Internet Marketing: 10 Deadly Sins of a Poorly Designed Website

Face it. There are tons of websites out there but very few that actually pull their weight and get results. Effective website design is not easy. If it was, every business that put up a website would realize enormous success. It takes many different skill sets to pull together a killer website.

That being said, here is a list of website design sins for your edification. Consider these deeply and I highly recommend you make sure your website doesn’t commit them.

Website Sin # 1 – Website does not have a crystal clear objective. Why do you have or want to have a website in the first place? What do you want it to do for your business?

Website Sin #2 – No clear call to action. This sin dovetails on the previous one. Once you are clear on your website’s objective, make it real clear to your visitor what action you want them to take. Clearly spell it out. Trust me, leave no room for interpretation.

Website Sin #3 – Website does not have a means to capture visitor’s contact information. You are missing a tremendous opportunity to gather prospects who are clearly interested in what you have to offer – hence qualified prospects to market to going forward. Do whatever it takes here. Offer what we call an “ethical bribe” in exchange for their contact information.

Website Sin #4 – Website doesn’t give visitors a reason to come back. Unless your website is a one-time sales website, you must keep it chock full of new and great content to keep it producing for you.

Website Sin #5 – Website has no substance, all style. Dovetailing on the previous sin, focus should be more on adding valuable content as opposed to having flashy animations. Flashy animations may wow your visitors once (if you’re lucky), but great content starts building a relationship or dare I say a dependency on you. Bottom line you’re adding value to your prospects.

Website Sin #6 - Website has an “it’s all about me” mentality. Keep the copy conversational in tone and focus clearly on what’s in it for your visitor. Make them feel that it’s all about them – make them feel special.

Website Sin #7 - Website is inconsistent with your “Brand”. Your website does not have to be the best looking site out there. It is far more critical to be consistent (same overall look, feel and design as your other marketing materials).


These next three sins are absolutely inexcusable and should not require much explanation. Nothing will frustrate your visitor more and detract from your credibility faster.

Website Sin #8 – Poor or inconsistent navigation. Don’t make people think. Make it real easy for visitors to find what they are looking for.

Website Sin #9 – Dead links. This is a credibility killer. Always do what you say you’re going to do. It is amazing what people can read into a dead link – the worst being that you simply don’t care enough about you visitor.

Website Sin #10 – Slow website. I know, it’s hard to believe but not everyone is using high speed broadband Internet connections yet. A little compassion here goes a long way.
 

Why Build a Website?

A website: What is it really? Is it a virtual brochure or a portfolio of your work, or is it a marketing tool to showcase your services or products to customers around the world. A website is undoubtedly one of the most important marketing tools these days. It is the company image, a catalog and a portfolio of the company. With the cut-throat competition and paradigm shift, website is of great significance in the marketing of the business on the World Wide Web. The website is representation of t
1.Promotion of a business

A website can bring wonders to your business, it can promote your business to millions of customers around the globe. Although marketing being the backbone of business, a website plays a very crucial role in the promotion of the business. It helps the business to transcend the barriers of time and distance. It acts as a brochure and a marketing tool to make your customers aware of your services/products anytime and anywhere in their own convenience.

2.Communicate your message

Communication is an integral part of any business success today. Through with the help of a website, you can communicate your message economically and effectively. Whatever be your message is, whether it would be commercial, social or personnel, your website is available to your customers/users 24 hrs a day in order to act upon your message.

3.Communicate with your customers

Make your presence felt among your customers whether they are in your town, country or out of continent, a website is an excellent way to provide comprehensive information to your customers about your services or products in a more tranquil and peaceful environment than in a traditional form of an advertisement. Even you can keep in touch with your customers via mailing list, RSS or simply visit your website.

4.Facilitate knowledge-building

A website can be outstanding tool to share knowledge among the employees. It can be used as a tool to facilitate knowledge building and share important information knowledge among the employees. It can also be used as forums, where people can exchange questions and answers and can post their queries to get an answer.

5.A sales tool outside the office

Your website can act as a sales tool that works 24 hrs 365 days of the year. Whether you are going to announce a press release or planning to introduce new services and products in the market or going to enter in to an alliance with the leading company. The corporate website of your company makes your clients or customers updated with the latest events in your organization thus making them updated with your products and services.

6.Reach an international market

If you have decided to enter in to the international market, it will be highly beneficial to launch a websites for that market also. The website will cater to their specific needs and expectations of that particular market. The regional flavor of the website can help to earn loyalty of the customers and make them feel closer to your company, its services and products.

7.Improve Branding

The brand can be defined as an emotional bond between a company, products/services and customers. It is a way to set apart your products, service or company from its competitors, and infuse loyalty among customers or clients. The content, style, presentation and tools such as Newsletters and press release allow you to separate from the crowd. It helps to make your visitor feel good about the organization its products and build loyalty.

Digital Photography Tip #1: Don’t Assume that DigiCams Do All The Work!

Maybe you have heard something like this before: “The better the cameras, the better the photos.” In this effect, you might have thought of digital cameras. Many believe that these models are just a one-click away for great photos. Do you also believe on this?

Ponder on the following article and the appropriate answer will be revealed to you.

The rivalry between film cameras and digital cameras is relatively fresh. How come? Three mega pixels digital cameras have an array of choices for consumers, which is already comparable to a high quality point and shoot models. Nowadays, the same thing goes with five mega pixels digital models for excellent quality photographs. The thing is, quality photographs can be taken with ease using digital cameras.

Some of the main advantages to digital photography are:

• pictures can be previewed immediately on the built-in LCD screen
• costs of installing films are replaced with memory sticks or cards that are primarily reusable and can store thousands of pictures
• the stored photographs can easily be shared by copying off the images and/or sharing the memory stick or card
• images can easily be transformed into black and white and/or sepia and can also be cropped after the picture has been taken

However, photos under low light and taken using film and digital models are both susceptible to artifacts or granularity. Images taken by both cameras appear to be very similar can be further improved with the advent of software that can improve and manipulate the quality and details of images.
Furthermore, you can take lousy shots with the most expensive Nikon models and make great photos with the passé point and shoot cameras. It suffices to say that it is not the camera that solely makes great and even picture-perfect images. The man behind the camera can squeeze or miss a big time out of the gadget that he has.

The following presents a ten-point aid that will enable you to take photos like a pro using your digital cameras. Practice on these tips so you can maximize the expense of your gadget.

1. Those Tones Should Warm Up

Change your white balance setting from auto to cloudy when shooting sunny landscapes and outdoor portraits. This increases the yellow and red tones, thus resulting in warmer and richer pictures.

2. Use a [Sunglass] Polarizer

A polarizer should always come in handy when taking those general outdoor shooting. Polarized shots have more saturated and richer colors because unwanted reflections and glare are minimized or even removed.

If your digital camera can not accommodate a polarizer, simply place a sunglass as close to the camera lens as possible making sure that the rims of the glass will not be taken along with the image. The effect of a polarizer can be maximized when the light source is perpendicular to the object.

3. Shining Outdoor Portraits

One of the most useful and amazing features of digital cameras is the flash on or fill flash mode. This feature allows you to take control when to use the flash. It simply goes on whenever you want it available. This helps in capturing great outdoor photographs.

The camera exposes for the background first then adds enough flash to illuminate the subject when you are using the flash on option. Wedding photographers have been using this technique for many years to create professional looking portraits where everything in the composition is simply excellent.

To come up with a more relaxed photograph, try putting the subject under the shade and use the flash to add illumination.

You can also practice on using rim lighting where the sun illuminates the hair of the subject from the side or the back.

However, you should not stand that far away when using the fill flash since most built-in models have a range of 10 feet or even less.

4. Macro Mode Frenzy

I am quite sure that you would want to look at the fine details of your surroundings but would not be willing to crouch down and lie on the ground with your belly.

In that case, you just have to look for the macro made or close up symbol, usually a flower icon, and get as close to an object as possible. Once the confirmation light signals you to shoot, just press the shutter down to record the portrait.

However, using the close up mode allows you to have a shallow depth so you can concentrate on the part of the subject that you want to emphasize and let the rest go soft.

5. Chaos of the Horizon Line

There are still photographers who become disoriented when lining up their shoots. In other words, once they look at their cameras monitor, images that are erect seem to be a little tilted or bowed inward.

The most appropriate way to take care of this matter is to take your best shot at a straight picture, then take another picture after repositioning the camera. Afterwards, you can delete the others once you feel you captured a perfectly aligned image.

Also, just practice level framing your shots until you become acquainted with the process.

6. Massive Media Card

You have to have an extra memory card especially when you want more moments to preserve. The following suggestions should be considered before buying a memory card:
a. for 3 mega pixels – a 256 MB memory card
b. for 4 mega pixels – a 512 MB memory card
c. for 6 mega pixels – 1 gigabyte memory card

Then you do not have to miss another shot because your card is full.

7. Not High Resolution All the Time

It is more advisable to squeeze more images by shooting a low quality and resolution settings than taking shots with a high resolution all the time. This way you can reserve a space and a 2272 x 1704 resolution on the next great image of the century and enough for the portrait to be printed on a 8” x 10” inch paper suitable for framing.

However, if you have enough memory (and you should), there is no reason to shoot at a lower resolution and risk missing the chance to display your work the big way.

8. Tolerate that Tripod

Tripods are “unnecessarily bulky” for some so seldom do people like to bring them around.

Nowadays, there is an ingenious way to settle the dilemma whether to bring a tripod around or to do without it. The UltraPod II™ developed by Pedco fits in your back pocket and holds your camera steady in various situations.

You can use the Velcro™ strap to attach your camera on a tree limb or an available pole. Its legs can be opened on any flat surface or even on a boulder.

Now, you can be a real photographer without carrying a heavy burden.

9. The Fun with Self Timer

Another under-used feature on almost every digital camera is the self timer. This function can be used to save the photographer for missing the picture by delaying the firing of the shutter up to 10 seconds.

You can attach your UltraPod™ to ensure that your camera will not be taken away that easily by some strangers. Of course, you need to aim at the subject and not at a distant background before setting up the timer. Also the depth of the subject should be checked too.

By using self timers, you can also avoid accidentally jarring the camera when you are interested in making long exposures of cars driving at dusk as you initiate the focus.

10. Slow Motions

Normally, you will use an exposure of one second or a bit longer to create the flowing effect of water. In this case, you have to look for waterfalls or streams that are under the shade.

One trick is to use a polarizer or your sunglasses to darken the scene and create a longer exposure. More so, this technique can also eliminate distractions from your portrait.

For a really good photographer, which implies using creativity and ingenuity, viewers often get curious and ask, “What sort of camera model do you have there?”

Would it be more humbling for them to hear that you are using a normal aim and shoot model?

Or you can simply say, “Model ME.”

Your Choice of Digital Photography Printing

Printing your shots into paper is the next important thing in digital photography. And the best photo shot will not be given justice if you have not used the proper printing equipments for it. To be able to do justice to the photos that you took digitally, a good printer will really make the prints come to life.

The existence of various types of digital camera paved the way for different types of printers to be developed. Manufacturers know that printing photos is way different from printing plain prints. That is why they are always coming up with printing abilities that would suit digital photo prints well.

Nowadays, there are a lot of ways to have digital photography printed. Each printing methods and techniques have their own advantages and disadvantages. It is best to know what these things so that you will know what to have and what to avoid when having your photos printed.Here are some digital photography printing choices:

1. Photo store.

The old style of bringing your film to a photo store for developing is still practiced today. The only difference is that films are not anymore used. You just need to bring with you your digital camera and the photo shop will print your photos for you.

An advantage in using photo stores is that they are complete with highly advanced machines you might not have at home. In addition, they know a lot of tips and tricks to make your photos appear its best. Plus, the photo store has the capability to edit your photos if you feel that it does not suit your taste. You only have to give the specific instructions and they will do the rest.

The disadvantage with using photo stores is the waiting period. Even if it does not take as long as it does with films, you still need to wait sometime before your photos are printed. Another disadvantage is that the printing machine they are using may not be the type that you want your photos printed on. So it is better to be very clear about the printing equipment that you want them to use so that this problem will be prevented.

2. Home printer.

This is fast becoming one of the most popular methods of printing digital photos. More and more people are getting their own printers installed at home so that they can print their photos anytime they feel like it.

This way, you can edit your own photos and compile them in your own private collection before you start printing them out. You only have to make sure that you have the proper printer for your digital photos if you want them to turn out the way you expect them to be.

With home printers, you do not have to wait in line for your photos to be printed. All that is needed is for your camera to be plugged in directly to your computer. From there, you can print the photos in no time.

The only drawback in home printers is that you have no other choice of printing process to use. The printed copies will depend on the kind of printing that you use.

With digital photography printing, you definitely have a choice. Just choose the one that you think will give you the perfect photo with minimal hassles and headaches.

Backing Up Outlook Express And Other Files

Has your computer ever crashed on you? I don’t mean the normal everyday, “I’m a Microsoft Product so I must shutdown” crashes, I mean really crashed where you cannot boot back up. Where your hard drive just quit working or some other major problem made you lose all of your data.

It’s like losing your wallet. Losing your money isn’t so bad, but all that time getting new ID, credit cards, and other important papers is aggravating. On your computer there is a lot of data we take for granted every day.

Documents we have created, music we have downloaded, pictures we have saved, and so much more. Most people know its wise to back up those items onto a CD-ROM or onto storage space somewhere on the web, but what are some of the other things you should be backing up?

Do you allow cookies to be stored on your computer to remember your login information for websites that you visit a lot? Then you also need to find the “cookies” folder on your computer and back that up as well. In Windows 98 its in C:\windows\cookies. In Windows XP,its in C:\documents and settings\username\cookies.

Do you know all of your passwords by heart? Do you use a program to manage passwords? If you use a program, find it, probably in program files, and back up the files inside that folder that related to your saved password files. If you ever have to reinstall that program you can re-add those files into the new folder and have all of your old password files.

If you do not use a program, you need to have a system of recovering those passwords if your computer ever quits on you. If you do not have one, create one and add all of your new passwords you create to it. Don’t put it in your wallet.

Hit F3 on your computer and select search for files on C Drive. Type in (*).PWL(*) without the parenthesis. It’s the asterisk dot pwl asterisk with no spaces. Hit search and windows will find all of the password files for you. To find them manually, check C:\windows. Back up those files if you want your computer logins to remain the same.

What about your email? Not just the saved email, but the entire folder structure you spent time creating, your address book, and your account information with all of the right settings to send and receive email. You will want to back these up whenever you do all of your other backups.

First, how to backup all of the email and folder structure in Outlook Express. Open Outlook Express. Go to tools, options, maintenance. There will be a button there that says “store folder”. Click on that. Highlight the entire path that comes up in the little text box. Now hit cancel and cancel to close all popups.

Click on “start” in your task bar. Go to run. Paste the path you just copied into the text box and hit enter. A folder will open. Go to edit, select all, then go to edit again and select “copy”. Now close that folder. Right click on your computer desktop, select new, folder.Rename that folder “mailbackup”. Open that folder. Go to edit, paste.

Leave that folder open so you can backup your mail account settings and information. Now go back to Outlook Express. Go to tools, accounts, mail. You will do the following for each mail account you have. Highlight one account, Click Export. Browse to where the mailbackup file is on your desktop and export it into there. Once you do that with each account, you can cancel out of the open dialog boxes.

Now, for your address book. Go to Outlook Express one more time. Go to export. Choose address book. Choose text file. Browse again to the mailbackup folder and export it to there.

Now using winzip or other file compression utility, you can zip the mailbackup folder up and back it up to CD-ROM or to an online storage place. Make a schedule of backing these things I have included in the article. Consider it insurance against a hard drive crash. Believe me, if you use the web a lot, you’d almost rather lose your wallet than lose all of your computer data.

Five Ways to Make Money Using Your Digital Camera

Have you ever wanted to find a way to bring extra money into your household--yet don’t have a lot of time to spend on a full-time endeavor? The solution is as close as the digital camera sitting there in a drawer. The following suggestions are only a few of the many ways you can make money in your spare time with your camera.
* Pet photos - Most owners won't struggle to take a photograph with their pet all by themselves. You can be the one who makes it easy on them. Not only can you charge for the service and your time, but you can offer the photograph in it's digital form or as a print that you can mail to them later - either created by your own photo printer or by a photo processing service.*Graduations - preschool, high school, or college graduations offer dozens, if not hundreds of opportunities to capture a significant moment in someone's life. If the family members of the graduate aren't located in as good a location or don't have as good a camera as yourself - you'll have even greater opportunity at getting the shots they couldn't.
*Holiday Family Postcards - offer your services to families that want their picture taken and put on a postcard that they can send to their extended family and friends.
*Photo Novelty Items - take photographs of people that want the pictures of themselves of their loved ones imprinted on coffee mugs, mouse pads, key chains, tee-shirts, and other items.
*Newborn photo service - parents of newborns are some of the busiest people in the world. Advertise your services on an on-call basis so that you can take informal snapshots for the growing family either before they leave the hospital, or after they get home. This way both parents and the child can be in more of the pictures all together, and the parents have one less thing to try and figure out

Tips in making a nice wedding photo

Brides and grooms alike are now enlisting the expertise of professionals to get the best digital wedding photography for that special occasion. And why not? They would surely want to have the best photo taken so that the memories will be preserved as long as they live.

More and more people are now shifting to the use of digital cameras to take pictures of their wedding. One of the reasons for this is that the quality is better compared to the traditional camera. Another reason is that the photos can be stored not only in their hard-bound albums but also on albums online.

Today, people are more dependent on their computers than ever before. With computers, they can easily upload their wedding pictures and share them with family and friends all over the world. You do not have to rely on snail mails just to send your pictures. They are being sent and viewed the minute you have them in your computer.

This is one of the many advantages of digital photography. If taken properly, you are assured that you and you partner will never regret having used digital photography for your wedding pictures.Below are some of the tips to get the best digital photography for your wedding.

1. Choose the right background.

Photos can really look great once they are shot with the perfect background. You can use the decorations in the church and in the reception areas as a back draft for your photos. Be sure to fix some scattered decorations so that they will appear simply perfect on photos.

Always remind the photographer to check if the view is good when taking pictures. It does not mean that you have to stand on the same corner or place. The best photographer is able to make even the simplest of background look great on photo if it is taken in the right angle.

2. Look out for any kinds of glass.

Glasses tend to cause reflections in photos. May it be an eyeglass, window or wine glasses. One way or another, they will cause a reflection or brightness to reflect back on the camera it is included in the picture.

To avoid this, the position of the camera can be altered so that it will not directly hit the glass. The photo can be taken sideways or downwards but never on eye level.

3. The perfect timing.

Persons being photographed should not always be looking at the camera. And they do not have to be smiling at the lens too.

One way of doing it is to wait for the right moment so that you can have a candid shot at them. You will see that catching persons on film when they are in their candid state is much better than having them wearing a fixed expression. Candid moments make photos look real and natural.
4. Review each photo.

To maximize the memory that your digital camera has, it is best to review every shot taken. There might be duplicates that can be removed so that you can free more space for a different shot.

You will probably want the best and the maximum number of digital wedding photography shots so you need to make the most of the capacity of the digital camera.

The best wedding photography is made even better now with digital cameras. This is one thing that you definitely should have on your special day.

A Guide to Professional Styles and Techniques in the Art of Digital Wedding Photography

When people get sentimental, they usually flip albums and look at the pictures that depict the things that happened in their lives. These pictures are not simply pieces of colored papers with images for they can trigger deeply-seated emotions. Emotions vary depending on the memories attached to these images seen and preserved.

One of the moments that most people would really love to preserve is the tick of events on their wedding day.

For this reason, people even decide to hire professional photographers to capture the important moments of their lives. However, these photographers may not always advise the client to strike a pose. They are expected to wait patiently to be able to catch memorable portraits. Most photographers that are employed for weddings have assistants so that they can maximize their strategy in creating an album that will not regrettable. What if you would also want to take pictures of a friend’s wedding?

Here are a few basic techniques and styles for anyone who wants to capture the said event using a digital camera:

1. If you want to take a picture of a couple or any intended target, make sure that the background is good and the environment is not so crowded.
2. If there is a nice background but it is hard to focus on the couple, you may shoot them from shoulder up.
3. If some of the guests are wearing glasses, they can be advised to stand tilt their heads a little down or sideways to avoid the glaring effect that normally appears when the flash is used.
4. If there is a couple or a group that you wish to include in the picture, you should zoom in or out of the picture.
5. You must not shoot a couple or any guest against the light so that dark images will not appear
6. Candid shots are also dramatic. These portraits reveal more than the quality of the picture itself. In fact, many professionals do this to capture intimate and memorable moments.
7. You should be alert at all times since you can seldom ask individuals to pose
again for you.
8. Your digital camera should be equipped with appropriate memory cards or sticks to ensure that no great moment is missed.

In other words, you have to have an extra memory card especially when you want more moments to preserve. The following suggestions should be considered before buying a memory card:

a. for 3 mega pixels – a 256 MB memory card
b. for 4 mega pixels – a 512 MB memory card
c. for 6 mega pixels – 1 gigabyte memory card

9. You are not advised to use low resolutions if the images will be displayed and
hung later.

Just always remember that the higher the resolution utilized, the larger the size of prints that can be made.

10. Keep a copy of your best works so you can use and reuse the techniques that
made your viewers smile and appreciate your creation more.

You can do this by saving albums on your personal computer to free up the space in your memory card. You may also use other software to enhance the quality of the prints to be made.

Photography is truly a wonderful art. Wedding is a wonderful event. The union of these things will trigger emotions and memories in the long run more so if images are captured and preserved well. They all depend on your camera and your love for this art and the couple.

Top Five Mistakes To Avoid When Choosing ERP Software

1. Not Knowing What You Really Need in ERP Software

Before diving right into choosing a solution, take the time to understand what you really need. To begin with, determine whether you need fully integrated ERP software or best-of-breed software. This will often depend on the issues you are trying to solve or the opportunities you are trying to capture, as well as the size and structure of your company. For example, if you’re a small to mid-sized company with limited budget and limited resources, then you’ll probably want to consider a fully integrated ERP software system. This type of system will allow you to streamline your processes and achieve improved productivity at a lower cost and with fewer resources.

Take into consideration that, in order to efficiently implement and use best-of-breed solutions, you will need extensive knowledge of both the business rules and the database constructs within each application of your business processes. This is due to the fact that all of your individual systems need to run in unison in order for your data to be consistent and accurate throughout your operations. If you’re not prepared to deal with the sometimes overwhelming task of creating your own interface between disparate systems, then fully integrated ERP software is your better choice.

Unless your needs are very narrow, expect to experience a significantly lower total cost of ownership (TCO) with fully integrated ERP software in comparison to best-of-breed solutions. Using separate best-of-breed solutions can often drastically increase your overall license and implementation costs, not to mention reduce overall operating efficiencies. With a best-of-breed solution, you may not be protected from version obsolescence, which can result in additional investment later on. Additionally, support of your operations can be hindered as you manage problems across multiple vendors.

The best fit for many small to mid-sized companies is often fully integrated ERP software. However, the solution needs to fit most, if not all, of your key business requirements – no small task for a single application. To overcome this obstacle, choose a partner with industry specialization who can help to ensure that your most critical business requirements are met.

2. Not Recognizing the Uniqueness of Your Business

Every industry is unique. Lack of industry specialized capabilities within your software is a common cause of failure for an ERP software implementation. Often “horizontal” solutions that serve many different industries need to be significantly customized in order to fit your business model and to integrate with your other internal systems. Take caution that while initial license and maintenance fees can sometimes appear lower, these generic solutions can often result in increased costs due to extensive customization requirements, upgrades, ongoing maintenance, and longer system deployment timeframes; reducing and delaying your overall return on investment.

Avoid choosing software that limits your capabilities and your company’s growth. Your software should enhance your business, not hinder it. The software you choose should have the specialized capabilities necessary to address all of the business requirements of your company and your industry, not just some of them. For an industry tailored solution, find a provider who offers specialized software for your industry and therefore will be able to provide the most beneficial solution for your business needs. Your solution should be specifically tailored for your business and industry and your provider should know your industry as well as you do; enabling them to make recommendations. By choosing an ERP software solution that is specialized for your industry, you will be able to get a specific targeted solution to meet your unique business needs. The right solution will deliver improved efficiencies, reduced costs, enhanced revenues and profitability, and faster ROI.3. Not Choosing the Most Qualified ERP Software Vendor

When shopping for ERP software, choosing the right vendor can make the difference between a successful implementation and ending up with one that falls short on satisfying your business needs. One of the most common mistakes in vendor selection is choosing an ERP software vendor who doesn’t know your business. Decision makers are often under the misconception that choosing software by a “big name” provider will equal a big return on investment (ROI). However, most big name providers are often too big to offer specialized industry knowledge for any specific industry. Avoid putting yourself in a situation where you have to teach your ERP software partner your business. Choosing a partner who already has an in-depth understanding of your industry will help you achieve more rapid deployment, be more cost effective, and be more efficient with the use of your ERP software solution. In many cases, resellers will have to learn your business and then retrofit a customized solution to meet your specific needs, which ultimately costs you more money. Find a partner who is using best practices, not just generic business process flows, in your industry.

Avoid vendors who are not in sync with where your industry is going. Instead, look for a partner who both knows your industry and knows where your industry’s future is headed. Your vendor should be very knowledgeable with new industry standards and incorporate related processes into their standard ERP software solution to handle these requirements, such as RFID. This will save you money by eliminating the need to customize your solution to fit standardized industry requirements. Additionally, the vendor you choose for your ERP software should ensure that solution licenses are all encompassing for any unique and necessary modules, such as EDI, RFID, and chargeback management.

Plan on having a long-term relationship with your ERP software partner. Be leery of vendors who want to implement your system and run; you want the vendor to grow with you so you can continue to grow your business. Responsive product support, ongoing product releases, and user forums such as on-line bulletin boards and user conferences are all essential business tools and services that your vendor should offer if they are looking to build lasting relationships.

4. Not Giving ERP Software Implementation the Attention It Needs

A common problem during ERP software implementation is the lack of a committed Project Manager on the customer’s part. The majority of successful implementations occur when the customer’s Project Manager dedicates 80-90% of their time to the implementation project. The role of the Project Manager is to streamline the process and keep things in check. When you’re investing your money and time into implementing a system that will enhance the performance of your business, isn’t it worth dedicating someone to making sure it’s done right?

Lack of commitment and support from the top is another area where companies fall short. The President or other top executive of the company should be involved. This does not by any means refer to them leading the day-to-day activities of the project, that’s what the dedicated Project Manager is for, but more so to their being involved in status meetings. A solid commitment from the top will flow through the organization to make implementation of your new ERP software a success.

Not documenting your business process flows when implementation is complete is another common ERP software mistake. The most successful transition can be achieved when there is written documentation for each department. This enables the company to continue to conduct business at its maximum potential during transition and learning. And, in the event that an employee leaves or changes positions within the company, the next person stepping into the position can learn the job more quickly and do the job more efficiently if there’s documentation at hand that serves as instant training.

Don’t assume that your employees’ training needs have been met by combining the implementation with the initial training provided by the vendor. This is another common misconception that can lead to failure of your new ERP software solution. It is imperative that employees continue to receive training after the software has been implemented, even with documentation that helps support employee training. Once the new system is live, users should have continued follow up training, whether it be every 4, 6, or even 8 months. This will enable your company to identify any implementation areas that may not have been needed at the time of deployment, but which have become necessary later on.

Proper and thorough testing is another common oversight when implementing ERP software. It is necessary to perform “a day in the life” test where users from each department of your organization do their job using real data. Walking through the complete process with a pseudo-real order while still in testing will allow you and your users to identify any errors or misunderstanding in the process flows before live deployment. In many cases, problems will be discovered during this testing process that may require some minor modifications before going live. In order to minimize errors after deployment and maximize the potential of your new ERP software, it is crucial to test all of your data, procedures and processes before launch.

5. Not Investing in ERP Software for the Long-Term

When choosing ERP software, be realistic about your expectations and perceptions of cost - you’re making an investment to improve or enhance your business. So, while hard dollars spent are important, the key is choosing the right ERP software and the right partner who will provide you with a fast and effective implementation, high ROI, and low TCO after implementation. While human nature tends to lead us down the path to the bargain deal - we often do this at home, not just at work - with ERP software, what appears to be the lowest cost solution often results in the greatest long term cost. When securing proposals, if you find a vendor’s quote to be far below that of other vendors you are considering, chances are the deal is too good to be true.

Use your intuition and good business judgment when comparing provider costs. Look for applications that support your ability to achieve your company’s primary strategic goals. Work within your budget, but make sure you know what you’re getting up front and anticipate with your provider when you can expect to start seeing a return on your investment. Hasty decisions in favor of the lowest cost ERP software provider or solution may leave you plagued later with hidden costs, and delay or eliminate any ROI for your business.