If you ran a retail store, would you update the signage facing the street once per year? Would you set/merchandise the store and never make a single improvement for months on end? Of course not, because you want to adapt to your customers changing needs, new trends, and optimize your retail setting for the best experience.

Marketing organizations fall prey to waterfall approaches to updating websites and this generally is a result of an annual budgeting process. Since you’d never leave a retail store untouched for weeks or months on end, why should your online visitors suffer this mistreatment with your site?

It doesn’t matter if you sell online or not, your website is a storefront, not a campaign. As such, maintaining a website is a process, not an event.

I filed my state refund about 45 days ago and checked on the status of it today via the North Carolina Department of Revenue website. Here’s the message I received after entering my social security number and refund amount:

Consumer-friendly messaging, right?

Aside from the visual design of the site, it’s the vague message that has my eyes rolling. Basically, this website exists to tell you your tax refund status, but the Department of Revenue cannot provide specific estimates on when individuals will receive their refunds. But alas, everyone who is due a refund will receive a refund! I guess that makes it all better, right?

Imagine if you placed an order for a product, it’s been weeks and you haven’t received your shipment. You call the retailer only to hear them say “we can’t provide you with a status of your order but rest assured, you will receive your shipment.”

Voice of the taxpayer online

I would love to see a government site use OpinionLab or ForeSee Results on their sites. Taxpayers should then be able to see the aggregated feedback ratings & scores. Government website operators could then focus on ease of use and helpful tools online. Messages like above only insult taxpayer intelligence and further throw gas on the fire.

For starters, I love DIRECTV.

However, I’m wondering when they (and other satellite & cable providers) will begin to think differently about how they present channel guides both online and via the TV remote?

Here’s DIRECTV’s guide:

These are mainly local channels. Wouldn’t it be better to offer a filter that said “Local Channels” that I could click and see these? I’m not familiar enough with the Station IDs to know if they represent ABC, NBC, CBS, etc. Sure, I can generally tell by the programming listed, but still. This would never fly on a major retailer website for listing products this way.

If TV stations were like consumer products…

If this were an e-commerce site, end-users would be driven away if they were forced to only view products by numerical product ID and a short-code. Through history of channel surfing by number, I suppose this method of thinking is engrained in many people’s minds.

However, with the volume of channels being what they are, presenting them in numerical channel order is a growing usability challenge. I live in a world where I DVR virtually everything and watch it at a later date. I am completely channel number and station ID agnostic — I honestly don’t know what channels “my shows” are on.

Searching for TV shows

Let’s look at keyword search results for “olympics”

Support topics are shown first. Then site pages.  Hopefully there’s research to support this ordering, but generally speaking, a topic like “olympics” is probably more related to TV programming than a support article. “Satellite doesn’t work” would certainly be a reason to show support articles first. Below the fold (scrolling down on a 20″ monitor) I see 5 results for TV programming.

I don’t know what NBCw vs. NBCwHD means. Unfortunately there’s no title for me to click on to find out why this matched my search for “olympics.” Let’s click “view all”:

More empty titles. Again, search results displayed by channel and then by date with no sorting options.

DIRECTV offers a slick option to “Record to DVR” from their website. As such, having the ability to filter search results by content rather than channel and date/time is important because on the web and with the ability to “Record to DVR”, the channel and date/time are irrelevant.

As I do my weekly “catch up” of RSS feed reading across a number of topics (online marketing, e-commerce, social media, etc.), I can’t help but notice the sensationalism, both positive and negative, around new products and companies entering the marketplace.

For example: Because I’ve been buried in doing actual work the past couple weeks, I first heard about Google Buzz through RSS feeds before getting the notification that it was ready for my Gmail account.

And judging by the RSS feeds, the type of coverage was akin to TMZ covering Jersey Shore cast news.

Oh my, people. Relax.

The early adopter community of these technologies get so caught up in overanalyzing every move in the industry that they lose sight of where these innovations and changes take us from a consumer perspective.

It makes me yearn for the format of a magazine that reports on industry news in a less timely format, but without all of the initial noise, gossip, and speculation woven into the article like I’m seeing so much of online.

Successful small, local businesses thrive when they carve out their niche by catering to a local group of loyalists, develop deep relationships, and create customers for life.

Social Media has the potential for large companies to feel small and make each customer feel valued like local businesses have been doing for years.

My local dry cleaner

Each week when I drop off my dry cleaning at the local dry cleaner, the owner greets me by my first name. I’ve even seen the owner working out at the local gym and he still referred to me by my first name.

Making me feel valued and worth remembering

It’s one thing to see a customer’s vehicle pull into your parking lot giving you have a few moments to recall their name, it’s another to see the customer out of context and still remember their name.

It’s hard to explain how this feels as a customer to be remembered both in and outside of the business.

I have yet to feel this way after visiting or purchasing from a website.

Which is your social media strategy?

That of my local dry cleaner? Or something else:

There’s little in the relationship and loyalty department to be gained when your business’ Twitter account is for posting your cheapest products, your Facebook page is about acquiring the most followers, and your blog is filled with content designed for search engine rankings and not people.

Build a relationship, not a campaign

The point of Social Media is not to “build a list,” “go viral,” or “get impressions/mentions.” Social Media is not a campaign.

Social Media, done correctly, enables your business to intelligently connect with your loyalists to build deep relationships over time.