The big problem for me is the user-interface. I don’t know of any other successful website that has done less in 15 years. Granted, it seems to work for this giant, but aren’t we ready for the next craigslist?

Here’s what I want to see in a classifieds website:

• Help me sell my items. There are billions of things you can sell, but it would be really cool if there was a system that helped create your ad by asking you questions about the product/service. For instance, if I was selling my wood dining room table I would select a furniture category, choose table from a drop-down, then maybe specify dining room table, then specify the material, then how many chairs, add some photos (more than four if I’d like), and finally some open-ended comments. Half of the battle of posting is coming up with the ad.
• Help me find specific items. If sellers chose from a specific set of questions, then I would have more to search from. If I wanted a red, woman’s, 10-speed bicycle, then I can search for that through elimination lists.
• Stop the scams (or at least the majority), before they are listed. Does it mention eBay motors? It doesn’t get posted. Is there lots of bad grammar, it gets reviewed, first. If there are words or phrases that continuously get marked as scams, then there should be a warning system to let users know or for moderators to review.
• Prettier. I want beautiful navigation, search pages and listings.

Now all of this will cost money and I don’t mind the classified making money from advertising. Craigslist turned down banner ads. Ads are not the problem, layout is the problem. If I can’t find what I’m looking for, relevant ads might be exactly what need.

There are a few alternatives to craigslist out there. I haven’t reviewed these, yet, but might do that soon.

• eBay Classifieds – Will eBay Classifieds take out craigslist? With eBay’s minority ownership in craigslist, and as it’s biggest competition, it seems like an antitrust case waiting to happen. Otherwise, they have the resources to be the next leader in online classifieds.
• Oodle – Looks promising and lots of rave reviews. I’ll have to try it out. (Sidenote: MySpace Classifieds are wrapped into Oodle.)
• Facebook Marketplace – Facebook might take over the world. The marketplace is not brilliant, yet, but I can see this taking off since so many people spend lots of time on Facebook already.
• Yellow Pages – Focused on services and brick and mortar businesses.
• Classified Ads – Paid ads take up a large amount of screen real estate.
• Backpage – Very similar to craigslist, with a smaller community.
• USFreeAds – Possibly uglier than craigslist.
• Domestic Sale – Small community.

What online classified features do you want to see?

Photo by LucasTheExperience used under CC license

I’ve always enjoyed writing. And I’ve wanted to start blogging for the better part of a decade. But, I just now started. There was always an excuse not to start.

Here are the ones I used:

1. Not enough time. Between school, work, marriage and having a kid, I always felt like I didn’t have the time. It’s not that I have any more time now than I did before, but I finally carved out an hour out of my day to write. Sometimes it’s early in the morning after the dog nudged me a awake and everyone else is still sleeping. Other times it’s at lunch or right before I go to bed. I tried to plan writing time by penciling it in on my calendar, but I found that I was too tired after my regular job and not motivated.
2. Higher priorities. So, maybe the newborn baby was a higher priority and then the couple of moves, etc. But, what it comes down to is I just wasn’t making the time. I still vote time and attention to high priorities, just not all of my time.
3. Not good enough. I’ve had a fear for some time that nobody will like my writing. I finally overcame this after reading a couple of blogs about writers with the same complex. I realized it’s not unique to me and I’ll probably find an audience, eventually. But if not, I enjoy writing.
4. Perfection. I wanted the perfect website (I design them, after all), the perfect story ideas and the perfect audience. While I was busy planning and designing and redesigning, other people were writing what I wanted to say. This is why planning is overrated. I finally just said, enough, and designed and built a simple layout. It’s not perfect, but I’ll improve it over time.

After many years, I’ve finally started blogging. Now the trick will be to keep blogging.

Why aren’t you blogging?

It’s not that planning is bad for business. It’s just that it’s been taken too far. I see communication specialists putting together pages of research that took months to compile to decide whether or not to utilize AdWords. Even more disturbing, I’ve seen IT documents run into the hundreds of pages for a single project.

Three reasons not to plan:

1. Actions provide results to improve upon. I know a guy who is brilliant. Yet, he wants his plan to be perfect before he acts. If he would just launch his product after half the planning, he could learn a lot more in a day from the feedback of users than he could in a month from research. Who would have thought craigslist would have been such a hit with the simplistic layout and sketchy ads?
2. Your instincts tell you to act. If you have a gut feeling that your business would generate a lot of business through Groupon, do a bit of research, then try it out. Don’t blow the bank on a feeling. Some ideas might only require an investment of a little time to build a prototype or a mock-up that can be tested in the wild.
3. Your competitors are acting. If the other reasons didn’t move you to action, this one should. While you are planning, your competitors are making money, generating leads, or increasing brand awareness. They are getting feedback, learning and already improving their tactics. If you’re still planning, they are widening the gap.

When I feel 80% good about a strategy, I give it a shot so I can learn how to improve or pull the plug.  You’ll never be 100% sure and trying to get that last 20% will cost you valuable time and money.

Have you ever planned too much and paid for it?

Social Media Response Flow Chart

If you’re going to use social media, then embrace commenting. Don’t just tolerate comments. Don’t just accept comments. Interact. Comment back.

If you are a company of one person, you may not need a policy for responding. Otherwise, before answering comments, develop some rules to live by. If you’re too busy, you can download the Social Media Response Flow Chart I already created for you.

Some things to remember when responding:

• Be positive. Respond in a friendly, upbeat, yet professional tone. Correct mistakes politely. Do not argue, insult or blame others.
• Be transparent. State your name and position with the business. This is your chance to personalize and humanize your business.
• Be honest. Own up to problems and mistakes. Inform customers when and how you will improve the situation.
• Be timely. Response times should be no longer than 24 hours.
• Be helpful. Point users to valuable information on your website or other approved websites. Follow up with users when new information is available.

Rarely. And I mean rarely, should you delete a comment. If you delete a comment, make sure it clearly violates your comment policy. Don’t have a comment policy? Check out why you need a comment policy here.

Something else to remember is not everything needs a response. Only respond to comments where you can add value such as correcting misinformation or serving the customer.

Make sure that the person who is answering questions is accountable, passionate, has the time to devote to responding and has the authority necessary to most comments. Make sure you have a plan in place to elevate high-risk comments such as a widespread problem, reoccurring problems or influential negative feedback.

What does your social media policy look like?

Before you do anything, it’s a good idea to have a clearly posted policy for commenting. If you delete comments first, then you run the risk of closing the communication channel that you are trying to create. Sure, if the comment is outright vulgar, illegal or pure spam, you can delete without much fear of repercussion. (Unless you are a government agency, but that’s for another post.) But, if the comment is simply negative publicity, then a comment policy will help to determine whether or not it is allowed.

Sample policy

[Company Name] encourages users to share comments, questions and concerns on our blog and social media websites. Comments posted by users do not necessarily reflect the views of [Company Name] or our employee’s.

We reserve the right to delete or not allow comments that contain:

• Vulgar or abusive language;
• Personal or obscene attacks;
• Offensive terms targeting individuals or groups;
• Threats or defamatory statements;
• Suggestions or encouragement of illegal activity;
• Multiple, successive, off-topic posts by a single user or repetitive post copied and pasted by multiple users;
• Copyright or trademark infringements;
• Unsolicited proposals or other business ideas or inquiries;
• Promotion or endorsement of commercial services, products, or entities; or
• Violations of third-party social network terms, when applicable.

To delete, or not to delete?

Even with a clear policy, you shouldn’t be quick to delete. Think about it for a second. Why are you participating in social media? (Don’t have a plan? Think about your online strategy, first.) You probably want to build brand awareness, generate leads, sell stuff or improve customer service. If people are posting positive comments about your brand, then you can thank them and they may or may not tell other people about your brand or the interaction. But, if someone posts something negative and you help them, then there’s a good chance they will change their attitude and even tell others about the experience.

People love a good apology. Think about all the steroid-using baseball players who apologized and those who didn’t. Who do we still love? Not Barry Bonds, that’s for sure.

Handling negative comments can be a bit tricky. Have you had any problems or success with negative comments?

Some might think, “Well I can just buy cake from a box or pay my friend to bake one.” If your friend is a professional cake baker, go for it. Otherwise, you get what you pay for. Your business website should be a delicious, inspiring piece of work that you are proud to share with the world. For that, you need a good strategy.

Here is a visual map of how a successful online strategy centers technology, content, usability and accessibility around the business.

1. Focus on the Business
   At the heart of it all is the business. 
   • Research and know your target audience(s)
   • Define your goals
   • Write measurable objectives to reach those goals
   • Come up with a couple of strategies to achieve each objective

   Whenever you do anything online, you should ask yourself, “Will this help achieve my goals?”

2. Find the right Technology
   The right technology can help you reach your business goals, while the wrong technology can severely impede your business’ success. 
   • Choose a content management system that fits your needs.
   • Choose a reliable host.
   • Utilize the appropriate social media and third-party tools.
   • Develop what you can’t find or buy to meet your goals.
3. Write good Content
   Good content is important to a successful website because it can bring your audience to your site (through effective search engine optimization, known as SEO) and keep your audience coming back. 
   • Write for the audience
   • Be concise
   • Make the text easy to scan with headings, lists and images
   • Know the appropriate keywords to use and use them
4. Test, test, test – Usability is important
   A usable website is one where the user is able to clearly identify what they need and/or perform a desired task. 
   • Site navigation – This is the yellow brick road of your website.
     • Ensure consistent global navigation
     • Support different navigational methods
     • Provide clear labels
     • Link to content in multiple places, if appropriate
   • User orientation – The visual cues that allow a user to know where they are in the structure of your site.
     • Clearly identify sections and pages
     • Provide a logical content structure – The site should reflect how your users see your content, not necessarily match your organizational structure.
5. Be Accessible
   Based on your target audience(s), how accessible should you make your site? Here are few things you need to think about: 
   • Physical disabilities – Users may not be able to see, hear or move to process some types of information easily.
   • Education levels – Users may have a different reading level than how the content is written.
   • Technical issues – Users may have a text-only screen, small screen, slow internet connection or unique browser.
   • Language barriers – Users may not be fluent in your language.