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By Ted Young
In the last issue, I talked about how to determine where your Web site fits on the contiuum of possibilities. This time, I'm focusing on a couple of the specific categories and how you might be able to set expectations and measure results against them.
Promotional Web sites are often derided as brochure-ware but can be useful for companies that want to make sure that, if nothing else, they have some presence on the Web. Since advertising isn't my strong suit, I won't say much more about strictly promotional sites as they get into issues of branding and awareness, which are hard enough for experts to measure.
Adjunct Web sites can be seen as an expansion of strictly promotional sites because they provide some way to open up a channel for input from current and potential customers. Market research surveys are a
good first start, as long as there's an incentive for users to fill them out. Contests are popular, as are giveaways - especially if they're freebies of the product being marketed.
Building communities around your product or service was all the rage a year ago when the Hagel & Armstrong book "net.gain" appeared, but this has somewhat died down. I believe this happened not because it's not a good idea, but because there's insufficient support for easily creating such communities. I'll talk more about communities for the next couple of weeks and tell you why they're still the wave of the future.
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Web site measurement: marketing, sales and service
Tactical Warfare Web authoring wizards Get a free subscription to this and other newsletters
Network World Fusion Focus, 5/6/98
The newsletter referred to at left.
When it comes to Web site content management tools, it's not yet time for the strategic buy, but there are products that will hold you over. Network World 12/1/97.
Of eight products we tested, Fusion and HotTMetaL Pro produce enchanting Web sites like magic. Network World, 9/8/97.
