business builder customer relations
How to cure
five deadly
Web-site sins
by Alan Bengtson
Is your Web site a winner or a loser? If it’s a winner, you probably already know why. But if it’s a loser, you may be unaware of the problems that prevent it from drawing in customers.
We’ve made a list of the five most common Web site mistakes, and the remedies, to help maximize your site’s return on investment.
Sin No. 1: Stale content.
Outdated content destroys credibility. A Web site goes stale quickly. If your latest press release is dated 2002, readers will be suspicious of everything on your site. And have you checked your external links lately? Without careful maintenance, “link rot” may set in — outdated links that go nowhere.
Because the Web is the land of lightning-speed interactivity, people expect up-to-date information and quick responses. But way too often, content grows stale and interaction — answering e-mails, specifically — happens late or not at all. Frustration soon follows, and visitors never return to your site.
Remedy: Schedule the maintenance.
First, schedule routine updates to make sure the content is still accurate, and cross-compare every page in your site for consistency in facts, message and tone.
If your site doesn’t tout your latest advances and features, where is your edge? Top-notch sites highlight fresh content because it brings visitors back and instills confidence in your entire Web site, and in turn the organization behind it.
After you’ve created a schedule for periodic updates, why not emulate the best sites by creating a “What’s New” section? It gives people a reason to return more often.
Sin No. 2: Weak content.
Poor content drives people away. No one wants to spend time on a site where all they read is “mission statement” babble or hard-sell advertising. Does the text of your Web site convey your business message with accuracy? Is it compelling?
A Forrester Research survey revealed that 75 percent of respondents rated the quality of Web content as “poor.” Given that statistic, a little effort will go a long way in putting your site at the forefront.
Remedy: Focus on informative content.
Chances are, people come to your Web site searching for some free information or they have a problem at hand. Focus on the benefits of your product or service by providing needed information or even education.
That way, your Web site will earn a reputation as a source for useful knowledge, and your expertise will shine through. People are drawn to use businesses that are leaders in their field.
Sin No. 3: Not catering to online readers.
Cater to readers who skip, skim and scan. On the Web, time and attention are in very limited supply. One study by usability guru Jakob Nielsen showed that 79 percent of online readers always scanned pages, and only 16 percent read word by word.
Another of Nielsen’s discoveries is that people read 25 percent slower online, so they want to do as little reading as possible. Does your site contain long paragraphs of text that look burdensome to read? Did you cut costs by just pasting your existing brochure into a Web page?
Remedy: Give online readers what works for them.
Online readers are impatient. The Web is an information superhighway, and most travelers are speeding down it. Clear “road signs” are crucial and you must exploit all types of signage, no matter how minor they seem.
For example, maximize the use of headings and subheadings so your readers can zero in quickly on key words. Make sure that different type sizes give clues to the importance of the content.
Because it’s harder to read online, writing styles and formats must be different from those used in print media. Keep sentences and paragraphs short. In fact, traditional paragraphs should be converted to bulleted lists, because they work better for skimming readers.
Sin No. 4: Unclear navigation.
A lost customer is a customer lost. Do visitors to your Web site always know where they are, where they’ve been, and where they’re going? Unclear navigation causes frustration. Readers will quickly abandon ship rather than waste time. Your home page should provide a road map to the entire site and make it easy for people to find information fast.
Remedy: Reveal the big picture and be clear.
Visitors landing on your site want to know two things fast: What is this? And is this what I’m looking for? Users take about 10 seconds to scan a Web page. That means you have less than a minute to make a good first impression.
Keep critical content in the top half of each page, since that’s what people see without scrolling. Experts say that it should only take three clicks to get to the most sought-after information. As for the navigation menu, use conventional names (About Us, Contact Us, FAQ) since people know what they’ll find there.
Sin No. 5: Not optimizing for search engines.
A study by Xerox Palo Alto Research Center found that 75 percent of users came to the Web to find out about something and/or to gather content. Will your site turn up on a Google search? Will it rank near the top?
Studies have shown (unfortunately for you) that users rarely look past the third page of search results. So the higher your site appears in the rankings, the better.
Remedy: Understand basic search engine optimization.
Moving up in the rankings is like broadening your advertising circulation at no extra cost. Understanding the art and science behind search engine optimization can really pay off.
Search engines calculate relevance in a variety of ways, and those ways are constantly changing and too complex to discuss here, even briefly. There are articles on the subject in the Resources section of our Web site.
And yes, that is an example of how to put educational content on your site to better serve customers. That’s one deadly sin down, four to go.
[contact] Alan Bengtson is a consultant at Lancet Software Development Inc. in Burnsville: 952.230.7360; alan@lancet-software.com; www.lancetcard.com
