Online overhaul

Scarff’s Nursery & Landscape’s website took a trip in the DeLorean last year.

President Peter Scarff had created it about 15 to 20 years ago, but then it sat until it got an overhaul a year ago.

“When we left our old website, it was pretty archaic,” said Scarff. “We updated it with our availability as often as we could, but it was just kind of there. It was a presence, but it wasn’t doing anything.”

In the fall of 2010, he contacted The Site Gardener to help overhaul the company’s website and bring it into the new century. The new site has the company’s availability on it for download, which is password protected, and it has an interactive catalog. It also features before and after photos for its landscape side of the business highlighting what it can do.

“We really skipped 15 years or so in website design and went from the mid to late ‘90s to the 2010s,” he said.

As a result, the Ohio-based business is getting more inquiries from potential customers for the password for the availability list and catalog.

“It tells me people are being drawn to our site,” he says.

If you’re looking to put together a new web presence for your business, Scarff has some tips.

“[Don’t] consider your needs, but consider the needs of your customers and anybody who’s going to be looking at it,” he said. “Things that you think are important may not be important. Look at how your website is going to be used by your customers, and, by all means, keep it current as much as you can. There’s nothing worse than a stale website or one that hasn’t been updated in months and months and months.

“When it’s the middle of April, and you’re looking at an inventory that was current in December, that doesn’t get very exciting.”

For more: www.scarffs.com