Most business-to-business and corporate sites design with customers in mind, but that’s not enough. Understanding and designing for at least four distinct audience segments is key:
- CONSUMERS: BtoB sites are often viewed by consumers that are not necessarily direct customers. We see BtoB sites having a downstream impact on the business customers of the site owners, but very few take that into account in their design and content.
- POTENTIAL EMPLOYEES: In many cases, one of the largest audiences using a BtoB site is potential employees—in some cases, it’s the single biggest audience for a BtoB site. While most sites have information for job-seekers, our research shows that this audience is impacted just as much by sections of the site not specifically intended for them; and it’s not like they’re just hanging out on the “job board” area of the site. This has significant implications for site design and content. Companies need to view their entire site through the eyes of a prospective employee—or, better yet, get hard data on which things about the site have greatest potential to make or break the “sale.” Sites are often used by current employees, as well, and understanding how content affects employee loyalty and satisfaction is often overlooked—but can have both positive and negative consequences.
- PARTNERS: Another high-volume audience is existing and would-be partners. The quality, accuracy, consistency, and nature of messages and information throughout a website can play an important role in improving the efficiency and effectiveness of dealings with vendors and partners. In many cases, however, this audience is either completely overlooked or significantly under-anticipated.
- INVESTOR RELATIONS: Investor Relations has become a significant objective of many BtoB sites. Organizations can communicate high quality, consistent and timely information to current and prospective investors in a very cost effective and efficient manner. Investors will usually look beyond the pages specifically designed for them, and having a clear understanding of how other content impacts investors’ attitudes and behaviors is important. In addition, it is not always the case that the standard material in IR sections is always the right material or has the desired impact. There is a need to get a handle on exactly what impact sites are having on investors, especially since websites are becoming one of the single most important sources used by the investor community.
The web is an ideal communications vehicles, offering a perfect opportunity to interact with key audiences in a consistent, high quality and effective manner, at the convenience of the user, without being too intrusive. But most companies actually only get anecdotal information from site users. There’s rarely a real, strong, statistically valid feedback mechanism and so it’s easy to miss the mark—or, worse, to do damage.
Don't forget about your customers, but also don't forget about these other key visitor segments. Whatever survey and analytics methodology you're using should be able to segment by these four audiences, so you're making sure you're meeting the needs of all of them.
