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2. 2 Homepage and Marketing Hartwig Tauber University of Applied Sciences Krems

3. 3 Overview Homepages – a Marketing-Task! Basics: CI and Homepage Defining Aims and Strategies Homepage-Marketing-Tools „Real-Life-Marketing“ and Homepages Measuring Homepage-Success: Statistics

4. 4 Homepages – a Marketing Task a homepage is a digital representation of a company for many customers the homepage is the first contact with the company it is important to give a good impression about who you are and what you want …and this is a typical task for marketing! (…and not for the IT-Department!)

5. 5 Basics: CI and Homepage

6. 6 the homepage has to fulfill the rules of the company-CI this means at least: –logo –colours –fonts –structure important: copyright! a customer should be able to recognize the company at first sight

7. 7 CI and Homepage: Technical Limitations the internet-technique has some technical limitations that have to be accepted when integrating the CI: –pictures have to be as small as possible –there is no “colour-proofness” –special fonts cannot be used in texts –metric measures are not possible

8. 8 Basic Design- and Marketing-Rules all basic marketing-rules are valid for homepages too! –KISS (keep it simple and stupid) –clear design – easy to read –few different fonts and styles –one design for the whole homepage it must fit to the customer-needs

9. 9 Defining Aims and Strategies

10. 10 Why should I make a homepage? first step: –define the objective –answer the question: why do I publish a homepage of my company in the internet –which needs and expectations do customers have? second step: –check technical limitations –check costs third step: –define the contents and the structure of the homepage

11. 11 How to define an objective? it has to be measurable –number of visits –number of feedback-mails –number of sold parts in a shop –number of newsletter-subscribers it has to be realistic there should be short-term and long-term objectives

12. 12 How to find the objective? Hint: Consider the homepage a usual marketing-tool Typical questions: –whom do I want to reach? –how important is the homepage for the company? –one-time-visit or community?

13. 13 Whom do I want to reach? define the target group check if you can reach the target group in the internet then decide on: –design –text –technical possibilities

14. 14 How important is the homepage for the company? check your marketing- and business-strategy think about the chances and possibilities that a homepage offers (market-research can help) have an eye on your competitors define the importance of a homepage for the company then think about: –available budget –services to be offered

15. 15 One-Time-Visit or “Community”? One-Time-Visit: customer should come to my homepage when he needs my products/services “Community”: users and customers visit the homepage regularly this influences –content –frequency of updates –maintenance-costs

16. 16 Typical Concepts Introduction-Homepage Information-Homepage E-Commerce-Homepage Portal and Community each concept has a wide range of possibilities

17. 17 Introduction-Homepage smallest form aim: just to introduce the company “digital folder” very often at small companies: –home –we about us –our products and services –contact

18. 18 Information-Homepage detailed information about the company, products and services something like a product-catalogue volume depends on branch of industry –technical data –comparison tools –digital assistant –favourites additional possibility: support-information for customers

19. 19 E-Commerce-Homepage “Online”-Shop aim is to sell products can be part of information-homepage normally there is a difference – it is not the same to offer “just” information or to want the customer to buy

20. 20 Portal and Community aim is to get customers frequently to the homepage good online-services and up-to-date-information necessary typical for media- and service-companies high costs only possible if internet is an important part of the marketing- or business-strategy

21. 21 Homepage-Marketing-Tools and Features

22. 22 Overview two aims: –getting visitors to the homepage –getting information from visitors Tools and Features that support marketing on a homepage (selected examples): –News –Special offers –Free samples –Newsletter –Games

23. 23 News Up-to-date-information on the homepage easy for media-companies and big companies hard for SMEs – “real” news should be updated at least 3 times a month news have to be of interest to the visitor “it is better to have no news on a homepage than to have old news on it”

24. 24 Special Offers special prices and offers –the same as in store and real-life (folders, catalogues) –special “internet-offers” possible for all sizes of companies should be updated regularly, company can define period (“offer of the day/week/month/…”)

25. 25 Free Sample visitor can order a small, but free sample of a product there are many “online-bargain-hunters” advantage: customer has to tell his name and address in correct form hint: free product only for permission of using data of customer (for marketing)

26. 26 Newsletter visitor can subscribe to e-mail-information advantage: e-mail is a “push”-media, homepage a “pull”-media at least one newsletter per month text in newsletter can make the recipient curious – complete information on the homepage important: different laws in EU-countries about permission to send newsletter

27. 27 Games many variations: –simple form with question –multi-part-questionnaire –interactive games in all cases: visitor enters his personal data hint: winning-games with questions about the homepage to introduce the homepage to visitors

28. 28 “Real-Life”-Marketing and Homepage

29. 29 A Perfect Combination? a homepage can complete marketing-actions typical examples: –special offers also on homepage –“…further information you can find in the internet…” –“…send us a letter/fax or go to www.xyz.eu... ”www.xyz.eu –… internet is “just” a part of a marketing-campaign – you only have to use it every marketing-action has also to be found on the homepage

30. 30 Marketing-Advantages of Homepages a homepage is available anywhere - if you have access to internet information is “permanent” (you cannot throw it away like a folder) information is “long-term” (not just 20 seconds of a radio- or tv-spot) information is “unlimited” (not just one page in a magazine) information is “personal” (visitor decides how much he wants to know) information is “dynamic” (can be changed fast and cheaply) it is easier to remember a URL than a phone or fax number

31. 31 Measure Homepage-Success: Statistics

32. 32 “Homepage-Success”? depends on objective in most cases the number of visitors is interesting statistic has more than one reason: –success-measurement –information about visitors (who/when/what) –preferred/uninteresting contents

33. 33 How to get statistics web-server writes every access into a log-file this file can be analyzed by –provider –company two different ways of analyzing: –online –offline

34. 34 Statistics: Clear and True? many different terms some of them are “standardized”: –hit –page-view –visit –visitor –unique visitor definition behind the results of a statistic is extremely important

35. 35 Summary

36. 36 Summary Homepages are a marketing-tool they have to fulfill CI-rules it is important to know the objective before making a detailed concept a homepage can support marketing-activities statistics are good to measure the “success” of a homepage

37. 37 Thank you!