Marketing's Role in a Web Site

Recently I saw a bumper sticker that said, in big bold letters, "Advertising Is A Lie". Like it or not, that's how many people see marketing.

Consumers see marketing as pure manipulation. In the office it evokes comments/rhetorical questions like "what do they really do?" While the sales force gets all credit because they "contribute to the bottom line", marketing brews up, in the words of a fellow copywriter, "true lies".

But for all the jabs and low blows, experienced business people know that marketing (or lack of good marketing) dictates a company’s success: it’s not what you sell but how you sell it (can you say "McDonald’s"?)

Enter the web, where the rules are very different. With a printed piece, prospective customers readily accept what you give them because they can’t do much about it. Web pages toss the remote control to the user, letting them decide what they will read. And if the hard facts aren’t there, well, neither will the customers.

That’s why marketing should take an advisory role and let the web team work as an autonomous unit. Marketing, the CEO, and other managers will ultimately dictate what information goes up, but the web team has to be allowed — rather, given the freedom — to filter those messages into discernable, user-friendly web pages. I call it "webifying".

One of my friends, an avid reader of Road & Track, always tries to advise his mechanic on how to fix his car when in fact he knows nothing about how cars work. Similarly, marketing folks might know how to create corporate messaging and positioning, but they aren’t necessarily the best choice for effectively conveying those messages on the web.

Web professionals are exactly that — people with backgrounds and work experience that makes them experts in their crafts; they can’t be treated (and more importantly, be perceived) as assembly-line types without the reflective thought and critical analysis that other "professionals" bring to the table.

You know that your site is your most vital communication tool. You know it’s often the first point of contact for prospective customers. But is your site’s content — the design, the copy, the links — consistent with those truths?

You have to trust your web team and let them do their job. I worked with a client who sends e-mails to the company’s Webmaster all day, telling him to change words and links, to add a logo here and there, all without understanding the context-sensitivity of the site.

Not only has the site become a patchwork of embarrassing flaws (out-of-context links, misspelled words, inconsistent terminology, etc.) but, more importantly, some of the company’s brightest workers, including that Webmaster, feel like robots. They told me.

My advice? Let the web team gather all the information they need and let them work. Then you should learn the difference between graphic design and information design; between content links and category links; between a site that facilitates user goals and a site that facilitates marketing goals. A good web team knows these differences.

Don't ask for pop-up windows or Java this ‘n that just "because". Let your developers, writers, and designers choose the most effective method of delivery; they know how people use your site. Don’t dictate the placement of design elements. Branding is important but, from a usability standpoint, the best branding is site where users can find the information they need.