Today I revisited the early 90’s on the web. It was a website that I found while prospecting that reminded me of my days running around in Reebok high-tops and rockin’ out to White Snake. No, the site wasn’t part of VH1’s “I love the 90’s” rather it is the corporate site of an industry leader in their field with an excess of 1 billion dollars in annual sales. A site with as much visual stimulation as a beta-version of “Pong”- never mind the content.

This publicly traded company has a website that by all accounts is severely outdated and makes them appear as backwards and small. Sure they may be an industry leader with innovative technology and impeccable product quality. However, new prospects visiting their site would never know this.

As a B2B marketer, steadfast in my conviction of the power of web marketing, I felt it was my responsibility to inform “XYZ Incorporated” how important corporate websites are in nurturing prospects and building investor relations (I also wanted the opportunity to get a new client). When talking to the Vice President I got an empathetic chuckle followed by the affirmation that yes, they know the site is outdated and appreciate my call ,however they have an employee who has some web knowledge and is updating the site in his free time.

Some web knowledge? Free time? Is this a project with the same build qualifications and priority as that of building your kid a tree fort?

Okay, excuse the mild freak out… of course I didn’t say this to the prospect who is held hostage to budgets and priorities as established by his bosses. It is just that for many companies big and small their website is an afterthought -simply used as a qualifier, fitting a web presence “check box” and not being leveraged as a powerful selling resource.

There are some companies out there that still rely on their secretary’s brother in-law or the guy in shipping who took a course on Flash at the local community college to work on their most important sales tool- their website. Others take it up a notch and use inexpensive online templates to guide their web development with an end-product that is reminiscent to a “MS Word Wizard Template”- not very creative, running on a parallel layout that reminds a visitor of the “(Insert Name) Family Reunion website”.

I just happened to hope this would not be the case for a publicly traded, billion dollar organization.

Related posts:

1. 2008 B2B Marketing Budgets- Spend More on Online Marketing
2. Take Me Out to the Blog Game, Part I
3. Giving “one size fits all” blogs a second look …
4. B2B Marketers…or mind-readers?
5. Lazy Web site: Whining & Dining

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