Ballymena Council and Fermanagh Council websites have been listed among the worst in the UK by government website comparison company, Site Morse.  At the same time Belfast and North Down Councils rank among the elite of the 450+ local council sites compared.

Site Morse ranks sites on over 400 technical criteria.  What they can’t tell is the relevancy of the content to the reader. After spending a couple of hours poking around the best and worst council sites, it appears that the councils that have put the effort into getting a technically attuned website have also put the effort into creating a customer focused site.

Take the navigation of the Ballymena Council website for example:

No - I didn't cut out their logo. There isn't one on the site!

The top line navigation includes ‘News’ which is the same as the home page, ‘Council Projects’ which was last updated in 2007 and ‘Print Page’.  Who on earth looks in the navigation when they want to print a page?

Their sub-navigation starts with ‘Corporate Documents’, the council ‘History’ and includes information about councillors and their committee structure.

These are all areas of interest for councillors but not necessarily the public they serve. If for example, a member of the public wants to know when their bin is due for collection, that information is not available on the website.  This website is self-serving.  It is made for the councillors, not the citizen.

Now take a look at Belfast City Council, some 40 miles from Ballymena.  This website is subservient. It is made for the customer, in this case the citizens of Belfast.

In this site, the City Council has established what areas are popular with their citizens and has brought them to the fore.  They understand the need for advice and have featured this in the main navigation and central areas of the page.

Subservient architecture built around the reader, not the site owner

The ‘Council’ tab on the Belfast City Council website gives lots of details on how the council can work for the citizen.

What Belfast Council can do for you

The Ballymena equivalent has photos of the councillors.

Ballymena Councillors

A subservient website is created when the marketing team shows leadership. They push back on ideas that are not customer-centric and say “no” when the content is not relevant to the majority.   A self-serving website is created when the marketer is under pressure to do the bidding of their peers.

At a recent online marketing conference for the Wedding industry, Mary from Wicklow asks “I make specialist wedding stationary – should I put my pricing online?”  The four guest speakers were split.  My opinion was that you should display pricing guides if possible.

My reasons for arguing that pricing guides should be put online is because in a price sensitive market – such as wedding stationary, it is one of the first queries any perspective customer has.  If you had a bricks and mortar shop, and the potential customer walked through your door there is a good chance you can change the terms of engagement by asking the question “well what budget do you have in mind?”  Online the same privilege does not exist.  Customer expectations are dashed if they want price guidance and you don’t give it to them. Your competitor is only two clicks away and your competitor may address the price concern head-on.

There are certain industries that are neither price driven or suitable for generic pricing.  Those industries are sensitive to other aspects influencing the customers’ choice.  Unfortunately in most industries price is a primary factor when making choice.  Unless your product or service is the clear market leader, withholding pricing may mean you’re not even considered as your compeitor overcomes customer questions and builds trust.

In my experience, few customers visit a website because of its design. There are few companies, organisations or political movements that win or influence their intended target market by having the prettiest website, yet this is usually the greatest bone of contention between Marketing Managers and the web design company.

Unless you sell web design services or design is pivotal to your business, like a boutique hotel, then content and structure are more important than design.

Amazon will never win a Best Website Design Award. What it will win is best and most appropriate content awards, as well as having a killer customer journey.  So the next time you need a new website, perhaps prioritise your time and efforts into creating a:

• Clear online strategy with defined outcomes and objectives
• Customer focused structure with clear customer journey and easy to find call-to-action triggers – such as call us on this number or add to basket or donate now
• Concise and appropriate content.  Use video where it works better than text and animation when explaining complex interactions
• Good website design

It is simple to criticise website design because design is subjective.  I argue that you should spend more time debating what really matters – the objectives of the site, its structure, the customer journey and ultimately the content.