Re: Justification to improve site usability

From: Rob Frankel <rob_at_robfrankel.com>
Date: Wed 12 Jun 2002 16:37:49 -0500

At 3:01 PM -0500 6/11/02, Josh Dahmes wrote:
>
>1). The cost of a negative web experience for a potential customer.
>How much does it cost to change a bad impression, that resulted from
>searching for a product that was not represented on a web site? If
>a potential customer did not find the product what would be an
>average cost to reactivate that potential customer?

It's horrendous. For the quick math, take the amount they invested
in the erroneous brand, add the cost of building the web site,
marketing materials and media they spent promoting it. Add the
amount of time multiplied by the wages of the number of people
deployed to develop and implement the plan.

Now total that and multiply it by two, because they're going to have
to re-develop everything all over again.

Finally, add the cost of retrofitting the new stuff into the old
stuff, plus all the months of lost business wasted during the
transition.

It adds up to more than a few cups of coffee.

>
>2). The number of exposures before a purchase action. In classic brand
>marketing, there is a figure that represents how many times a potential
>customer has to see a product before taking action - like purchasing said
>product. Do you know what this is in web exposures? If you do know a
>figure, I am sure that it would be represented over a specific time period,
>as well. (As opposed to sending pop-ups that many times immediately.)"

One. That's it. If your branding is right and you recognize that
the web is driven by people seeking out solutions to their problems,
all you need is one hard hit that shows your brand to be "the ONLY
solution to their problem." There's little time for anything else
other than clicking and buying.

>Obviously, things will vary from one industry to another and from one
>product to another. But if anyone knows of locations of research data
>or simply has ideas about the issues I would greatly appreciate the
>feedback.
>

True. This doesn't necessarily hold for every sector of commerce.
But it does hold up quite well as a rule of thumb.
--
Rob Frankel, "Yes, I really do turn users into evangelists for your brand."
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Received on Wed Jun 12 2002 - 16:37:49 CDT