Surface Ripples

Update It!

I follow one particular website for a certain type of information. At the top of the landing page, they have a “banner” or “tickertape” with announcements of various kinds of news. 

This banner or “ticker” doesn’t get updated very often. The effect of this, unfortunately, is to dissuade people from watching it as they feel that the same old stuff will come up day after day.

Worse, headlines that are clearly “old news” remain up longer than is perhaps necessary. After more than 6 months of the year's "ticker", one of the headlines has been up for three.  That’s not an update, that’s history. 

To retain interest and persuade customers and others, visiting our website for the first time that we are “on top of our game” (or even ahead of it!), our updates need to be timely and up no longer than is absolutely necessary.

Interestingly, I’ve received a number of mails from the same site announcing “special deals” - why weren’t they on the “ticker” at the top of the website? That would be interesting.

Managing websites is no easy matter - I know from personal experience! However, as the movie says, “with great power comes great responsibility”. There are other websites out there, crying out for attention, space in your busy day, and to be moved up the rankings in search engines. Our failure to keep things interesting means that we’re likely to lose interest and potential business.

The way around this is to have a firm policy in terms of website, content, management and updates. Staff in charge of the website, need to understand how often it should be changed, updated, and what constitutes “the news” as well as what news is no longer “new”.

I’ve spent more than half my life delivering change in different world markets from the most developed to “emerging” economies. With a wealth of international experience in international financial services around the world running different operations and lending businesses, I started my own Consultancy to provide solutions for improving performance, productivity and risk management.  I work with individuals, small businesses, charities, quoted companies and academic institutions across the world. An international speaker, trainer, author and fund-raiser, I can be contacted by email. My website provides a full picture of my portfolio of services.  

Labels: Customer Care, Productivity, Selling, Social, Strategy

posted by William Martin @ 09:33