This time round, Sachin Karweer, Business Head – HGS-Interactive, writes on the things that tell him a website needs repair.
The last time we discussed why your business needs a digital marketing strategy. Now that (I hope) you’re convinced it’s important to have a good digital plan in place, it’s time to focus on specifics.
This seems to be the series of platitudes. From me. I mean, the last time I said Digital was growing. And this time, I have to begin with the following: One of the most important pieces of the digital world is a website. A good website speaks volumes about your company and works as a catalyst for your business.
Of course, in today’s digital and online world, that’s a universal truth. So end of platitude.
Remember how we used to cringe at the sound of squeaking chalk on the blackboard, as kids in school? Well, that’s just the kind of effect a badly designed website has on me.
So this time round, let’s talk about the things that tell me a website needs repair.
Looks, or working?
One great business leader with a truly instinctive and great eye for design, Steve Jobs, had said, “Design is not what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” It holds true that a website needs to be functional. Otherwise, how is web design any different than art?
It takes a mere 50 milliseconds (that’s 0.05 seconds) for a user to form an opinion about your website and to decide whether to stay on it or leave. So you want to make sure that they decide to stay, as websites are a crucial marketing vehicle that can induce visitors to engage in a meaningful dialogue with your company.
Your website is the face of your company and needs to be updated to accurately reflect who you are or what your business, does so that it can attract the right audience. You need the right strategy depending on what results you want to see.
So OK, let me count out some signs that tell me your website definitely needs a revamp.
- Obsolete User Experience:
Is your website cluttered with a lot of text and stock images? It’s time to change that. We now live in a world where it is all about clean designs with a focus on communication and networking. Less is more. I know generalizations are odious, but really, I believe that less is more. Cut the clutter, keep your website nice and clean with just the required images and text for the purpose of the page at hand. Such sites, if designed well and with good copy, are welcoming to visitors.
Remember, your visitors are part of one massive community of individuals who are online at any given point of time. So your website needs to be an active part of that mother lode of individuals, from amongst whom you need to build a community for your website, and for that, you must join social networking sites and add plug-ins. It is imperative that your site features interactive elements to encourage visitors to move freely from one internal site page to another. Otherwise, visitors will be left wondering where they should go next. A simple, clear and effective call-to-action is needed to get customers moving and directing, enticing them to know more, sign up for a newsletter or click the ‘Buy Now’ or ‘Add To Wish List’ or ‘Submit Review’ or ‘Submit Request’ button.
94% of people have cited website design as the reason they mistrust or reject a website, making it all the more necessary to have a great design.
- Ir-responsive:
OK, that’s a word I’ve coined, but I did need one to sound as drastic as ‘irresponsible’ , because if your website isn’t mobile devices responsive, well, that’s sheer irresponsibility.
Smartphones have been around for several years now, and if your website was built any time earlier than a year before now, it’s probably not responsive, and therefore doesn’t serve your content in a mobile-device adaptive manner.
The majority of web traffic originates from mobile devices these days. Four out of five consumers today shop on mobile devices. If your website isn’t mobile responsive, not only will they leave you, but they will file that unfriendly fact about your website in their mental home pages, and will probably never return. In today’s instinctive times of split second decisions, nobody has the time to wait for your site to load.
What’s more, mobile users have made it clear they want to enjoy good user experience on their devices. Embracing a responsive web design for your company website will ensure that users have an optimal experience on their mobile device. A decreasing bounce rate and an increasing customer/lead outreach indicates satisfied customers, and that means good word of mouth, thumb or mouse, and an enhanced reputation and increased sales.
- Poor search engine ranking:
Google’s Mobilegeddon from last year made it very clear that non-mobile-friendly websites would be penalized, and pretty badly at that. It is essential that search engines know of your existence and index your content. Search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing love websites that are well-coded and not heavily image-based. 75 percent of users never scroll past the first page of search engine search results. If you are virtually nowhere on search results, then it is time to play nice with the search engines — with a website revamp. Build an SEO-smart and therefore search-engine-friendly website. That can help enable visitors to find your site and let them stay, thereby increasing your lead database.
- Embarrassing layout and design:
Intuitive design is how you baffle the end users by making them think, “How did the brand know what I’m thinking?!” A great website design instills trust in your business. Studies of user behavior have found that visual appeal and website navigation have the greatest influence on people’s first impressions of your brand.
First impressions don’t just paint a pretty picture; they also generate a lot of money. Websites covered with tables are passé. Tables are made with HTML code that are hard to read and difficult for search engines to track.
75% of users admit to making judgments about a company’s credibility based on their website’s design, indicating that its look and feel matters. In an age where customers check the website before making a purchase, your website’s ‘first impression’ can have huge implications lasting for years. The best of content can become powerless when embedded in poor design.
- 404 — Not Found:
Imagine a potential customer visiting your website only to see this dreadful error. Functionality is of paramount importance for you if you want more traffic and are aiming to generate more leads. Your website needs an overhaul if parts of the site are not functioning properly and constantly showing errors. 88% of users are less likely to return if they have had a bad experience with a website. It can easily be prevented by installing and using an effective content management system (CMS) that can manage your content so that you are not losing pictures or getting broken links.
- Slower than a snail:
Nothing is more frustrating than slow processing speeds and pages that take forever to download. 47% of people expect a web page to load in two seconds or less and 40% will abandon a web page if it takes more than three seconds to load. So it is well worth whatever time and resources you need to spend to improve your website’s speed. Do whatever is necessary to make the end user’s experience fast and efficient— you will be rewarded with high ROI.
- Wrong landing pages:
Imagine promoting an offer, only to see that the offer URL leads people to the contact page, where they have no clue what’s to be done. It is necessary that you authenticate landing pages. You must follow up on any suggestions you made in the advertisement or inbound link while directing a visitor to a landing page. Nothing is worse for the reputation of your company than failing to follow through with a promise you made somewhere else.
- Re-branding or new marketing goals:
When you launch a website, it can be difficult to tell which features are necessary and which are superfluous. If your business undergoes a significant change, such as a change in ownership or M&A, the purpose of the website changes, making many of the features redundant. Functions, features and pages that were useful when you started out may hold no value later. In such a scenario, it would be a good idea to strategize and redesign your entire website for optimal usability.
- Tech-savvy competitors:
If your competitors have changed their website which has improved their rankings substantially and pushed yours down, it is necessary for you to make some modifications to your website – whether in design, structure, SEO, or a combination of all. Remember, great web design is good business.
- Not 100% confident of your website?
Do you hesitate when someone asks for your web address? If your current website doesn’t make you completely proud, then you definitely need a change. You have to treat your website as an investment. You need to carefully evaluate your website and see the extent of changes required. More than a pretty face on the Internet, your website should contain comprehensive product information to target the market.
You need to look at your website as an evolving living being – one that needs to be fed good content, filled with hearty signposts guiding visitors around and not only taking care of their needs, but ensuring newer needs are created in them. Nurturing a website is an ongoing process, and by doing so, you are setting the stage for a fantastic user experience which in turn will contribute to better website conversions in the digital space. So go, visit that super successful competitor’s website again, with an even more open and better informed mind, and then give your own website a critical once-over.
Before I sign off, here are the home pages of two websites that I saw recently, and liked. Check them all out. Hope you like them. Leave your views in the comments section, or write to me at [email protected]
The first is 360 degree cruise walkthrough designed beautifully, while not being very heavy; it hits all the right notes.
This one below is a nice minimalist and clean responsive website with strong calls to action:
And here’s a third website. It’s a responsive and intuitive site that allows users to experiment with different looks and colours.
3 https://www.bergerpaints.com/get-inspired/
Statutory disclosure: The third website is one that my team created for one of India’s biggest paint companies.
{Note: All statistics and insights are derived from: Taylor & Francis Group, 2012 Mobile User Survey Keynote, eConsultancy, Comscore).
Sachin Karweer is Business Head – HGS-Interactive, and a young veteran in Digital Marketing. TVNEWS4U.COM invited him to write about the Digital Marketing space, from the knowledge, skills, experience and effectiveness perspectives. His column offers insights into trends and specific developments, and their impact on the industry and the business of marketing a company or its offerings to the millions of people who are so active on digital, online and social media today. You can reach him at [email protected]
