5 points on chapter 1

Points made in “Site Seeing”
1. Know your intended message, and focus on it. There are many people in the world with many different ways of thinking about the same thing (god for example, like in our comps due today), and unintended ideas, some of which are possibly offensive, may arise from not thinking through an intended message properly.
2. Know your client. I know this better than most, as while at the company I’ve been working for, we have had “good clients” and “bad clients”. Good clients have a general idea of what they want, and are willing to communicate with you and negotiate about what can and can’t be done, whereas bad clients fight amongst themselves and end up rejecting everything you offer, even though some of the various elements may agree from time to time, all of them will never fully agree on anything. Avoid bad clients, no matter how desperate you are for business. Getting to know your client, and which type they are, can be crucial to your sanity, reputation, and your bottom line.
3. Collect as much important information as possible! If you miss something, you might screw everything up, and end up with something that you’ll be embarrassed to show the client. Like say, if you forget their logo, or forget that the purpose of the site is to sell things, and forget to provide any links to a store, and focus more on the technical side of things, you’ll have to go back and do everything all over again.
4. Know the audience. Do not place possibly offensive material on a site meant for the eyes of children. You will pay dearly for it! Also, how knowledgeable is your intended audience about the target product/service? In many cases people will browse the net to find out more, or for professional services, may know quite a bit already. Do not assume however, and make sure that additional information is available, even if it’s not on your site. Consumers want pictures of the products they are buying, and will often assume that what they see is what they are going to get. I bet Ikea has this problem all the time.
5. Mission statements are a useful tool in everyday life. You write them without even knowing in many situations, like a grocery list or appointment book. You intend to A. Pick up those products or B. Make sure you are at a certain place at a certain time. Make sure everyone at your firm is on the same page about what the message should be, or you’ll end up with a varied and wide ranging array of messages which may contradict and or vary from one another.