Entrepreneur Magazine recently wrote an article titled The Cost of Quality which talks about the costs associated with designing, building, launching and managing your website.  It’s a very interesting article that emphasizes the fact that in order to be successful online, you cannot entrust your online presence to a cheap design template or the “dude next door” working out of his parent’s garage.  Of course it will cost you some money to get a website that drives your business goals and objectives, but it’s all about expectations and understanding what a quality website or application will take in effort and dollars spent to design, develop, and deliver.

What we’re talking about here is viewing your website as an investment, not just a marketing spend.  Your website is an asset that belongs on your balance sheet; revenue and expenses as related to it should be tracked.

Another point is that your website is just like any other asset you purchase; the old adage, “you get what you pay for” really rings true.  You can go to your friend’s cousin who lives in his parent’s garage to get a website for $1,000 but I can guarantee, you will pay for it later on.  We’ve been in the business for over 16 years and we’ve seen it happen time and time again.  Somebody went the cheap route and ended up with a website that didn’t work the way they wanted it or it broke down all the time or it flat out never got finished, because someone who didn’t know what they were doing promised them the farm at an impossibly cheap price.  Everyone knows that is just not reality – “If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”

I encourage you to read the article from Entrepreneur Magazine and think about your current web services provider: are they fulfilling your business goals and objectives (or even considering them for that matter), or do they take the time up front to ensure that you have a solid plan for accomplishing what you’re looking for, even if it costs a little more?  If you fit into the former description, I would suggest you take a look at a firm like ours and see if there really is a difference…my guess is that you will be pleasantly surprised.

I was in a meeting last week and someone made a comment that a website is not that big of a deal and really not much different than a yellow-page ad in the phone book.  I nearly leapt out of my chair!  Online marketing and yellow-page marketing are worlds apart!  Here are just a few points of refutation to this argument:

Measurement:    It’s tough to measure the success of a print piece other than the number of people who get it.  With a website, you can not only measure (using analytics tools) how many people come to it, but which pages they go to, how long they stay on each page, the path they took as they navigated through your website, where they came from, where they went to, and the list goes on and on and on.  The limits of understanding are endless!

Flexibility:  Once you’ve placed your print ad, you are stuck with it until the next round of printing (or in the case of yellow-pages, next year’s printing).  That typo is there until you reprint – read time and expense.  With a website that has even a basic content management system you can make changes any time you want, day or night.  Typo - Fixed.  New product - Added.  You get the idea.

Space: With a print ad you are limited to the size of the block.  With a website, not only do you have more space, but you can add more pages and sub-pages to make sure that the additional detail (and levels of detail) are available.  You can also link to other pages or websites where there’s even more content!

2D versus 3D:  Print is a 2-dimensional product – unless it’s a pop-up book.  Online is a multi-dimensional, interactive technology that allows one to drill-down into layers of information, link to other sites, launch applications, view videos, etc.  The ability for interaction is much greater!

Level of interactivity:  One can have real-time, immediate interaction with applications or other people via the web.  Have you tried Skype?  Played a multiplayer game online? Used instant chat?  Placed an order with Amazon?  Now remember how you interacted with that print piece?  It probably made you smile, or at most go to their website at a later time (notice how it still drives to a website?)!  But, did it make you “click” right then and there to make the purchase or fill out the contact form?  No, it didn’t, because print can’t.  A great deal of the impact the Web provides for businesses comes from the immediacy it allows.

Behavioral swing:  Because of all of the previous points – and probably some more that I didn’t mention – people are turning to the Web more and more.  While there may be a variety of very legitimate reasons to continue your print pieces, you cannot neglect the Web.

At BitWise, we don’t know the print business, we know the Web.  If you have print related needs, you should call someone else...but if you would like some help with your Web strategy, Web asset management, web development or anything Web related really, give us a call, I am fairly confident we can help.

Would you invest $100k in an asset and forget about it?  Amazing to me is the fact that many CEOs would invest $100,000, maybe $250,000, in a web site plus an equivalent amount on staff salaries, with no plans to measure ROI, growth, effectiveness, etc., over time.  What other corporate asset would warrant such reckless use of the precious resources of money and time?

The Non-Techie CEO

Further, what executive would drop such money and not strategically leverage that asset to its fullest?  The answer to this question is:  the executive who believes “I.T. is handling it…” – the executive who thinks it’s all about “technology”.  Such executives find it easier to hide behind the statement of “I’m not very tech savvy…” rather than taking the time to plan, organize and direct (the basic tenants of management) resources around the company’s investment in web assets.  You need not be a “techie” to take such ownership of corporate web strategy.

Build It, Forget It

It’s time the executive suite own, leverage, manage and expect results from your web—related assets.  It’s no longer acceptable to build it and forget it.  Failure is certain when you don’t use such assets strategically, rather waiting on the proverbial Marketing vs. IT battle to shake out.  Seldom, after 16 years, have I seen a productive, effective, efficient nor healthy Marketing vs. IT collaboration around a company’s web site.  When I have seen it, the executives are in the game, setting strategy/direction and ownership, not leaving such to just happen.

End of Projects

It’s time to stop thinking about your website or application as a “project”.  Projects have a start, an end and iron-clad targets that are established at the beginning of the project.  Most web site projects require several months, and multiple iterations to complete.  Unlike a project, a website or application should be a living, breathing, effective, ROI-focused, analytics-backed asset that is dynamic, flexing with the changes in the business climate.  Traditional project management methodologies work great for static targets, not living websites and applications.

Pajamas to a Party

Finally, my dear friends…  Some of you are simply wearing your pajamas to a party.  So many web sites, I submit because too many executives follow the mindset outlined above in this post, are tragic.  The designs are dismal, the messaging is off key, the content is from the Renaissance era and the functionality is missing in action.  Stop fooling yourself into thinking that your prospective customers and partners aren’t using your web site as one of their first steps in due diligence.  You do it when looking to work with another company, right?

It’s time to park your pajamas, get serious, own it and leverage your web assets as you would any other investment.  On June 30^th @ 8am at BitWise (Carmel), we’ll be talking about these points and more, with case studies.  Come and hear how your fellow execs have taken the reigns of their web assets and are leveraging such for true competitive advantage in the marketplace.  Oh yeah, by the way, even though our event is at 8am, please do not wear your pajamas.  Contact Kim Smith at 317-805-4376 or by email kim.smith@bitwisesolutions.com to register.