I’ve mentioned in earlier blog posts that the evolution of my business has meant a mis-alignment between my website, my blogging strategy and the audiences I serve.

My core business, Crossman Communications has become much more sophisticated in recent years in the offer we make to potential clients: we now develop and execute content marketing strategies for businesses with revenues upwards of at least $1 million and our sweet spot is businesses with between $10 million and $20 million; we’ve been doing a lot of work lately in the area of electronics and business technology manufacturing and marketing.

Our second business, Awakening Author, provides book writing coaching, editing and publishing services for highly successful entrepreneurs who are involved in transformational work.

And, finally, as the traditionally published author of three books, with a fourth due out at the end of October, I am also an author, with a product (my books), and a speaking business around supporting it. I generally speak about creativity and expansion in the field of human expression.

But there’s only so much you can expect from one website. I have three different businesses serving three different audiences and I can no longer cram it all onto one website and hope for the best. For one thing, I know better. And, for another, my desire to grow my business necessitates a much higher degree of clarity than is currently in evidence through my website.

So I’ve started the processes of changing the Crossman Communications website. I’ve spent the past few months talking to web developers to find the individual who can deliver what I want at an agreeable price. Finding a web developer can be a bewildering experience. Some are extremely adept at graphic imagery, but not so great at optimization.

Others are brilliant at building a site to maximize conversions, but don’t do an amazing job of telling a story, either visually or from a navigational perspective. This will be my fourth website in seven years and I anticipate another one will be needed before too long as my business, and the technology, advances. A website is not something you can set and forget for too long.

So far I’ve had quotes ranging from $4,000 to $8,000 for the building of the three small web presences I am planning to build. These numbers strike me as inordinately high– especially when I am planning to write all of our own copy! I want a simple WordPress site that is visually beautiful and easy to navigate. There’s a lot of back-end optimization that needs to be done, and although the members of my team, Leah Roberts and Tania Brown, are brilliant at that type of work, they’re already working flat out on client projects.

I often hear from other business people that they find the task of getting a new website to be a confusing and frustrating project so I’ll be reporting back on how this project is going from time to time so I can share my insights and learning. It really serves to underscore for me the fact that marketing is never actually “done” but rather a continuous work-in-progress.

Meanwhile, if you have questions about your company’s content marketing strategy, or your upcoming book publishing project, I’d love to chat! Please email me at susan@crossmancommunications.com and let’s see how we can contribute to the task of helping your business generate the revenue you desire and deserve.