I can afford, for free. Of all the strengths I could list, this has to be the most important, because again, someone can be the most knowledgeable, but if they're not willing to give freely, will you get their best?

So having stated some strengths, let me move to the less fun part, and talk about my weaknesses. Like strengths, I could list dozens of weaknesses, but I will pick just a few important points.

I would say the following are my relevant weaknesses:

1. I like to think in the abstract and have a hard time using examples to clearly express a thought. I have noticed that I tend to look at problems and solutions from a very abstract level, but that many of the people I work with need me to provide concrete examples before they fully grasp what I'm trying to say. While abstract thinking can be a strength when discovering a solution (e.g. it allows me to ignore distracting details) at some point ideas need to be sold and this requires that my customers or colleagues completely understand what I have in mind.
   
2. I don't like solving problems where success is hard to measure. If an owner or executive is facing a difficult business problem, but he doesn't really understand his goals or objective in solving that problem, I usually don't want to take the challenge on. I avoid these situations because I worry that: a) Without a clear measurable objective no solution is really going to solve the business problem. b) If it does solve the problem, the inability to measure success will make success impossible to confirm. This leads to me turning down some business, which can be frustrating, but for me it is a precaution worth taking.
3. I don't like complicated solutions, but sometimes they are required. I like problems with simple, elegant solutions. This, for example, is why I'm a fan of the products Apple makes. Steve Jobs and Co. always seem to discover the simplest answer to a problem. I try to do the same with website strategy. Unfortunately, simple solutions are not always possible. Yet, I am very reluctant to adopt a complex solution, even when it is the best solution to a problem. This can be a challenge. Fortunately, simple solutions are the best solutions for most business problems.

I'd say the above list of strengths and weaknesses are the most relevant to my role as a web strategy consultant and website designer. Of course, I have other strengths and weaknesses totally unrelated to my role as a web strategy consultant and thus largely irrelevant.

Overall, while I may not be suited to every type of career, I believe that my strengths are a good match for a person providing consulting services, and that my weaknesses are also compatible with what is expected from a web strategy consultant and website designer.

Why Did I Leave Microsoft?

I left Microsoft because I saw an opportunity to spend more of my time working on the things important to me, namely, volunteer activity. Microsoft provided excellent income and an opportunity to help others in one particular setting. However, for me there is a point beyond which secular work provides diminishing returns.

By leaving Microsoft, I was hoping to work up to the point of satisfaction, and no more. My goal was to use the remaining time in even more rewarding activities.

I did not leave Microsoft feeling that the work was not enjoyable. In fact, I really enjoyed the time I spent there, especially towards the end, and I enjoyed the people that I worked with. In particular my manager was fun, friendly, and cared about the personal well-being of each member of his team. Leaving the people and work atmosphere I had become so comfortable with was probably the hardest part of departing.

However, when I compare what I was trying to accomplish, with what has occurred, so far it is a success. I only pray it continues this way. For example, since leaving, I have had more time to pursue volunteer activity. My freedom to relocate has allowed me to move to help out on a volunteer project thousands of miles from Redmond, Washington. I've also been able to help others through this company. So in many ways the decision to leave Microsoft has provided blessings.

How Do I Make money?

Paid services I offer to generate income.

Summary: In order of importance, I generate income off of three types of paid services: website reviews, educational classes, and implementing design improvements to existing client websites.

All of the resources on this website are free with no advertisements. Consequently, I have been asked on multiple occasions, 'How exactly do I make money?'

In the table below, I provide a brief explanation of the free and paid services offered on this website and through my consulting company.

Free Services	Paid Services
Educational Articles on this website discussing frustrations website owners and executives commonly face as they try to grow sales.	Website Reviews in which I analyze your website to identify changes that will accomplish the goals you tell me you're hoping to reach.
Statistics and Research I share to help website owners and executives measure their website's performance.	Classes in Web Strategy to teach attendees common causes for website failure.
Video Reviews of selected websites to teach lessons in website strategy.	Design Improvements to existing websites to help you build features on your website to address problems your website is facing.

The free resources on this website are offered as a way for website owners and executives to self-improve their websites without paying outside consultants.

For most websites, the free resources should be enough to help you identify why your website isn't performing well and to discover your own solutions.

However, sometimes business owners and executives need direct interaction and discussion. When this is necessary, then my paid services are used.