Responsibilities for website owners and internet marketers

Over the course of my career, I’ve been obsessed with best practices. Be they best practices for writing code or for separating responsibilities, I’ve always had dreams of running that well-oiled marketing and technology machine.

If you’re just starting out in working with an internet marketer, you may be a little uncomfortable in knowing what your role is vs. what your internet marketer’s role is. You don’t want to come across as a micro-manager, but you also own the work that you’re paying for, right?

From my side of the table, here’s what I see as the line in the sand for responsibilities.

Task	Responsibilities
	Internet Marketer	Website Owner
Analytics	Create reports for Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) based on marketing goals	Identify specific goals of internet marketing activities
Content Authoring	Advise on best practices for writing web copy Facilitate brainstorming on types of content that should be available Monitor content for best practices in formatting and structure	Write web copy Monitor content for consistent writing style and tone
Design & Aesthetics	Use colors and fonts appropriately Educate Website Owner on the limitations of HTML, Style Sheets, Flash, and other media Educate Website Owner on trade offs for design, accessibility, SEO, and usability Implement styles to be used for authoring content	Direction of color scheme, fonts, “emotional tones” of design, branding, use of logos, etc. Choose whether content should stretch with the browser window or not Define needed styles for authoring content
Navigation	Organize content into meaningful categories and subcategories Educate Website Owner on best practices for navigation Limit the number of categories in site’s global navigation	Inform Internet Marketer on information that needs to be available on site Inform Internet Marketer about decisions for the future direction of your company
SEO	Keyword research and reporting back to Website Owner Educate Website Owner on best practices for linking and keyword usage Ensure that key parts of web site are accessible to search engines Collection and reporting of SEO metrics	Provide list of “best guesses” on keywords that customers user Decide which main keyphrase to optimize each page for Ensure that marketing message doesn’t get muddied or lost during SEO activities Comment on blogs and social networks with links to relevant content
Strategy	Give feedback and opinions about what the priorities should be Provide feedback for future marketing activities Educate Website Owner on “what’s possible”	Drive the decision of priorities Provide feedback for future marketing activities Ensure that the focus of web site does not stray from its core purpose

Thanks to a great podcast from Boagworld about the role of the website owner for inspiration. Definitely recommended reading and/or listening.

May you and your internet marketer have a happy, loving, life-long relationship.

Technorati Tags: design, internet, internet marketing, marketing, Search Marketing, seo, web, web marketing

This entry was posted on Monday, February 18th, 2008 at 10:02 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.