Yet look at ten random brand-centric websites and you’ll likely be greeted by vague messages, uninspiring images and dated design. This leaves a negative impression on the visitor and makes the offering look less valuable.

It’s clear many, if not most, organisations fail to realise the full potential of this channel. And it’s easy to understand why. Developing a measurably effective website is difficult. And the bigger the organisation, the harder it seems to be. 

However it’s almost certainly worth the effort.

The quality of your web presence can, and should, reflect the quality of your offering.

The wonderful wealth of the World Wide Web

To understand the value of a website we only need to look at Google, eBay or Alibaba each of which started as web pure plays.

Your website can be your showroom, storefront, research lab, customer support centre, training academy, news station, library – all at once. It can open entire new value chains.

The quality of your web presence can, and should, reflect the quality of your offering. It expresses your attention to detail, design flair and sense of pride. It highlights your brand’s uniqueness and organisation’s greatness.

When to maximise the value of your website

After you decide your website is a worthwhile investment, a plan is crucial. The plan aligns operational, brand, and online initiatives to progress your organisation’s overarching strategy.

It’s important to start as soon as possible. Strong, relevant websites get more effective over time. Effectiveness is developed by building a website incrementally then continually adding content, monitoring usage, and tweaking the site based on learnings. It’s surprising how much value even a small change can produce.

Your website strategy should answer questions like these:

• How will our website help us achieve our objectives?
• Who are our visitors and what do they want? 
• How can we attract more of the right audience? 
• What can we learn from our current website? Our competitors’ websites? Other websites that have brought success to similar organisations?
• What resources should we commit to the project and how should they be allocated?
• Who is most suitable to be involved in creating our website?

So many experts

Probably the biggest challenge in website development is finding the right team. The ideal team includes people with experience in data analysis, business and brand strategy, copywriting, coding, graphic design, audio, video, animation, infographics, UX/UI and project management.

The web development dream team will have already successfully worked together. This is important because another big challenge is agreeing on a development methodology.

Many organisations miss out on www wealth because key decision makers find digital daunting. It doesn’t have to be like that.

What methodology?

The first website was published in 1991. Since then no standard approach to web development has emerged. Compare that with film. Making video is another collaborative media, but one in which everyone involved has a clearly defined role. That makes the process a lot easier.

One reason for the lack of web development methodology is there are so many different scenarios. From pure digital startups, to the sprawling diversity of a multinational, and everything in-between. Along with that goes a huge range of application software and platforms.

The pace of change also makes it tough to standardise web development. We have seen long periods when new web technology and trends could obsolete fundamental www design principles every 18 months.

This has stabilized in recent years. A website developed today by an experienced practitioner can expect to live longer than one launched say 10 years ago.

Where should we start? 

Many organisations miss out on www wealth because key decision makers find digital daunting. It doesn’t have to be like that. Here’s how to identify competent web practitioners:

• They can clearly articulate strategy, tactics and executional decisions in simple, jargon-free language
• They have examples of previous projects and can explain their strengths and weaknesses 
• Their websites can enlighten you about organisations and business sectors you know nothing about
• Their messages and designs reinforce each other
• They have a methodology and can explain why it’s effective
• Part of their process involves understanding your existing workflows and team strengths and adapting their methodology to yours 
• They offer a choice of technical solutions, some application platforms may not be right for your operations

Above all, aim to involve senior team members in key stages of the development process. Your website is simply too valuable to your brand to delegate fully. A junior team, or people who don’t understand the company vision and strategy may need guidance to create the most effective online hub.