CMI Web Studio

One of the biggest misconceptions about designers (and usually Web designers) is that we’re just Web designers — that the scope of our skills begins with Lorem ipsum and ends with HTML emails. This is ridiculous.

Everyone in this industry fills dozens of roles throughout a given day. On a call with a prospective client, we take the role of salesperson. After the contract is sorted, we become researchers, combing through the client’s outdated website, looking at analytics and identifying breakdowns and room for improvement. Soon after, we become content curators, wading through the piles of content in PDF format sent by the client, identifying what works and what doesn’t.

Then we’re architects, laying out content to get the most important messages across, while ensuring that everything in our layouts remains findable. We design the website itself. We manage client expectations and work through revisions. We write code. We introduce a content management system. We carefully insert and style content. We create and update the brand’s presence on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. We help to create an editorial calendar to keep content fresh and accurate. We check in on the analytics and metrics to see how the website is performing.

Notice that “design” is mentioned only once in all of that work.

Two separate studies have been released over the past week that show why people “friend” and “follow” brands on sites like Facebook and Twitter.

The first, from Google, looked at Facebook. The study found that 55 percent of Facebook users do not friend or “like” any brands on Facebook. Of those who do, 18 percent become a fan of one or two brands, 11 percent do so for three or four brands, 10 percent five to nine brands and just 6 percent ten or more brands. And why do they become fans?

25 percent to receive discounts and promotions
18 percent to show others they support the brands
10 percent because it’s fun and entertaining
8 percent to hear new info first

The second study comes from ExactTarget and surveyed Twitter users ages 15 and up. They found that:

38 percent of users follow brands to get updates on future products
31 percent to receive discounts and promotions
30 percent to get updates on upcoming sales
28 percent to get a “freebie”

The writing is on the wall. Your top business social networking priorities should be to offer discounts and promotions, and to keep users informed about product releases and other company news that will benefit the user. This does not mean announcing a new CFO, but rather a new product line, an update to an exisiting product or news about how your products can help improve consumers’ quality of life, for example.

Of course, discounts and promotions loom large. Build a value system with users by rewarding their loyalty with discounts and you are likely to see new fans and followers. And, don’t stop at promoting this strategy solely on networks – make sure your website provides links to your network profiles and informing users that, by becoming a fan or follower, they can expect discounts and promotions. As always, set a strategy including well-defined limits. After all, you don’t want to give away the store should a discount go viral.

Web users have options — thousands of them. It’s one of the reasons the Web is so useful but also one of the great challenges of Web business. How do you make sure your site is the one that stands out amid the rest and that users keep coming back for more?

The answer is to provide the most relevant experience to users’ expectations. Largely, this can be accomplished with a well thought-out design.

We can often get sidetracked by ideas that might seem innovative but, in the end, don’t deliver on the promises our brand makes to consumers. For instance, if you’re running a business blog it doesn’t make much sense to have a lengthy Flash intro — your readers are likely busy professionals that want access to information as quickly as possible.

The latest installment of a series of reports on the impact of social media, conducted by ROI Research Inc. and sponsored by Performics, examines how consumers use social networking sites to get advice on what to purchase; how they give advice on companies and products, and whether they post content specific to various industries.

According to the survey, the most highly discussed verticals on social networks were automotive (61 percent), travel (60 percent) and entertainment (57 percent). When it comes to social networkers seeking or sharing recommendations on local retailers, however, home furnishings led all categories, including automotive.

Other highlights of the study include the following:

• 56 percent of respondents are fans of appliance brands or retailers on Facebook
• 49 percent of respondents most often use social networking sites to seek advice on electronics purchases
• 49 percent of respondents discuss apparel on social networking sites to compare prices
• 49 percent of respondents follow automotive brands or retailers on Twitter
• 38 percent of respondents most often use social networking sites to give advice about financial services and home furnishings companies or products
• 26 percent are likely to make an automotive purchase as a result of a recommendation someone posted on a social networking site (higher than any other vertical)
• 23 percent of respondents follow at least one travel company on either Facebook or Twitter

The results were compiled over 2009 and 2010, and seem to confirm social media’s heavy impact on the retail landscape. While marketers remained unconvinced until relatively recently, the fact that businesses are increasing their advertising spends on Facebook by up to 20 times more than last year’s amounts is a clear indication that the doubt has subsided.

Nearly one-third (32 percent) of consumers will start abandoning slow sites between one and five seconds.

• 84 percent are only willing to try a slow performing website a few times before giving up.
• 39 percent say speed is more important than functionality for most websites, while only one in five rank greater site functionality as more important.

Speed also makes a difference when it comes to accessing a mobile site.

• A third of all Web users are also using a mobile device to access the Internet.
• More than half of mobile users expect websites to load as quickly, almost as quickly or faster on their mobile phone, compared to the computer they use at home.

Slow load times are common and users feel frustrated with poor performance.

• Two thirds (67 percent) of users encounter a slow performing website a few times a week or more.
• More than a third (37 percent) said they would not return to a slow site, and 27 percent would likely jump to a competitor’s site.
• For mobile web users, slow website load times and poor formatting are the top two issues encountered on the mobile Web.

Web users have visited sites and not been unable to accomplish their tasks.

• More than 80 percent of users say they have been unable to accomplish their tasks – such as completing a purchase or a financial transaction – on a specific website at least once.
• Nearly half (47 percent) say they have frequently abandoned sites where they couldn’t finish their tasks in the past three months.

“When web users encounter web or mobile site performance problems, their patience and loyalty run thin,” said Matt Poepsel, vice president of performance strategies at Gomez. “However, many companies fail to realize that seconds really do count because their customers refer to best-in-class Web performers like Facebook, Google and Yahoo! as a measuring stick or standard for determining how fast all sites should be.”