I can’t believe how many small businesses I’m meeting that have horrible web sites that the miss the mark on so many levels.

I’ll primarily focus here on SEO, which seems to be the missing ingredient in web site planning. Sure, the web sites sometimes have page titles populated with keywords. Big deal. Where is the keyword strategy? Where is the content area for text that will contain those essential keywords?

One web site looks absolutely wonderful. Great design instincts. Bad execution. After a few seconds, the visitor won’t know if the company is selling bed sheets, pillows or home decorations. And the site has one of those “neat” extended home pages. Do they work for everyone? Is it really fun to scroll and scroll and scroll?

Yes, someone included keywords in the page titles. The problem is that the page titles all include the three main products the company sells. Focus kind of got kicked to the side.

A redesign is in the works.

Another web site has over 50 pages. Great. Well, not so great from an SEO perspective. All of the pages are rendered in the browser from one product page template. It’s impossible to customize the SEO titles on every page because there is really only one page.

A redesign is in the works.

Another web site has some of the latest design elements and functionality. Again, it looks terrific. But the main product is lost in all of the big images and changing background colors. And SEO? The web developer didn’t offer that option. The web site has some content but not much – and not the type the client needs. Ouch.

A design is in the works.

And the impact? Lost sales and extra web site development costs…

Clients deserve better. They should work with web site developers who understand the full picture.