My biggest learning this week:  Think it all the way through. Design.  Content strategy.  New opportunities.  Site structure and implementation.  Be clear about what’s next.

A few golden nuggets of the week:

• When someone approaches you with a golden opportunity, understand that in most cases, they’re expecting the same in return.  One hand washes the other, so to speak.  This can work for you or against you – but think it through from both perspectives.
• When you’re designing an interface, it’s ok to break UI rules if it works best for the user – especially when no one else is going to use it.
• If you’re going to try to do something different, to be bold, be sure to think through the entire implementation – not just the homepage.  Where do we go from here?
• We all have to make compromises and need to learn what to fight for and what to let go.  This is a hard lesson when it comes to design, but we need to remove emotion from the equation and keep it as impersonal as possible.
• Even if you think something looks awesome, if the colors remind someone of a childhood trauma, it’ll never fly.  (That’s ok.)

It was a week of big lessons – but I anticipate there being a lot more “hey here’s a cool JQuery technique I tried!” next week as I get rolling on actual design and coding again.

And I tried.  I really did!  (Ok, I didn’t try that hard, but I gave it a couple weeks.)

This was going to be: the year that I went digital.

So idealistic was I:  I’ll scan all of my documents! I’ll use iCal and Evernote and the ‘To-do’s’ in Mac Mail!  I’ll put everything in Basecamp!   No more lists and scraps of paper all over my desk, I thought.

I work all day on a computer and rely on my iPhone for everything – this will be easy!

First, there were client meetings.  Added to iCal: check.  To-do’s based on emails in my inbox:  added to the To-do list in Mail: check.  But wait – now where does it go?  Where’s an overall list of ‘to-do’s'?  And I have to remember to plugin my phone to sync my calendar.  And there’s a totally different to-do list in iCal!  Then there’s Evernote and learning to use it for the tool that it is. . . Desktop app syncing with iPhone app . .. and more lists.  It started taking me as much time to add something to my To-Do list (and figure out how to sync it with everything) as it does to just complete the task.

Needless to say, I still have my scribbled notebooks on my desk, and I broke down and bought a day planner this week too (to add to my library of day planners I’ve had since 1994 – which make for neat scrapbooks and memory albums for me).  I essentially scurried back into the hole from which I came, quickly.  I guess I wasn’t ready to make the change, to commit.

I got to thinking about the ways this applies to building websites, building online businesses and social networks.

Whenever we build a new website for a client, we’re essentially building them a new way to interact with their clients or customers.  We’re giving them a different voice, with different methods of publishing and creating information.  We’re asking them to add these new methods to their daily routine – because the web, after all, requires that sort of dynamic interaction.  We put everything on a CMS these days – and we ask our clients to change things, add things, keep it fresh.

I’m putting together a few social media packages for clients right now that include a blog, Facebook fan pages and Twitter accounts.  They’re easy enough to set up, but I’m not sure my clients understand the commitment they require.  We can’t just ‘build it and they will come.’

Successful online communication, if you’re not already doing it, requires a total change in the way you go about your day.

That’s the hard part.  There are some of my clients who ‘get it’ – they understand and are ready for that challenge;  they wade in slowly but with both eyes open, embracing the new opportunities the web can provide them.  And then there are those who don’t fully trust what an online communications strategy can do for them.  They balk at daily updates and laugh at Twitter’s value.  I build those websites – but when I’m done, I’m not excited about the future of the new site.  I’m sad, knowing that my new baby will sit untouched for months, maybe even years -  well past it’s usefulness.

(If you’re going to invest in a website, make sure you’re ready to commit to using it.)

So how do you incorporate all of these new communication tools into your life?  How do you make your investment really work for you?  Stop thinking about your web presence as a brochure, and start thinking of it as a voice.

1. You’re working with a new client that has a unique question:  a blog post idea or FAQ question pops into your head!  If one client has this question, others might too.  Write about it!
2. You see something interesting on an industry news feed: Tweet it!  Share the link!
3. You just sent out the biggest order ever – or one that’s a especially remarkable:  take photos of the packing process and share them on Facebook!
4. A client tells you how pleased they are with their new fill-in-the-blank from your company: add it to the testimonials page and ask them to write a review on your Google Local listing!
5. You just signed a deal to provide something previously unheard of in your industry – the quickest installation or revamp or largest whatever it is – get out your Flip video camera and record it!  Use your desktop movie editor (iMovie, Windows Media) to edit a quick video together and post it to your Flickr and YouTube and Facebook accounts.  Add it to your website.

I completely understand that we are all busy people, and continuing on the path of least resistance requires the least amount of effort.

But the rewards that come from making these changes – the rewards of building your online presence, creating that online community and establishing your online credibilty – those rewards are worth the effort.

I’m not sure that the rewards of moving my calendar and to-do lists online are as great – so I don’t feel too bad about not committing 100% – but in an effort to show my clients that I get it – I am going to incorporate Evernote into my life as much as possible, and start getting used to organizing things digitally.  Each day, I’m going to take a small step to changing the way I organize my life, so that maybe, just maybe, 2011 will be the year.