In the latest American Customer Satisfaction Index, Q2 2008 on www.theacsi.org, Google was the top ranking website with a score of 86 out of 100. Google has risen to fore precisely because it focuses on doing the basics and doing them well.
You could argue that all websites should be doing the same. We’ve talked to many business owners, some of whom draw our attention to their competitors’ sites who use some sort of user-generated content, and say “…we need to be doing that too.” But the question is, should they?
Val Fox of Red Valise in the US found that when she asked the website users of one of her clients what they wanted from the site, only 10% wanted social applications.
Most wanted the company to improve the site’s navigation and search functionality.
This tallies with our experience; people will engage with the site functions that they need for their particular activities. Everything else is a distraction. The core functionality and content of a website is critically important.
The functionality, or way the site elements work together, needs to be clear and effective to allow easy navigation around the site.
Without the right information and depth of content, visitors just won’t find enough to interest or inform them.
So how can you find out what your Website users actually want?
• Via web statistics. Your hosting company should provide access to data that you can use to find out what site features your visitors are using. The free Google Analytics can show graphically the popularity of links on any page on your site. What paths are visitors taking through your site, what pages are they exiting, what countries are they from?
• Conduct a survey. There are a number of inexpensive or free online survey tools that will host the survey for you. All the survey systems mentioned below have basic free systems and then you pay per month or year for more features. Some systems are: SurveyMonkey (surveymonkey.com), SurveyPro (esurveyspro.com) and SurveyGizmo (surveygizmo.com).
• With Google Website Optimizer you can try combinations of different content and layout. Combined with Google Analytics you can measure the number of conversions (sales, signing up to a newsletter etc) to find out which versions work best. Which site functions, if any, can be left out without affecting the number of conversions?
Bear in mind that your website users may not necessarily be customers and your customers may not use your website very much at all, depending on what type of business you run.
The idea of this analysis is to improve your site so that these website users, who are often prospects, become actual customers.
By Alex Garden www.netinsites.com
