Ads Versus User Experience? No Contest!

I did chuckle to myself on reading an article headlined as ‘It's More Likely You Will Survive a Plane Crash or Win the Lottery, than Click a Banner Ad’.

Now. I’ve got nothing against banner ads, especially when they are part of a well-strategized integrated marketing plan. My issue with many marketing campaigns is the balance marketers put between the level of spending on ads, and the overall internet user experience.

Quite often the time, man hours and budget invested into things like Google AdWords, far outweighs the same money and effort spent on the website and landing page itself - especially from a user interface perspective. Why? A website is part of the whole integrated user experience and as such has to be fit for purpose.

A recent report from the Society of Digital Agencies (SoDA), states that 77% of web agencies believe that poor website user experience (UX) is an issue for their clients. So why is UX so important?

Here are a few considerations for you. When reading them, think about your own website and how it fairs for UX:

Missed opportunity and sales. Do you know how many your site has lost out on? Trust me, it's probably very big. Offering a great UX has been proven to increase online sales two or three-fold - just by getting the right and most relevant information to visitors at the exact right time. What's more, slow loading pages will very quickly cause your visitors to lose both interest and the propensity to spend. Do you know how many of your visitors successfully complete, for example, an online registration form, compared to those who started it? The result may shock you!

What’s the impact on your business? In March 2014, Forrester released the “Business Impact of Customer Experience” report. This highly renowned analyst group estimated that moving from a below-average customer experience to above average would return $1.4 billion in additional annual revenue for wireless carriers, $1.4 billion for Airlines, $494 million for insurers (up 61% from 2013), and $572 million for retailers (up 152% from 2013).

Do you know your visitor engagement scores? 4 out of 5 visiotrs who do not find what they want from a website will, within seconds, look for another site. Remember... those first impressions count.

Does your website strategy take into account user engagement and customer satisfaction? Is your website something you can be proud of, and more importantly, something you and your customers can USE?

Are you thinking about mobile usage? Whilst most Wordpress sites and themes are nowadays mobile and tablet friendly, there are still a few that are not. As marketers we must all remember that the expectations of UX here is every bit as high as that of a desktop PC. Is you website responsive and mobile ready?

What judgements and perceptions are your visitors making, based upon their own UX of your site? And how is this affecting the crdibility of your brand? Needless to say that the ability to consume online content easily and effectively makes a huge difference and can ultimately boost your visitors' confidence.

Perhaps another perspective will help me sell to you the real importance of the user experience... 3 out of 4 internet users learn about a company and its products from its website and blogs - not its online ads.

So remember... Ignore website UX (User Experience) at your peril!