Website Development and Design Best Practices: A Mini Audit Guide for Marketing Coordinators

An organization's Website as the Hub of its Digital Landscape

An organizations’ website is the hub of their digital landscape.  In other words, itis the common digital connection to all the organizations’ digital platforms such as social media.  The company website is ultimately where we want our target audience to end up in their journey with our brand, product/service acquisition or awareness campaign, think of the conversion funnel.

Now, one of the responsibilities as a Marketing or Communications Coordinator job that you may have after graduation is to develop or maintain the company website. The first thing you will want to do is audit the website to analyze and understand if it’s meeting best practice standards for todays Website Development & Design.  Once you know this answer you can maintain as is or recommend changes.  If you are developing a new website, you will be able to employ best practices for website development and design. 

In this case, an audit is a snapshot of where the website is at in this point in time. It provides a baseline from which you can recommend improvements to management or perhaps a client.

Directions

1.  Scenario:  Imagine you just started as a new Marketing Assistant with Public Mobile. You want to impress your manager and decide to embark on a mini audit to highlight the good, the bad, and the ugly parts of the corporate website.

2. Start the audit by using the RACE acronym we learnt about in class, to guide you in identifying the strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the development and design of your website.  Under each section of the acronym ask and analyze the points listed below and provide concrete examples to prove your analysis.  These points represent Best Practices for website design and development.

R is for Reach

· How does Public Mobile build brand awareness for its products and services to drive website visits?

· Does the content and copywriting relate to the target audience? List the top five keywords (long or short tail) they are currently using and recommend other keywords (up to five more) they should be using for this site.

· To analyze the keywords for this site using any of the following tools:

· Is the content of the website purposeful to reach the website goal and objectives?

· Is the brand and design consistent throughout the pages?

· Is the website responsive on other digital devices such as an iPad or a mobile phone?

A is for Act 

· How does Public Mobile interact on its website to generate leads and persuade visitors to purchase their product?

· Is their website User Friendly or in technical terms have strong UX?

· From a design perspective is the colour, images, typography, and layout appropriate for the target audience, visible, readable and legible?

· Is the content useful and relevant by being accurate, updated, and understandable?

· Does the website function well?   How long does it take to open?  Is it easy for the target audience to navigate through and find what they are looking for?

· Are there identifiable calls to action (CTAs) and are they working? 

 C is for Convert

· Can you find where a customer pays (ecommerce transactions or offline channels)?

Does the ecommerce follow the best practices such as: being clear (simple process with clear messaging), easy (few steps), and trustworthy (on brand and secure)