HOME BUILDER
JAMES HEIN
If you have a site where you are advertising or selling something, this week is for you. Start by visiting a well-known brand or product site. Pick a big car manufacturer like Honda or BMW, or a major electronics manufacturer like Pioneer or Panasonic. Browse through the site and look for the following information on any products - detailed specifications, reviews, comparisons with other products, product discussions or forums and somewhere you can register product complaints.
Now, download the brochure for the product you looked at, and compare what you see with what you saw on the web site. All too often the two are indistinguishable. The biggest problem with manufacturer's web sites is that they are often just an electronic version of their brochure. But what do people really want to know about a product that they are thinking of buying it?
They want to find out how it compares with similar products. The most common search I enter into a search engine when I am buying is "(product name) review", because I want to see an independent review of what I am interested in.
For the most part, any review that is available on the site is either one that is paid for, or a glowing review from somewhere. I also get annoyed when I want to see the detailed specifications, such as fuel consumption figures, and I have to navigate through multiple layers to get there. Remember the basic rule: If you can't find it after three layers the site has been poorly designed.
Jump onto eBay and pick an item. For the most part there are full specs and a few pictures of each lot that you look at. Now go to Amazon.com and enter a search for The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam, by Robert Spencer. Start reading through the comments and reviews, some are supportive and some are downright critical which is why I used this example.
Amazon allows real people to express their views and opinions about every book and item that they sell. This allows you to make some kind of informed decision about your purchase and to identify products known as lemons. They also allow people to refer to items that are not sold or available from Amazon.
So why, as a product seller, would you make a business decision to allow negative material to appear on your web site? Consumer confidence comes to mind. If I see that a product supplier allows for negative feedback I will start to think that they are interested in improving their products. A forum that discusses your products allows you to give feedback on how to work around some issues, or to let people know there is some way they can get it fixed, upgraded or repaired. It also allows you to collect information on what is missing and what you might like to add in the next model. Missing colours and design features are also other pieces of information you can collect.
So thinking in Web 2.0 terms, your web site should allow for participation, which allows you to add intelligence to your web site and your design team. If you don't do this, a forum will appear somewhere else and people will still be doing reviews in magazines and people will find them. Or if there is no review they may move to some other manufacturer where such materials do exist. The old days of keeping information behind closed doors has gone. In today's world, if you are not providing the information then someone else is and they may be making money from it. In some cases they may even be selling it back to your marketing department. Why pay for market research when you can do it on your web site?
I know that some of these ideas will seem radical to many here, where information sharing is not part of the culture. People here have their forums, visit http://www.pantip.com, where they discuss all manner of things including hardware, but sadly for ex-pats this site is all in Thai.
Email: jclhein@gmail.com.
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