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The performance of a website (how fast it is, how reliable and accessible it is) is key to maintaining brand identity and reputation.

By David Flower, VP EMEA at Gomez.

It’s a well known fact that if a customer has a bad experience online, they will not only move to a competitor’s site – but also not shop with that brand in the real world either. Studies show that the customer will tell up to 10 friends, resulting in a cascade effect of customer and sales loss.

Downtime and inconsistency don’t just prevent purchasing; they ruin customer experiences and create lasting harm. Customer experience via the web is sometimes the only differentiator a company has to offer in their marketplace.

If the company’s website is slow, unavailable, inconsistent and generally clunky, it speaks volumes about what customers should expect from that company’s merchandise. If the website is bad, how can the product be good?

Regardless of the quality of the products and services the company is selling, the company’s web performance is quietly snuffing the life out of the brand, and the company may never even realise.

So, poor performance damages brand value, and ensuring quality web experiences is key:

Find your strengths and weaknesses

•    Set a competitive (or comparative) baseline
•    Focus on availability, responsiveness, and consistency
•    Share information across the entire organisation, at all levels

Know your customers

•    Turn to web analytics packages and other sources for in-depth demographics
•    Model performance in a way that resembles end-user characteristics
•    Make the end-user the centre of every activity

Test the entire system

•    The modern online store environment is extremely complex
•    Identify a range of tests that will exercise all critical application elements
•    As changes (or surprises) happen, evolve the monitoring strategy

Monitor what matters

•    Identify the most critical user-facing application paths (home, search, cart, etc.)
•    Develop profiles of key personas and model them
•    Don’t neglect supporting functions (store locator, self-service, etc.)

Keep third parties honest

•    Identify external dependencies in the user’s experience, such as differences in provider or internet connection speed
•    Understand the “quality chain” and manage it
•    Establish baselines for external performance and quality contributions

Seek internal alignment

•    Seek shared metrics, goals, and dialogue
•    Keep the user at the center
•    Connect cross-functional actions to outcomes

Take a geography lesson

•    Understand that distance effects user experience
•    Look at the behavourial differences by geography to understand problems
•    Identify and validate ways to mitigate distance effects

Manage change aggressively

•    Focus on change as a major impact area for users
•    Consider change actions across all contributing parties
•    Consider intentional and unintentional changes against existing experience models

Link application performance to business performance

•    Collect the necessary metrics to construct relationships (behaviour, experience, satisfaction, financials, etc.)
•    Develop and publicise ROI models
•    Help all groups identify their contributions to the bottom line

Evolve the metrics over time

•    Start by sharing a small set of user-oriented metrics
•    Increase the aggressiveness of performance targets over time
•    Add new dimensions of quality and experience as the organisation is ready to receive them

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By David Flower  on   Jul 11,2008

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Keywords

website    web content    ecommerce    web technology    online sales   

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