Executive Summary

• • Vendors know the importance of websites but often create sites that do not answer the questions that prospects and customers have.

Introduction

Our References for This Article

If you want to see our references for this article and other related Brightwork articles, see this link.

Background on Reviewing Vendor Websites

Having reviewed many vendors’ websites, I can say that while vendors can create description pages, the vendor that can create a series of compelling blog-type articles that are interesting to readers is rare. When blogs first arose, they were often by independent authors, and blogs gained a reputation for being an honest and authentic voice. Once blogs took off in popularity, many vendors wanted their own blogs. I was often asked how to create a successful blog by software vendors. The problem was that I was writing in an authentic voice, while the voice of the marketing department at companies is much different. The main pages of a vendor’s website can be promotional in tone, but if the blog articles keep that promotional “vibe,” it tends to be less successful. A vendor’s blog is generally better for “how-to” articles that highly different uses of the software and even answer technical questions. Because a good blog article will normally have many more keywords of interest to a reader, they normally perform well in search results without much SEO. Brightwork Research & Analysis has always brought in significant volume without much SEO because we were writing about topics that naturally interested people. There are really very few vendors that understand this, and that can keep the hands of marketing off of their blog. This is so uncommon that I won’t even bother listing any companies. Again, a blog should have a different voice and orientation than the primary pages of the site, which are by their nature promotional. Any person can only take so much promotional content before they begin to tune out—this a bit like the slot machines in Las Vegas. Often the casinos will place the brightly colored slot machines at the ends or on the outer side of the row to gain the attention of passers-by (or so I have been told as I don’t gamble and don’t spend time in casinos as I find them depressing). However, it becomes fatiguing to play a brightly colored slot machine for too long, so the gambler normally gravitates to the less gaudy slot machines further down the row. In this analogy, the main pages are the brightly colored slot machines. The blog posts are not. Now you have their attention, and the promotional assertions have been made. Now the blog articles are the workhorses. They are there to communicate more articulated and sometimes technical information to the reader. The reader is now “in your big tent,” and now you can begin building credibility through the power of the information provided. The promotion has to dim down. Actually, prospects are not the only readers of your blog posts. Current customers are also readers as they are trying to figure out how to use your software that they have already purchased or are interested in learning how to use it better. Promotional content is just going to get in the way for these readers.

How Things Can Change in Marketing

There was one vendor that used to do a great job of this. Still, they hired a new head of marketing. This person had zero interest in communicating anything true, appeared to have ADHD, and I stopped interacting with this vendor entirely when they had previously been one of my favorites.