http://www.wait-till-i.com/2006/07/28/becoming-clueful-a-collaborative-article-about-what-web-developers-expect-from-clients/ Chris Heilmann - Accessibilty, Web Development and Pragmatism - can talk, will travel Sun, 06 Jul 2008 19:55:37 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 http://www.wait-till-i.com/2006/07/28/becoming-clueful-a-collaborative-article-about-what-web-developers-expect-from-clients/#comment-5074 fragrances Sat, 21 Jul 2007 05:30:33 +0000 http://www.wait-till-i.com/?p=308#comment-5074 It seems to me that some of the problems can be solved simply by resorting to good sound business practices. Of course, the web is still not covered enough in business school (I only graduated three years ago and there was a decided dearth of courses discussing how to use a web page productively for marketing purposes). For instance, any business owner or manager should already have a well-developed business plan before he or she tries to tackle a web environment. Such a business plan is already going to address the specific directions the business hopes to take, how it will be positioned in the market, what sort of client base it is looking for, etc. Thus is should never be all that difficult to get a client to cough up this sort of information (though in practice I realize it often is). In general, I think the main problem is the one you’ve identified: business owners need to re-orient their thinking so that they understand a web space is like any other sort of “property,� and needs constant maintenance and updates. If they could recognize this comparison, I think acting the way a business should would take care of the rest. It seems to me that some of the problems can be solved simply by resorting to good sound business practices. Of course, the web is still not covered enough in business school (I only graduated three years ago and there was a decided dearth of courses discussing how to use a web page productively for marketing purposes). For instance, any business owner or manager should already have a well-developed business plan before he or she tries to tackle a web environment. Such a business plan is already going to address the specific directions the business hopes to take, how it will be positioned in the market, what sort of client base it is looking for, etc. Thus is should never be all that difficult to get a client to cough up this sort of information (though in practice I realize it often is). In general, I think the main problem is the one you’ve identified: business owners need to re-orient their thinking so that they understand a web space is like any other sort of “property,� and needs constant maintenance and updates. If they could recognize this comparison, I think acting the way a business should would take care of the rest.

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