Our so delightful Smart Woman Online today is the famous (we know you're famous, Susan, don't deny it!) Susan Getgood of Getgood Strategic Marketing. And yes, that really is her name and she really is good! We met Susan at Blogher but we've been a fan of her blog, Marketing Roadmaps, for a very long time. Jane is naturally drawn to good writers and Susan is one of the best. When we had the marvelous chance to meet her at Blogher (among so many dynamic ladies and gentlemen), it started what we hope will continue to be a strong friendship. No doubt, dear readers, Susan is a lady worth knowing, as a professional and as a friend. We consider ourselves luckier than a four-leaf clover. Read on and you will see why...

Lip-sticking: Let's begin with your background. Tell us a bit about who you are and how you came to start your own business.

Susan: I’ve been in software marketing for 20 or so years. When my most recent job with a company (Sr VP Marketing at a filtering company) ended last fall due to a restructuring, I decided I really wanted to "do my own thing," versus jump into another senior level job. I felt my experience helping a number of small to mid size companies grow to the next level might be valuable to similar sized firms. As importantly, I would enjoy the different challenges, after marketing the same product for 10+ years.

Lip-sticking: We are so impressed with your website and blog. Why do you have both? We sometimes tell folks they don't need a website if they have a blog...are we wrong?

Susan: It depends… on the website and the blog. The goal of my website is to directly sell my qualifications as a strategic marketer. My blog, on the other hand, is about my take on marketing and the Internet. I do mention clients on the blog, but I don’t really sell the business.

That’s the divide: the website is a sales tool and the blog is the intellectual capital. I ask for the order on the website, and I don’t even discuss it on the blog.

For some, it is entirely possible to use the blog form as a main website, but it does become a sales site at that point. And if you are going to develop your blog into your main website, you probably will want to look into the software platforms like Word Press, Movable Type and Expression Engine versus hosted services like Typepad and Blogger. The hosted services just don’t have the flexibility you’ll need to add the functionality a main website (blog-gish or not) will need.

I often recommend having a strong selling website that asks for the order, and supplementing it with an active blog that supports the message but doesn’t deliver it directly or overtly. It is an effective strategy that blends a fairly static website, which doesn’t require daily updating, with a blog, which by its very nature gives the sticky content you need to get people coming back.

Lip-sticking: Give us a quick overview of your recent trip to Blogher -- why did you go? Who was the most amazing person you met there? And, will you go again?

Susan: I posted some of my impressions of blogher on my blog, getgood.typepad.com. As to the most amazing persons I met there, too many to count them all, but for sure among them would be you, Mary Anne, the Blogher organizers Lisa, Jory and Elisa, and Chris Halvorson from Stonyfield Farms. I’d already met the Diva – (Toby Bloomberg) in person.

Lip-sticking: You have experience with client blogging using numerous authors...what were the challenges in that project? How did you manage to overcome them? Would you recommend this kind of blog?

Susan: The biggest challenge in a multiple author blog is finding the voice of the blog when you have many voices. The biggest challenge in a customer blog is finding the right customers, convincing them to blog, and then motivating them to blog regularly. So a multiple author customer blog is chock full of challenges.

That said, I think it can be one of the most compelling and interesting types of blogs for the readers. Nothing beats hearing from your peers about what they are doing.

For a company that is willing to hear the bad with the good, and deal with it effectively, a customer blog could be a very effective addition to the marketing plan. I have two posts on my blog about it if you want to read more about the experience. Just search on the customer category.

Lip-sticking: We spent some wonderful downtime with you at Blogher. You talked about your so delightful little boy. How has being a Mom changed you?

Susan: Completely. I have a completely different perspective on what is important than I did before I had my son. And I was someone who definitely wanted a child but who would have been okay if it hadn’t happened. Until it did, and now I cannot imagine any other life.

Lip-sticking: So, shopping online...it gets a bad wrap sometimes. Folks say, "I'll get my identity stolen," or, "Bad people will seek me out and cause me harm." We say hogwash. What do you say?

Susan: Hogwash as well.

Lip-sticking: Do you shop online? When shopping online (if you do) do you care about shipping? We mean, are those extra costs going to drive you away, or do you just accept the dollar or two as part of the convenience of not having to waste gas driving to the mall?

Susan: I am an online shopping addict. [whoohoo -- Jane has to stand up and cheer!] I LOVE being able to find any and everything I want or need, right there on the Internet. I have been shopping online for YEARS and have never had a problem with my identity getting stolen. On the other hand, mind you, I have managed to leave my Amex at TWO restaurants in the past 10 years.

Shipping costs – most of the time I don’t mind. I appreciate the convenience and selection. I have on a few occasions decided to NOT buy something because the shipping costs were too high and I felt I could find the item locally if I really needed it. For the most part however, not a problem.

Some sites offer free shipping. Two examples:

Ø I LOVE Amazon Prime – free 2-day shipping for a small annual fee

Ø Zappos (shoe site, thanks, Manolo the shoe blogger) often has free shipping, and usually upgrades you from standard to express, getting your new shoes to you in about two days.

Lip-sticking: Give our readers three pieces of advice on how to get YOU to shop at their website.

Susan: Free shipping, If not for all, at least for frequent customers. A good shopping cart remembers me, what I’ve looked at etc. LandsEnd and Amazon are excellent in this respect. No hassle returns. Free shipping on returns would be the best. LandsEnd with the bricks and mortar option of Sears is one good example. Amazon makes it easy with the return labels, but I wish they wouldn’t charge you – especially if you’ve forked over for Amazon Prime (as I have).

Lip-sticking: We recently encouraged you to update your online pic -- and you did! You're gorgeous, but, that's really not important. How important would you say image is...to a business?

Susan: Image is important, and you certainly want a good one for your firm. In the long run, however, substance is more important. A business should focus on all its fundamentals; product, price, distribution channels, competition etc. etc. are just as important as promotion and image. A great image or marketing program may get you started, but it is the fundamentals that sustain a business.

Lip-sticking: Let's close with something fun -- what was the most fun you had on a recent vacation? And, was it fun enough to convince you to do it again?

Susan: Well, I am on vacation now which is why I almost forgot to send this. It may sound silly, but what I find the most fun on vacation is the ability to spend time with my family when we are all focused on being together, on finding activities we will all enjoy, not off doing all the things each of us has to do on a daily basis.

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And that...as they say in the movies ... is that! Susan has a long history serving clients and businesses and working with them to improve their marketing. She is naturally intuitive and shares her expertise on her blog, as most of our interviews do. What did you learn today, dear readers? We learned that websites are a sales tool and blogs are intellectual capital. We never thought of it quite that way before...this will help us tremendously in future meetings with prospective blog clients.

We send Susan thanks and hugs.

What's not to like about that?