Just Browsing…

I spent some time tonight looking at the websites of competition for one of my clients. I was trying to get a feel for what makes this client different and how to make them stand out even more online. Something struck me while sorting around these sites.

Most people give no thought to what they are putting on their websites and where they are putting it. One of the sites has a lot of text on the main page, but it’s all GRAPHIC. There isn’t any real thought out process of what they want the website to do or be. Most of these would be better off being called an online brochure instead of “website.” I say this because there is no interaction with the user which is the direction the web is taking. These sites are simply to say “We have a website.” But no one understands that in this day and age, that is usually the first or second exposure to your company.

Your website should be an extension of your business. Visitors should visit your site and should get a real feel for what your company is and does. There should be the same feeling for people when they visit your physical location. They should get a sense for who you are and what you are. When I visit a site for a company that has all their text as graphics on the page, it tells me that there is no real substance to the site or to the people behind it. It’s almost like a facade to something that isn’t really what it pretends to be.

There are certainly some times when just a brochure online does the trick and is exactly what people need. That’s fine for those situations, however, the web is growing and expanding, and it’s become increasingly important to give people a REASON to visit your website. They need to be able to do things for themselves, to save them time. Static websites are great for this type of work if you have someone to can manage the code properly. However, the problem is that most people don’t have someone that can manage the code properly, so they end up just with a graphics heavy site that no one can do anything with.

Yes, websites should tell everyone about how great you are, but they should also function as an extension of your business to help you service your customers better, faster, and more efficiently.