Add Some Talent To Your Business Orchestra

Some talented musicians can play more than one instrument. But can you imagine a musician playing a note on the violin, then putting it down, grabbing a cello, and playing the same note in harmony, and following that with a note on the woodwinds? And what if music isn’t your forte? No wonder minister and professor Halford E. Luccock said, “No one can whistle a symphony; it takes a whole orchestra to play it.” This article originally appeared on lightningstrikestudios.com. If you’re reading it anywhere else, it’s stolen. Please let me know at jules@lightningstrikestudios.com

Now apply this to business.

Make a list of what you do best. Make a second list of things you’re passionate about. Chances are there’s a lot of overlap between the two. If you’re honest, though, chances are the word “everything” is not on either list. Now make a list of all things your business needs. Can you do everything on that list? Do you even want to?

We all face two inescapable facts:
1 – Our time is a limited resource
2 – Everything takes time

Putting these two facts together we realize that being successful as an entrepreneur requires identifying those things we can, should, or must do ourselves; and letting someone else do the rest.

Take, for example, the task of building a website for your business. If you’re an experienced web developer, and you want to do it, and you have the time, by all means create your company’s website yourself. If any one of those isn’t the case, what should you do?

There are web hosting companies that claim you can create a do-it-yourself professional-quality website in only a few minutes. Really, have you ever seen anything of “professional-quality” that only took a few minutes to produce?

Think about what’s involved in creating a website that will present you and your business in the best possible light.

Hosting

• Are the servers fast and reliable?
• Will you be limited in terms of storage size or bandwidth?
• Is email included and how do you set it up?

Design

• Will you use a content management system? If so, which one?
• Are your design choices restricted to a limited set of themes or templates, and can you customize them to suit your needs?
• If you’re using a CMS with a 3rd party theme or plugins, how will you handle updates?

Graphics

• Do you have a custom logo in a scalable vector format?
• Will you use original quality photographs or are you stuck using tired stock photos?
• Are your photographs or other graphics in the right proportions, at a high-enough resolution, and do they need to be edited?

Text

• Does your text tell a compelling story that addresses your visitor’s needs?
• Do you have a clear call-to-action?
• If your site’s blog will have multiple contributors, do you have an editor to ensure quality and a consistent message?

Video

• Will videos you take with your phone be enough, or do you need a professional videographer?
• Will you embed videos in your site, or merely link to them on some video sharing service like YouTube or Vimeo?

Security

• How will you protect your site against hackers?
• How will you backup your site?

Social Media

• Will you link your site to your social media channels?
• Will you display your social media posts on your home page?
• How will your blog posts appear on your channels?

SEO optimization

• Are you making judicious use of keywords in your text and headings?
• Do you have meta tags for all your images?
• Do you have a sitemap that makes it easier for the search engines to crawl your site?

This list is by no means exhaustive; we’ve barely scratched the surface of what you need to consider. But addressing even this limited list will take time. Even if creating a web site is on your Passion and Skill list, you could end up trying to whistle a symphony. Instead, add some talent to your orchestra.