In the modern digital era all brands are publishers. They are curators of content and information that engage, entice and excite their audience.
Finding the right way to share and publish content – and thereby engage with your audience – is paramount. Making the right decisions around web platforms and web publishing technology is crucial. Get it right and your web presence will be dynamic, creative and in-touch with the needs of your user. Get it wrong and the site will be un-engaging, un-enticing and a poor advocate for your brand.
With the right tools and technology partners, enterprise organisations can publish content that is up-to-the-minute and responsive to their users’ needs as well as presented on-brand and on-trend.
In this article, we outline three web battlegrounds. These are crucial points where marketers must make clear and decisive decisions that will impact the future direction and impact of their web presence and brand.
Custom web build vs. Out of the box
The first decision that needs to be made in any web project is whether to choose a custom build, or an out of the box solution (such as WordPress, Magento, Joomla, Drupal).
It’s easy to understand why organisations might choose to build their website on a custom platform, designed to their bespoke requirements. Every business is unique, so they should have a website to match their unique requirements. Right? Well, maybe not…
A custom build site is often great in the short term. It matches the business needs perfectly at that moment in time, the proposition is well articulated, products and services can be easily located and purchased, and (hopefully) the site looks beautiful. The challenge is that things move quickly. The business proposition changes, new services or products are needed, web functionality and technology change and user needs and consumption habits evolve. Updating a custom build site to reflect all of these variable factors can often prove time consuming and costly. Brands find themselves over-reliant on specialist developers (often the same ones who created the site in the first place) who understand the unique intricacies and complexities of the site build.
An out of the box content management solution (CMS) offers pre-built website solutions that can be rolled out quickly and easily and (contrary to some pre-conceptions) can be tailored and amended using a vast array of themes and plugins. Crucially, an out of the box CMS can be easily updated by anyone who has good knowledge of the CMS used – there is no longer the reliance on the developer.
Hosting vs. Platform
In the past, marketers have been guilty of taking a back seat when it comes to technical decisions such as choosing a hosting provider. They want to focus on the creative vision and strategic direction, so decisions about the technology in the back office are left to IT or the web dev team.
But if your role, and the purpose of your marketing campaigns, is to increase traffic to the website and drive conversion rates, then why wouldn’t you take a proactive interest in where and how your site is hosted? Web hosting is a commoditised market where vendors compete over price and capacity, but rarely over customer service or reputation.
Failure to get a grip on this means you could be penalised by your own success. It doesn’t matter how successful a campaign is, it will count for nothing if visitors to the website or campaign site can’t be converted because the site is down and the hosting provider can’t fix the issue, or the site is unable cope with the volume of users and the hosting provider can’t scale quickly enough.
When investing precious marketing budget in exciting campaigns, don’t waste it by settling for a hosting provider that doesn’t understand your business or have the technical expertise to integrate with your CMS.
Mobile first vs. Responsive design
It’s predicted that come 2017 there will be 5.13 billion mobile phone users, of which 2.5 billion will be smartphone users (emarketer), and it’s estimated that 80 percent of adults own a smartphone (GlobalWebIndex). So it stands to reason that we should think ‘mobile first’ on all web development to ensure but your site is optimised for mobile use.
But with the proliferation of mobile devices, manufacturers, operating systems and screen sizes and resolutions – what does mobile first really mean, and is it still relevant?
Thinking about smartphones in isolation leaves brands vulnerable to slipping behind the innovation curve. The same GlobalWebIndex research found that 47 percent of adults own a tablet, 37 percent own a games console and 34 percent own a smart TV. At the moment just 9 percent own a smart watch, but we can surely expect this to rise with the release of the Apple Watch. And who knows where consumer wearables will take us in the next five to 10 years?
We are accessing the internet and websites in a variety of ways and consumers expect a consistent user experience, irrespective of the device. So a better way of thinking about web design for end point devices is to consider ‘responsive design.’
This hinges on the idea of developing flexible websites and content that is built around the user, not the device. Don’t be limited by the most popular device right now. Just because the iPhone 6 has a 4.7-inch screen, that doesn’t mean it’s the de-facto device upon which all developers should benchmark themselves. Who knows what the next form factor will be? Brands need to embrace responsive design so that they have the freedom to react to the future needs of users faster than their competitors.
Staying ahead of the digital curve
Marketers are conflicted. Pulled in a dozen directions and fighting to keep on top of a changing job role and ever-shifting expectations from the business. Technology developed for marketers is a fabulous opportunity. Marketers can leverage data and customer analytics to enable incredible levels of insight and business transformation.
Deploying the right web technology and cutting edge functionality helps ensure that the best brands stay ahead of the digital curve and puts marketing at the forefront of innovation. The constantly evolving nature of consumer habits and user demands mean that, more so than ever, brands need to make astute decisions about how they develop and maintain their web assets.
By Fabio Torlini, MD of WP Engine.
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