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Killing Sales: Seven Website Mistakes Manufacturers Make, Part II
February 17, 2014 |Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
As part of my second-annual social media review I looked at over 100 North American PCB manufacturers websites. The goal of the column this week and last is to highlight what companies could be doing right by talking about real-world examples of what some manufacturers are doing wrong.Last week, I covered how some PCB manufacturers shoot themselves in the foot by having outdated websites that are often poorly maintained and focused on how wonderful the manufacturer is, not on what the benefit to the customer would be of working with the manufacturer.
This week, I will look more at the content companies put on their websites, and how it can backfire.
Don’t Have a User-nasty Website
I found a couple of companies with lots of news...all undated. How can that be useful to anyone?
I found a PCB manufacturer offering free white papers (good!), but the nine mandatory fields to fill out is a killer. The people visiting the site are not asking for a mortgage, they just want the free white paper.
And I found a PCB manufacturer with a form offering to answer website visitor’s questions, also good! And then the heartbreak: Eleven fields to fill out. What question is so important that I am going to wade through filling out eleven fields?
It is generally accepted that the more fields to fill out, and the more information that is asked for on a contact form, the more people will give up and bail out before completing the form. That is why best practices these days is forms of a maximum of three fields: First name, last name, and e-mail address. And smart companies just ask for an e-mail address. Period. Why just the e-mail address? Because it works better. Think of Amazon.com and its “one click” ordering.
Feature a News Section with Actual News Over 20% of the PCB manufacturer websites I visited had abandoned news sections. It's like the news sections have an expiration date on them. Some lowlights from my exploration:
- A news and upcoming tradeshow section completely unencumbered by--wait for it--any news or upcoming trade show information;
- Latest news from the company's Winter 2009 newsletter
- Latest news from 2004 (10-year anniversary this year!)
- “July 1, 2006 is here! We are ROHS-compliant” (good to hear)
- *Here are photos from our last trade show” (in 2012)
- An announcement about the company's next trade show--in February 2013
- A news section wishing visitors a "Happy New Year and welcome to 2011"
- “We are delighted to announce the new equipment we have purchased.” This is dated March 2007. If the company only buys new equipment every seven years, it is no wonder they are so delighted.
The second runner-up for worst news section is one that says “Latest news: Welcome to our redesigned website.” This was also the latest news last year at this time.
First runner-up for worst news section goes to the company where clicking on “News” results in a server error and an http dump showing the viewer a page of code.
And the worst of the worst: The company with the welcome message from the CEO who left a year ago (a very nice touch).
Companies behaving like this deserve the opinions that readers form from this behavior.Don’t Insult the Visitors' Intelligence
A lot of PCB manufacturers like to make fabulous statements like, “We have 99% on-time delivery.” Amazing. The generally accepted industry average I seem to hear is 83 to 85% on-time delivery. If that is the case, how can everybody seem to be 97% or better? I will tell you how: They don’t bother to prove it.
On December 28, 2013, The Business to Community blog reported figures compiled by Zendesk:
- Four percent of people trust brand advertising and
- Eighty-three percent of people trust recommendations made by friends or colleagues.
So a company saying how wonderful it is will not impress many visitors. But what if the company gets testimonials from customers? That would change things around completely, wouldn’t it? Well, maybe...
The best example of this, and I saw it on multiple PCB manufacturer websites, is the “fake” testimonial. You know the ones I am talking about: The ones that say “You guys are the best” and signed “R.N.” or just “automotive industry.” How laughable is that? It doesn’t matter whether or not they are real, they look faked. Either the company is afraid to list the real customer name and company, indicating the tenuous hold they think they have on the customer, or the customer refused to allow their name and company to be used, in which case it isn’t much of a testimonial, is it?
Companies are insulting the intelligence of their visitors if they think testimonials like those are going to carry any weight. Real testimonials come from real people at real companies.
The overall theme here is one of company-centric websites versus customer-centric websites. The questions that PCB manufacturers seem to be asking themselves are “What are our competitors doing?” which is a sure road to disaster, and “What would make us look good?” Instead, they should be asking, “What would our prospective customers find useful? and "What would bring them back often?” Websites should be an asset, not a liability. Websites should provide a preview, a hint, of how wonderful it would be to work with that company. I was not satisfied with my own website last year and I found someone to completely change the look and feel of it. Cost? Under $2,000. At that price, I have some new ideas and I will update it again this year. It is an investment, not an expense. A lot of PCB manufacturers should start thinking this way too.Bruce Johnston is a sales consultant specializing in social media and especially LinkedIn. He has over 25 years experience in high-tech sales and management. He can be reached at brucej@practicalsmm.com or through his profile on LinkedIn.