A lot of our clients have upgraded their websites over the last 12 months and most of the time they say they want a “New Design” to make it look modern and up to date because their competitors have launched new websites and it makes their site look dated and very 1990’s.

A new website design is great but have you really thought about your website’s goals?

Is it to

• Look good and make a great impression
• Provide information to your current clients
• Improve your service levels to your customers
• Reduce your support costs by through online efficiencies
• Attract New clients
• Help you “Get Found Online”
• Sell more products from your ecommerce online store
• Provide great content so people will come back

During the 1990’s most websites were what was known as a “Brochure Site”, They were designed, built and put up with static information such as lists of products, company overview, maybe some news (that never got changed and often ended up as being very out of date and irrelevant) and other content that never changed.

If you haven’t noticed the use of the Internet has changed over the last few years and the way you use your website and website “best practice” with all the features and functions is developing to a far higher level than the old brochure sites of the 1990′s

The recent study on online activity titled the “Internet Activity Index” released by the Online Publishers Association shows the trends of the types of activity that have occurred on the Internet over the past 6 years. The study’s findings has important implications for online marketers and the features and functionality of companies websites and how they should be focusing their time, resources and strategies in 2009 and beyond.

So what were the changes in online activity?

Change in “Time Spent” of Each Categories Internet Activity

Some Major implications for companies websites are as follows

1. Search is up more than 111% since 2003 which shows how important SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is for “Getting Found Online”. In 2009 this is an important part of a companies initial web design so Google can find you. Also continuing to work on “Organic SEO” after you have built your website is now vital
2. Social Media such as Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn have emerged to be an important part of the Internet and starting to involve some elements of Social Media in your marketing and on your website has become vital.
3. Ecommerce has continued to grow (up 26%) and having an online store as part of your website should be considered or even setup an ecommerce store for one of your companies divisions to enable clients to buy online

As a part of building and updating new websites we are providing website grading as part of the upgrade that compares your website to your competition and provides a benchmark to measure your new website as a “Marketing Portal” for your business that can be measured over time.

So how is your website performing?… is it helping you achieve your goals? Do you realise that the Rules of Marketing have changed and and that your website is vital for “Getting Found Online”? Anyway, those topics will have to wait for another blog post where we will go through some of the basics of the “New Rules of Marketing” and how to use your Website to “Get Found Online”.