Let’s  say you have just launched a new website.  Your marketing team loves the web design.  Your IT team is thrilled with the security and efficiency and the C class folks are all lining up to salute.  It’s perfect right?  Maybe, maybe not.  What about taking that quantum leap and testing your site with your intended audience, your customers?  Or, as The Net Impact recently determined for the City of Wentzville MO, why not test the site from the perspective of your citizens?

When it comes to a municipality website, the usability of the site by its citizens is a necessary condition for performance.  If the  website is difficult to navigate, people leave. If a landing page fails to clearly state what the municipality offers and what users can do on that page, people leave. If users do not like the access to pertinent informationof the website, they leave. If a website’s information is hard to find or doesn’t answer their questions, the visitors will be left hanging or will  soon be clicking away to a differetn website. Notice a pattern here?

So how do you determine if your website is user-friendly? User testing allows you to roleplay how citizens will navigate your site. At the same time, you record their comments and responses to their efforts to navigate and move through the site in order to accomplish a designed task.  Sound complicated?  It’s really not.   

For an excellent example of  usability testing review the  recent case study conducted by The Net Impact for the City of Wentzville’s website.  After The Net Impact  launched the  The City of Wentzville’s new website, the city worked with our Web marketing team to conduct a series of usability tests to gauge how user-friendly the website’s navigation and overall experience was for visitors and to get a better idea of ideal traffic flow for visitor satisfaction. We created a series of scenarios and tasks for testers to complete on the City of Wentzville’s website.  These tasks were specifically designed to take testers through the navigation pathways of the site and to recreate the experience of a typical visitor to the website.  An impartial  third party service was enlisted to select a broad sample of testers.  A random sampling of testers, with diverse backgrounds including gender, age,  income level, and computer skill level, was determined.  This group best represented the  profiles of actual visitors to the site. As testers performed each task, their mouse movements, clicks and live feedback were all recorded.

Once the user tests were complete, our team of Internet marketing specialist analyzed videos and tester feedback to generate a recommendation report and next steps in order to improve the user experience. From the results we concluded that overall the testers were impressed by the amount of information provided.  Several commented that they wished their own city provided this information and thought this site set the bar high for other municipalities.  However, there were still ample comments from  testers reflecting confusion and difficulty in  finding information .

The Net Impact’s recommendations included consolidating menus, eliminating redundant information and making links to highly requested information more obvious. Some of the tester’s comments also regarded  web design.  The majority of the testers found the site aesthetically pleasing.  Many liked the colors and the rotating photos, but wanted to see more pictures of the city. In addition to suggesting Wentzville add more images to display the character of the  city, The Net Impact suggested different options for the city to make other tools, such as their community calendar easier to find and more simple for visitors to use. – Read more TNI  Case Studies

In conclusion, based on the invaluable feedback from the user testing, our team continues to work with the City of Wentzville to revise aspects of their website to in order to continue to increase effectiveness and functionality. 

Bottom line: User testing is an important aspect of any Internet marketing campaign. The Net Impact employs usability testing as part of our analytics methodology in order to construct  complete online marketing strategies. Remember as well that website testing is an ongoing process, but when managed properly it will drive your efforts and help visitorsrealize a greater satisfaction with your municipal website. Contact The Net Impact today to learn how we can help you find the most effective way to make your website visitors take action.

The new websites’ features include enhancements to the ways in which products are displayed and indexed on the sites. Website visitors can now search for instruments, set-up a wish list and add products to an online shopping cart. Unlike their competitor’s websites, Bausch + Lomb’s websites pioneer user-interaction, including improved product detail with “click to enlarge” functionality on all product images and product videos. The rebranded Bausch + Lomb logo design was created to coincide with the corporate rebranding, and the website colors, imagery, design and navigation elements were also updated for corporate consistency.

The new websites’ relationship between design and product create an engaging experience for the user while reinforcing Bausch + Lomb as a credible industry leader in the medical community. Check out the Press Release!

An excellent example of a non-profit organization that leveraged social media to enhance their marketing efforts is Epic Change. Have you heard of TweetsGiving? It was one of the first charity initiatives on Twitter. In November 2008, during the week of the Thanksgiving holiday, Epic Change leveraged Twitter to raise money ($10,000 goal) to help build a classroom in Tanzania. In 48 hours, that goal was met from 336 unique donors. Not only was money raised, Epic Change found a slew of new volunteers who were interested in the causes the organization seeks to support. Why did it work? It was more than just a sheer charity initiative. Using the holiday where most Americans express their thanks, a part of the TweetsGiving initiative was to act as a creativity catalyst, asking people to tweet what they were thankful for with the #tweetsgiving hashtag. All in all, there were over 3,500 tweets expressing gratitude for something in their lives.

Stacey  Monk, Founder and CEO of Epic Change says, “Social media is making change possible. With social media, we’re able to hear totally new voices, who might not have had access to mainstream channels, which represents a real shift in power, and where change can originate.”

From dipping their toes into the water with a low-investment campaign to diving off the cliff, today many nonprofits are actively exploring social media. But a common problem many non-profits face is that they blindly leap into social media without implementing a strategy. Without a well created Internet marketing strategy, there is no way to measure your online efforts. This leaves the non-profits at a loss to justify their investment of time, money and resources, or reap valuable insights to improve their efforts. Whether you measure social media success based on how many new volunteers you recruit, the number of sponsorships or donations, the dialogue shared among your online community, or the influx in web traffic, fans and followers, it is vital to measure your results against clear marketing objectives, just as you would with any marketing campaign.

When starting a social media campaign for you non-profit, remember: a simple, yet powerful mission and message can take a campaign far. Non-profits on social networking sites should set goals, update consistently, become a part of the conversation, build community and create value. Without a clear vision and well thought out strategy, it is difficult to encourage an audience to participate. If the time and energy are strategically spent to create a social community, others will help spread your message and your desired results will come.

Recently The Net impact teamed with St. Louis based non-profit, the Karla Smith Foundation to help build online aware for their campaign event with BringChange2Mind, a non-profit superheaded by award-winning actress Glenn Close that works to combat the stigma of mental illness. KSF and BringChange2Mind combined forces to host an unprecedented mental health awareness and anti-stigma event, “Change a Mind, Change a Life”, in St. Louis, Missouri.

The Karla Smith Foundation was in need of a strategy to build online buzz around the event and direct traffic to the event website. To quickly and effectively generate awareness around the campaign, The Net Impact worked closely with the Karla Smith Foundation to create the website, www.changeamind.org, for the highly anticipated event. In order to direct traffic to the website and create online awareness, The Net Impact implemented a social media marketing strategy for the campaign, which included a strong presence on Twitter and Facebook. The KSF social networking sites were updated daily with exciting news regarding the event, such as notices of upcoming media appearances, videos and pictures, and sponsorship information. The KSF Facebook and Twitter continued to see steady growth in fans and followers as well an increase in the level of fan engagement in the weeks leading up to the event.

As a result of the social media marketing campaign, KSF was provided with the opportunity to share valuable information with their existing community, increase interest around their event, catch the attention of local media, build their brand awareness and attract new fans and followers to get involved with their organization. Most importantly, the KSF Facebook page now serves as a platform for their online community to share personal experiences and give valuable feedback in real time.

In conclusion, while many non-profits still have a long way to go, the integration of social media in their marketing efforts can help these organizations meet and exceed many different goals. Social  media is a platform that allows people to participate in a conversation about what they think, feel and care about, making social media and excellent space for the non-profit sector to continue to explore.

AIRHAWK, a comfort seating system for motorcycles manufactured by ROHO Group Inc., announces the March 18, 2010 launch of their website, www.airhawk.net. The Net Impact and XG-ad, a full service advertising agency specializing in print advertising, combined services to create the website design for the comfort seating system’s website, which is powered by the Auctori, web content management system (WCMS) built for search engine optimization.

AIRHAWK’s parent company, The ROHO Group Inc., approached our team to work with AIRHAWK’s print advertising agency, XG-ad, to create the web design for the premium product’s website. We took XG-AD’s Phohotshop design work, and made it web ready before placing it into the Auctori web content management system. The Auctori solution provides AIRHAWK with the opportunity to strengthen their Internet presence and their overall brand reputation by giving users a cutting edge yet professional site as well as the power to maintain their content in real time.

“This was one of the smoothest web launches I’ve managed.  We had the best of both worlds for design and internet marketing utilizing The Net Impact and XG-Ad.  The design is edgy and fresh while the back-end that I oversee is so user-friendly, easy to understand and of course, completely search engine optimized.  These two companies made a great team and in the end, produced a fantastic site that we are very proud of and excited to promote,” said Rebecca Heckert, eMarketing Coordinator, The ROHO GROUP.

Read the Full Press Release!

On November 9, 2009, Gohomebuyer.com, a comprehensive website dedicated to educating homebuyers to make an informed decision when buying a home, launched their newly redesigned website, which was designed and searched engine optimized by The Net Impact.  

“We hired The Net Impact to help launch our new product, Go Homebuyer!. The Net Impact redesigned our website, Facebook page, and assisted in developing a plan to help drive hits to our website. Their level of knowledge about design and optimization was tremendous. Thank you for putting us on the right course for web success!,” said Amanda Pozzo, Real Estate Educate, GoHomebuyer.com.

Go Homebuyer! Originally contacted The Net Impact to help implement a search engine optimization strategy. To create an effective approach, our team reviewed Go Homebuyer! ‘s current web analytics. After conducting a thorough internal site traffic analysis, we developed a plan of action to increase the site’s visibility in search engines and to improve visitor navigation. Go Homebuyer! also utilized our press release optimization service to boost the visibility of their press release, add additional links to their website and  to increase target traffic flow to their website.

When working on the SEO strategy for Go Homebuyer!,  Go Home Buyer! came to the realization that  their website would benefit from a site redesign in order to improve visitor navigation and conversion . In addition to search engine optimization services, Go Homebuyer! also looked to our web design services to boost their online prescence. Our design team created a new website and new landing page structure for the online company, which was then handed over Go Homebuyer!’s in-house developers who  applied the design. To reflect the look and feel of the newly designed website, we also designed a custom Facebook  and launched the Go Homebuyer!’s Facebook Advertising Campaign.

Gohomebuyer.com  offers a variety of online resources covering the most interesting and relevant information in real estate today. This includes a comprehensive suite of online courses which includes video, audio, graphics, activities and much more. Since Go Homebuyer!’s resources are all accessible online, the need for a user-friendly and attractive website is an important aspect to the success of their business.  Our search engine optimization team and web design team were a perfect match to meet Go Homebuyer!’s  online objectives to increase search engine visibility and to enhance the look and feel of their new website.

“We enjoy working with out-of-the-box thinkers like the Go Home Buyer! team.  Their innovate approach to bringing information and education to new home buyers and their  openness to new marketing ideas made this a great project for all parties.  We will follow up with a web analytics review in about 30 days to confirm and challenge aspects of our original strategy.   Any changes as well as additional testing is already in our thought process,” said Steve Thomas, President, The Net Impact.

DorothyLee, a unique online store that provides quality and customizable apparel and accessories at affordable prices to families, small businesses and Fortune 500 corporations, approached The Net Impact in search of an Internet marketing firm that could provide them with a plan of action to improve their search engine traffic. The customer service-oriented company had worked with several SEO firms to create search engine optimization plans and to implement the determined SEO efforts.  The firm had not yet seen any concrete, positive end-results from these past marketing efforts and the related expenses.

The Net Impact analyzed the online store’s analytics for their primary URL http://www.dorothylee.com/, compared traffic patterns to the site architecture, conducted thorough keyword research, investigated the marketplace and analyzed the competition. Using this information, TNI then developed a Traffic Based Design™ that would greatly improve the site’s visibility for key search terms organically and increase traffic.

This Traffic Based Design™ plan included:
• redefined site architecture to create the required landing pages
• rewritten meta information and content for each landing pages
• optimized links and title tags
• URL rewrite recommendations
• Image alternative text tag recommendation
• Website validation testing
• Website ADA compliance testing
• Competitor Analysis Report
• Keyword Rankings Strategy
• Baseline Keyword Positioning Plan
• Suggestions for calls to action to improve conversion

 “It was a pleasure working with The Net Impact.  We met with the company president, Steve Thomas, before getting started.  He never used any sales tactics and we felt that he was always being straight forward and honest with us.  Upon coming aboard, we found the company to have great customer service and communication skills.  They responded to all emails and calls promptly.  Also, the completion of our project was done in a timely manner,” said Nicole Minor, Owner, DorothyLee.com.

The Net Impact’s partnership with DorothyLee is continuing to grow as we are currently working with the retailer on the next steps for improvement, including the creation of an annual web marketing calendar with defined deliverables, conversion testing using Google Optimizer, a social media strategy to support the main ecommerce site and a regular review of Google analytics that will define monthly recommendations.

“Ultimately, we were very happy with all of the work that was performed; in fact The Net Impact exceeded our expectations on all fronts.  We highly recommend any company in need of SEO work to select The Net Impact as your #1 choice.  We’re sure that you will not be disappointed,” said Minor.