Keeping business websites up to date
The importance of keeping business websites up to date: Are you losing money, stature and customers through your out-of-date website?
A few years ago, it was sufficient for a business simply to have an online presence. However, technical developments such as e-commerce functionality and interactivity have turned the modern business website from a collection of static text pages into a commercial powerhouse. Web 2.0 tools and software are creating new opportunities both for marketing and interaction with customers, with options such as live chat support, interactive feedback and personalized interfaces. The rise of Google and the success of its PageRank search results have changed the way people look for websites, and the way businesses think about how they are found and what to offer searchers when they arrive.
Viewed through a modern lens, many business websites have simply not kept pace with technological developments. Instead there has been a tendency for businesses to build a website, put it out on the Internet, and then assume that leaving it there is enough. Even large companies with dedicated in-house staff often focus on one aspect of their websites to the detriment of others; for example, content over features, design over content or software over design. Instead, Web designers should take a holistic view of their sites as organic and constantly evolving entities, incorporating relevant content and features as well as identifying the value in new technologies and leveraging them to benefit both the business and the consumer.
For example, building RSS feeds into a website allows consumers to receive regular updates on company news and products, bringing information directly to their desktops. Incorporating social feedback such as rating and reviewing products encourages a sense of community, fostering word-of-mouth and viral marketing among current – and potential – clients. Search engine optimization allows businesses to use the power and popularity of Google to their advantage, and link exchanges and clickthroughs such as AdSense offer additional opportunities for revenue generation. The potential for interested businesses to take advantage of new technologies to build better, more successful websites is enormous.
Routine maintenance, while more mundane, is just as important as evaluating and incorporating new technologies. Failure to carry out regular checks and updates can result in broken links, features that do not run properly in newer Web browsers, and dated style and design. Usability and accessibility standards are constantly evolving, and businesses that fail to keep track of developments will soon find that their websites suffer as a result. An out-of-date website suggests that a company does not care enough about either its clients or its products to keep its marketing materials up to date – a company that is lazy and behind the times. Usability guru Jakob Nielsen stresses the negative impact of linkrot on the consumer: “It is in your interest to reduce the amount of dead links in your own pages. The overall quality of the user experience strongly influences people’s assessment of the credibility and value of a site: if a site doesn’t work well, users will abandon it (1).” Worse still, if the most fundamental part of the website – the information it contains – is not regularly reviewed and revised, in addition to aggravated customers the end result could be a hefty fine for breach of trading legislation, as one New Zealand company discovered at great cost (2).
A company’s website should be thought of as a virtual store or branch, as important to its customers as any physical location – indeed, in some ways more so, because a website that has been optimized to take advantage of search engine rankings can draw interest and trade from all over the world. A company’s website is also a primary marketing tool, where it can gather core information about products, services and facilities that it wishes to disseminate to its clients. In Canada alone, close to 70% of the population is online and a total of $7.9 billion was spent in e-commerce transactions in 2005 (3). This is a significant market share, and one that is growing all the time.
A website riddled with poor spelling, dated information or dead links is the online equivalent of a store that hasn’t been cleaned in months, with old products cluttering the aisles and dirt accumulating in the corners. Alternatively, a clean, up-to-date, user-centered website that utilizes the best of the Web’s new technologies is a flagship store built to the highest customer service standards. Attempting to save money on website maintenance and design is invariably a false economy; as the average consumer grows increasingly tech savvy, the importance of maintaining an up-to-date website as a communication, marketing and commercial tool will only increase.
