Who “Owns” Your Web Site? by Caroline Birch
When the subject turns to a company’s under-performing web site, I typically ask the following question. “Who actually “owns” the site?” Sometimes the answer is that the company owns the site. Sometimes I receive a baffled look. So I clarify the question. If you can’t identify one person within the company who actually “owns” the site, meaning the key evangelist, the site driver, the content manager and SEO guardian, all in one, then you may have a fractured web presence.
All too frequently, there are multiple “fingers in the pie” when it comes to your company’s web site. Now, of course, there must be collaboration between functional areas (sales, marketing, product marketing and IT) to determine the look and feel, promotional offers, e-commerce solutions, etc. Similarly, the IT department or web master is responsible for all the back-end maintenance and HTML. However, in my experience, a software company’s web site is often not really fully owned or overseen by any one person, or even function.
Let’s examine this true, personal example. I was new on the job as VP, Marketing for a software company. The Webmaster reported to me and was exceptionally territorial about not allowing anyone else to change anything on the web site. However, he would accept ad-hoc requests for changes to the web site from anyone who asked – members of the marketing staff, sales managers, even the CEO. There was no one person charged with owning the web site from look and feel to content and key words. This holistic approach is vital to maintaining a cohesive, effective site, especially if you are selling direct from your site to customers and/or resellers.
What did I do? I stepped in as the owner of the company’s site until we could hire a Web/Internet Marketing Manager. The fact that I named myself as web site owner effected a more reverend view of the web site as a critical component of our marketing communications and removed the haphazard approach to site content.
The prevalence of social media has made us prolific on-the-fly updaters of our personal web presence. We’re the arbiters of what we want to post and when. Content on a company’s web site, however, needs to be evaluated as the sum of the whole and the image, positioning and messaging must be guarded. Now, that’s not to say that updates and new content can’t be nimble and timely or that there shouldn’t be management and peer review of the site. There’s also so no hard and fast rule about whether the site should be owned by someone in marketing or product marketing. That is a decision that will vary by company and staff expertise. What is vital is that there is one go-to-person for your site who has a macro perspective and who is most vested in a perfectly cohesive, user-friendly and successful site that keeps prospects and customers coming back.
About the Author
Caroline Birch is Principal at Just Think Consultants, a professional software marketing consulting firm that provides expert consulting services on marketing strategy, integrated marketing planning, product launches, marketing communications and sales distribution strategies to software companies.
Visit http://www.justthinkconsultants.com to learn more about how Just Think Consultants can create new customer opportunities and revenue for your software business.
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