Do you have an under-performing website?

Back in April 2013, I wrote a post about whether your website was ugly and you dressed it funny. As I develop WordPress (WP) websites as part of my consultancy, I’ve had the opportunity to look at many a tired and under-performing website. Note that I’m not talking about website response time. I mean under-performing in delivering business value to you. On two separate occasions this week, friends and business colleagues reached out to me to talk about under-performing websites in general, and  theirs in particular. What drove them?

Your under-performing website anchors your web presence

Whether prospects look for you on social media sites, perform branded search, or organic search, they will find their way to your website. Is your site delivering for you? Well, perhaps your website is delivering everything you expect, but your expectations may be low.

The Tiny Under-Performing Website

If your site was developed before 2009, chances are good that it is not responsive. It won’t look right on a mobile device. Find out by taking a look at your site on your mobile phone. Does it look like a tiny version of your website, with tiny print and tiny links that demand tiny fingers? When those who seek you on mobile devices see that, they will see you as part of yesterday, rather than a vital player of today. This kind of web presence is more like a lead balloon than a secure anchor. To see how a responsive site adapts to a smart phone, look at my website. It is as easy to read on a smart phone as it is on a laptop’s browser.

 

 

 The Antiquarian Under-Performing Website

The British Museum is full of amazing antiquities. So amazing that many are priceless. Can we say the same about your antiquarian website? Let’s see… 2004 must have been a good year for template-based website development, as I’ve come across many that were launched then, and have not changed one iota. Has your business remained frozen in time? Mine hasn’t. Have your products and service offerings advanced with glacial rapidity? Mine have not. Have you and your team remained in stasis? Don’t bother answering that one.

If things have changed, evolved, and progressed, why has your under-performing website become a time capsule? Probably because the original developer has moved on, you have no idea how to make changes, and it is simpler to pay your monthly hosting fee and feel satisfied that you have some kind of web presence. Imagine visitors to your site reading a 2004 newspaper to find out the latest news. That is what your under-performing website offers them. Not very good… The first of my two colleagues mentioned this as his website issue. Developed offshore, the challenge of making even simple updates is too time consuming and fraught with difficulty. Until I redevelop his site, it is a remembrance of things past. When I spend time updating my WordPress website’s written and media content, it takes minutes and involves using an interface similar to MS Word. Easy, quick, and trouble-free.

The Stale Under-Performing Website

Perhaps you do update your website “latest news”, events, and bios. It’s still all wrong when your under-performing website has a “days gone by” look. Nostalgia is great, but your site hasn’t been around long enough to play that card. Maybe you missed the whole “slider” thing. It came, and in a year or two will be gone, but you and your website never noticed. What about that blog you hoped to author? Yes, it is challenging to post frequently, but when your last post was three years ago, you are making a statement that you probably don’t want to make. Visitors may commiserate, but they will not excuse. Distracted, undisciplined, disinterested… what are they thinking?

 

The Ineffectual Under-Performing Website

OK, your site is modern, responsive, and up to date. Is it an active participant bringing you business? At first thought you will say “Yes”. We have information about who we are, what we do, our products, services, and solutions. We even tell you how to contact us, and connect with us on a variety of social media sites. That sounds great, but you have described the domain of marketing, rather than sales.

Can visitors to your site have an online chat with one of your sales team? How about requesting or setting an appointment to visit your premises to take advantage of your services? Is your business subscription-oriented? If so, can a site visitor buy a subscription to your research? What about products? Is your site ready for E-Commerce? If your answers to these questions were mostly “no”, then your website isn’t delivering the value that it could. You have an under-performing website.

The MIA Under-performing Website

Perhaps your under-performing website is missing in action. If your site doesn’t pop up high on the first or second page of an organic web search, it might as well be missing. The individual doing the searching will probably not find you. What about your website’s analytics reporting. Is it hooked up to Google Analytics, Clicky, or other web analytics solution? Can you tell who is doing what on your site? If not, then lots of interesting facts about how your site is performing from a marketing/sales support perspective, is MIA.

Here comes the good news. A WP website provides simple analytics right out of the box with JetPack Stats. If you are used to seeing nothing today, even JetPack is a great leap forward. WordPress Plug-ins make it simple to add Search Engine Optimization (SEO) capabilities to your site, and to connect to Google Analytics and Clicky. Why suffer in silence and ignorance? The answer is “no good reason.”

 

Don’t worry, we can help

Principal Consulting develops WordPress websites that specifically address the deficits that we see in so many under-performing websites. Using WordPress and its many available plug-ins, the website deficits I’ve mentioned earlier are all easily addressed in an efficient and effective way. This technology is open source, and is effectively hosted on every large hosting service you might care to name. In 2012, Forbes reported there were 60,000,000 WordPress sites around the globe. We didn’t pick WP by accident.

You won’t be dependent on an offshore team in who-knows-where, or on a developer who used obscure technology and then moved on. Millions of sites around the world use WordPress. You can learn it too, and take over the day to day management of your site. No worries, we’ll have your back, to ensure you get the results you need.

Time to talk to us about you and WordPress

No, I’m not going to do a deep dive into this technology. I’d prefer to talk to you about your business needs, and show you how we use this terrific technology to solve similar challenges for other clients. Ready to learn more? Contact us, and let’s get your WordPress site started.