Budget, depends on how much revenue your website can help you generate, and how much cost you can save by launching your website.

1. Do you have a statistic for the past 6 months? Send it to me pin@1.com.my, I would be able to review it for you, to find out what kind of info your customers are visiting

2. Who is currently maintaining the updating of your content? How much time and cost involved per month basis?

3. How many new enquiry you have received every month?

4. Any operation task which you think it can be done online, and save the cost of offline operation?

I must admit, your current website is quite updated and I like those customer quote. I can see your effort of including your event picture as well.

This can all be streamline with Blog to make it more accessible and organized, yet easier to manage. Visitors are smart nowadays, they want to see actual comment from customers than quote.

If I’m a visitor to your website, I would like to see more from your customers, not from your web master. In fact, this is part of the Web 2.0 concept where most of your website content are actually from your visitors by comment, this indirectly build up trust and closer relationship with your visitors, first step to convert them to your customers.

The objective of your revamp, should focus on increase visitors and conversion rate, not simply for the sake of ‘creative’ outlook. Therefore, your exsiting visitor data are important.

Incidentally, what kind of budget range should one be looking to put aside for a revamp?

I guess you would have guessed by now that I’m looking to revamp our website :)

Any takers?

No doubt, a website mockup can roughly give you an idea of how good the design skill of a web design company. Sadly, this the fanciness of the design of a website is becoming the de facto standard of how ‘big boss’ judging at web developers.

Check out the drop down menu in Tourism Terengganu Website (http://www.tourism.terengganu.gov.my/), I would sure it pleased the few persons who make the decision of appointing which web developers. Behind this, how much are you aware the conversion you have just lost, including poor indexing by Google that directly affect the number of worldwide travelers who will find this website. Who knows because of this menu alone, it limits the content updating as well as increase cost and time to maintain. The whole same website can be replaced with just a Blog, yet converting more visitors to the website to real travelers to Malaysia.

So, what is the reference if not mockup?

Let’s look at the reason of creating a website. The success of a website is more realistic if we hook it to the Conversion Rate of the website, capability of achieving a measurable result. Such as more sign up to your training event, more brochure download, etc.

The web company must be able to share with their customers, identify the goal of creating website, and finding a solution that can achieve all this.

Nice/beautiful design increase conversion?

Definitely no. Just look at Google and Facebook and learn how they focus in content, useful content.

No visitors are dropping by your website just because there is some nice flash animation, or fancy dropdown.

If they are coming on this purpuse, they are probably not your potential customers, perhaps, some web design students who wish to do some research, that is the closest I can think of :)

I have included some reading which you might be interested:

http://www.1.com.my/2008/05/29/criteria-for-selecting-good-web-developer/

http://www.websitesolution.com/2008/07/08/advertisement-in-year-1924/

http://www.websitesolution.com/2008/06/09/old-marketing-manager/

http://www.websitesolution.com/2008/04/09/what-is-good-website/

http://www.webdesigning.com.my/2008/06/12/blog-kills-web-developers/

http://www.webdesigning.com.my/2008/05/01/a-must-have-feature-for-your-website/

Many thanks for your answer in advance.