Is your IT messing up your potential customer relationships?

Don’t get me wrong. I love technology. I love what it brings to us and what it can do in our daily lives. But it scares me when the IT department is put in charge of a really important marketing tool. This is not good for customer relationships.

As part of our initiative to make technology and marketing work more effectively to build customer relationships, we have set up a new project Create a Website. Our point is simple.

The goal of your website is to focus on customer relationships — and either generate leads or convert sales. YOur website is not a technical coding project.

To get this right we use WordPress – a really powerful – and free content management system and the hosting we use. But this is the email I got the other day (bold added by me):

Morning Michael,

Firstly I must thank you for all the information you sent through.

I have come in today and spoken to my boss about the website the hosting and domain etc; too which she replied we already have all of that….

Our IT company has organized our host and our domain it was just a case of no one actually sat down to create the website.

I am rather upset about this as I was really excited about this project, now all the work that I have prepared for it is going to be emailed to our IT guys and they are going to do everything from them.

So once again Thank you for taking the time to prepare that information from me and I assure you if I ever need somebody for this reason I am saving your contact details and you will be the first I call!

Have a super day!

Missed customer relationship opportunity

Based on the ignorance of this boss a really important part of the marketing strategy has just gone down the loo. This company is a small business and they have just handed potentially their most vital marketing communication tool over to the IT department.

Here is what is going to happen from here on:

• The IT will waste weeks sorted out a website from scratch trying to design a site
• It will then site in cyber space –wasted
• The boss will then be convinced that the web is a useless medium as there were no real results.
• No customer relationships will be developed

And all because the site was left to the IT department – who have no idea of marketing, how to market a website  and how to build customer relationships. Ironically they may not even understand how to code a website.

So how do you set up a website to build customer relationships

When setting up a website the following questions should be looked at and reviewed:

• How does our customer look for information?
• What tools does our customer use to communicate with each other and others?
• What is the point of the website: Is it a marketing site or an online brochure?
• How do we market the site: Howe do we expect to get traffic?
• How do we measure the effectiveness of the site?

When you are looking at the specific website details here is what I would review:

• What open source technology can we use?
• Is the code well designed so that Google likes it?
• Is the code flexible and easy to use?
• How much is it going to cost to make any changes?
• How much can we manage in house versus outside?

The one customer relationship tool that is critical

When it comes to creating credibility and getting people to take there is one major consideration: Content.

Good compelling content is critical for a user. You need to design your content in the following way:

• Your potential customer wants to come into your site and see a theme
• The themed content must be relevant to what they are looking for
• They must want to read it
• Is it up to date
• Is it focused on their needs rather than your own posturing (our directors are on the front page?)

The most important marketing strategy note:

The internet has caused a paradox for many marketers and how to build customer relationships. On the one side it has amplified the traditional broadcast approach. It has opened multiple means of communication for your customers.

It has also amplified your customer’s life. It has allowed them to talk to others, review things and learn about new subjects in a flash. Today they are happy to give their attention to brands that are relevant and are trustworthy.

To simply put up a website and hope that it is going to work is naive. And really hopeful. It will not work. And like all things that you demand in your business it should work. It should get results and make a difference.