Have we heard enough yet about how your website is going to give you a return on investment (ROI) with no explanation of how? Or does website ROI cause you to think about ecommerce only? Ever done a search on “website ROI” and read through a bunch of marketing mambo jumbo on usability gains, conversion percentages, and yada yada yada…
Let’s cut to the chase; website ROI is about money. How much money you make or save by applying website technology. eCommerce is the first thing that comes to everyone’s minds as selling is making money (hopefully). But ecommerce isn’t the only way to make (or save) money on the web.
Let’s look at the things companies spend money on to promote their businesses and deliver products; Marketing, Advertising, Recruiting, Sales, Customer Service, Customer Loyalty, and Production to name a few. The thing all of these areas have in common is that they’re about COMMUNICATING! When done well, a properly marketed and designed website will have a profitable impact on these communications areas of a business by improving the time it takes to communicate as well as reducing the cost of the medium traditionally used to communicate (paper, print, phone, mail).
However, just having a website doesn’t make ROI happen. Thought needs to be given to each area of one’s business and model the website to suit the businesses brand, processes, clients, and colleagues so that its usage and maintenance becomes a natural part of daily business activity.
Additionally, by putting the power to update the website through tools such as content management systems or by giving users the ability to communicate to larger audiences through email marketing tools or by running meetings online, these functions all help companies operate more cost effectively through the use of the web.
And of course, at the end of the day, it’s all about conversions… getting a website visitor to take action and give you their email address, submit a contact form, or even pick up the phone and call you to say they think you can help them. Customer acquisition costs money and the web improves acquisition ROI.
A recent document I was reading even suggested that branded website impressions were resulting in distant future conversions to a greater degree than previously estimated. I would suggest that goes to the credibility factor that as people are engaging businesses for services, they simply view the website to consider that the business is a legitimate consideration.
The bottom line comes down to this; the web is a powerful medium that can pay dividends with a well thought out and structured website presence. Do your homework and commit to using the power of the web to help your business become more profitable. Although there are no guarantees for huge success, incremental gains over a period of time will add up exponentially. Actually there is one guarantee… if you do nothing, your return will be $0.