PlusOne - Musings of a marketer

I was doing some market research for a client and had cause to look at this site Restaurant & Catering Queensland - Home Page.

Website usability is important, so the website for a state chapter of an industry peak organisation would eb well-maintained - or so you’d think.

First up, the site does not work in FireFox. My logs show me up to 20% of people use this browser now - so that is potentially how many people find the site totally inaccessible. (Which is really amusing when they have a big 2005 Award for Excellence button on the page).

Next, after switching to Internet Explorer so as to get into the site, try downloading the application forms….hmm something wrong there as well.

By this time I am wanting to contact them and share the site issues with them. But there is no contact link on most pages, so back click a few times to find the link.

Ah, a form. Fill it in and click send….I get and error message. Scroll down and luckily there is an email address. So enter the text in there and click send. There I’ve improved my karama by being helpful.

Two minutes later I get this bounce to my inbox

Host rcq.orq.au not found

The following recipients did not receive this message:

Perhaps they will read this…

Lesson - a website cannot be set and forgotten about. It is like a child, it needs constant checking upon, and feeding and supporting. Otherwise it ends up being an embarrassment.