ITPV » These problems point to emerging markets as the

What does 'the can' mean? Well Carter Hutton Shirt , its literal meaning relates to canned goods on supermarket shelves. If your can is up there among thousands of others, the label had better state pretty clearly exactly what's in the can.

Sliced peaches? Peas? Coffee?

Really, it would be unthinkable for a can label designer to feel that any job was more important than simply describing the can's contents.

So here's the your Web site were up on a shelf among tens of thousands of others (it is!), do you tell people what's in the can?

How quickly can a first-time visitor find out exactly what's in your 'can'?

In general Jake Allen Shirt , I think most Web sites do a horrible job in this regard. If a Web group were given the job of designing the label for a can of chili, it would probably read something like this:

"Family Meal Solution"

And if they were sent away to improve on this, they'd come back two weeks later with something like:

"Robust Family Meal Solution"

It seems as if we go to extraordinary efforts to disguise what can be found in our sites. It's almost like we turn all our cans around, so they are facing away from the aisle. We fill that first screen with the contents Kyle Brodziak Shirt , the ingredients and other non-critical information... But we fail to achieve the most important task of all - telling our visitors what it is we do and offer. We don't tell them what's in the can.

Here's a quick example.

I recently went to a site called . The name and tagline that jumps out off the screen at you is this:

PLAID.
So Beautiful. So Easy. So

Do you have any idea what they offer through their site, based on those words? Neither did I.

So here, drawing on my many years of copywriting experience and a sock-drawer filled with awards, is my suggested alternative:

PLAID
We Sell Craft Supplies.

And no Alex Pietrangelo Shirt , it doesn't take any great copywriting talent to write a simple line like that. In fact, the temptation to 'copywrite' can often get in the way of clarity at a time like this.

Remember, visitors come to your site with the hope of being able to achieve a specific goal. They want to do something. They want to get a task completed. Whatever the dominant tagline or copy block on your home page may be, it needs to be written with a view to helping your reader get started towards achieving her task.

Don't think of your home page as 'ad space'. Think of it as one can Paul Stastny Shirt , on a long shelf, in an aisle in a huge supermarket that stocks millions of cans.

Don't assume that everyone knows what it is you do. They don't.

Don't assume that every visitor will take the time to dig deeper and work out for themselves what you offer. They won't.

The responsibility to describe the contents of your site is yours alone - and you need to achieve that within the first two seconds.

Job one is to tell people what's in the can.

Nick Usborne is a copywriter, author, speaker and advocat of good writing. You can access all his archived newsletter articles on copywriting and writing for the web at his Excess Voice site. You'll find more articles and resources on how to make money as a freelance writer at his Freelance Writing Success site. There is a shortage of good technology talent. It is impossible to find engineers. If you are in staffing Dmitrij Jaskin Shirt , you have more than likely noticed the common themes in current industry publications.

Are these themes fact or fiction? The answer depends on your point of view, and more importantly, the ability of your company and its resources to maximize talent. As many organizations race to 'globalize,' their human resource partners are left to create workforce plans and talent management strategies based on conjecture. Organizations are realizing that there are gaps and challenges their current structure cannot overcome.

Organizations need a plan; they need to build roadmaps and swiftly implement the changes. However Alexander Steen Shirt , before building a plan, solid data are required. The sheer amount of data at our disposal can be paralyzing at times, and organizations need to be able to sift them and find the salient information they require. There are several facts that are currently indisputable for certain categories of knowledge workers, especially technology professionals and engineers.

The U.S. will face a decline in the full-time workforce as the baby boomer population ages; Europe will face a similar retirement spike in the face of a declining population. In both western markets Brayden Schenn Shirt , the number of skilled occupations is growing, while the graduate populations stay relatively flat. For example, the number of occupations in the U.S. is predicted to be 22 million by 2010, while the available workforce will be only 17 million (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics). In Europe Scottie Upshall Shirt , the working age population will actually shrink by 13 million in the next 15 years (UN Population Division). Exacerbating this challenge is the fact that the West is retaining fewer students from emerging countries as their native economies increasingly offer viable employment options after graduation. These trends in the U.S. and Western Europe are well documented, and are as influential as labor costs in driving multinational employers to the emerging markets.

These problems point to emerging markets as the next great hope for answering labor woes. The largest contenders are India and China, followed by Eastern Europe, Latin America and the rapidly expanding Middle East market. To properly address the issues with each of these countries and regions--including infrastructure Joel Edmundson Shirt , political ch