Just How Good Is Your Business Web Site?

Here are ten questions that will help you determine whether you've got the business web site you should have. We'll start with questions about the business side of things.

Questions from the Inside:

You set your web site up to help your business. The following five questions will help you determine if you're getting the results you want.

Do you have clear business objectives?

Business objectives are designed to measure efforts to increase profit. That means that they will either measure things that increase revenue (sales, leads) or decrease expenses (lower marketing expense or custrsomer service expense).

Do you know what you expect visito to do on your site?

There are three kinds of visits that happen on business sites. Initial visits are the result of a search or referral of some kind. Research visits bring a prospect back when he or she has questions. Terminal visits result in a key objective like a lead or sale. Do you know what you want visitors to do in each of these situations?

Does your web site work with your other marketing efforts?

You have marketing efforts that are online and in the physical world. Does the look and content of your site match your physical materials? Do your physical world materials always mention your site?

Do you have ways to capture people's names and emails?

Visitors to your web site are anonymous unless you capture their email addresses, and perhaps their names. Then you can stay in contact with them and follow up.

Does your web site help you build profitability?

If you can't answer this question, you need to revisit the objectives question at the top. If you can answer it, consider ways to modify your site to help you either increase revenue or decrease expenses.

More Questions From The Outside:

The questions above addressed how your site works for you. The five questions below are about how your site works for visitors.

Do you have information that people want?

People show up at your site to solve a problem or answer a question. Do you have the information that will help them do that? How do you know?

Can people find the information they want on your site?

Having the information on your site is no good if your visitors can't find it. Check this by asking an intelligent 15 year old to find specific things on your site. If they can't find it, you can bet that your customers can't either.

Make sure you use the words your customers use. Make sure you have ways to help them search.

Can visitors read your pages?

Use large enough type that contrasts with the background. A surprising number of sites violate both these principles. What about you?

Can people print your pages?

It should be so simple. Your visitor should be able to hit the standard print command and get whatever he or she sees on the screen. But don't take this for granted. Check to be sure.

Can people use your site at 2 AM?

When people use your site they want to be able to finish things. Can they do everything they need to do even if your office isn't open?

Great business web sites meet the needs and objectives of visitors and the business. These ten questions will help you assess just how good your site really is.