This series of posts from Vicky Brock will explore practical tips on how tourism businesses can improve the returns from their website through a systematic process of measurement and optimisation.
But first the basics for tourism websites:
1. Availability
Is your site quick to load, reliably available and viewable on non-Microsoft and accessibility browsers?
2. Product information
Does your site convey your product benefits, pricing, booking process and location information clearly? Can web visitors easily find the answers to the all questions they are likely to have?
3. Contact details
Are these clearly on display on every page and can they be viewed without scrolling down the page. Do contact numbers make sense to international visitors too?
4. Recency
Is your site bang up to date, with no expired information or prices and the correct calendar year?
5. Searchable
Can you find your own site on google, yahoo, aol and msn using terms your customers are likely to use?
6. Navigation
Do the signposts on your site make sense to people outside your business? Test it on friends or family. Can a visitor arriving deep in the site (rather than the home page) still find their way round?
7. Readable
Can your site be physically read, eg is the text size/colour suitable and the background generally plain and light? Does the page still convey some meaning if you only glance at it quickly?
8. Offline Marketing/communication
Is your website consistent with your image offline and do you try to communicate benefits, your unique selling points and a call to action in a way your target customers can relate and respond to? Do you advertise your website details on all your offline material?
9. Trust
Do you correct broken links and mistakes, remove out of date content and project a reassuring image? Making your website personal by giving your names, testimonials or including a team photo builds trust. Ensuring there is no discrepancies between prices and other details advertised on the web and the information quoted on the phone is essential to maintain trust.
10. Measurement
Are you making any efforts to understand who is visiting your website? Do you know if traffic trends are up or down compared to last season? Do you know which of your advertising activities are driving sales and which are wasting you money? Using web analytics software to measure your website will allow you to start improving the effectiveness of your website.
This series of posts from Vicky Brock will explore practical tips on how tourism businesses can improve the rewards from their website, by using techniques like measuring website traffic and understanding when and how potential customers are using the web.
In the next post, I will explore the tools available for tracking your website and simple tips for starting a web measurement and optimisation process.
This entry was posted on Sunday, August 5th, 2007 at 9:09 pm and is filed under Web analytics and web measurement. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.