“Let me be as clear as I can: you must have a clear web strategy, an elegant web site that runs in browsers, smartphones and tablets, has clear branding for your firm, integrates social media, and all around is an easy place to do business with your firm. Those needs are pretty easy to say. You may have a few more items to add or some things to remove. But the real trick is how to get a really great web site built and maintained.”
The above excerpt is from a December 2013 article from the CPA Practice Advisor website which talked about the importance of having well . . . a good website.
Similar to your profile on LinkedIn, a website is your outward facing persona that creates the first and most important impression of your organization.
Now that I have stated the obvious, I thought that I would do a little homework myself to see what makes a good website. Timing of course is everything, so I was happy to see that one of our Year in the Life candidates cloudBuy have just announced the launch of their new website.
While you know that I have an opinion on just about everything, I thought that it would be a good idea for you to assume a place on our Dragon’s Den panel of experts and share your thoughts on the new website relative to the following key areas; design, readability, ease of navigation, loading speed & performance, ability to be found by search engines, localization including local search, and the ability to run in different browsers on different devices.
In short, does the site inspire you to want to learn more about the company and its solutions?
NOTE: Follow The Year in the Life 2014 Series on Twitter #YRiLife2014
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Procurement Insights 
MarkFP
February 10, 2014
Hi Jon, always a good idea to review a website although once it has already been published any tweaks can then be expensive. Much better to do at an earlier stage where possible. CloudBuy’s site looks modern and refreshing if perhaps a little dark in my opinion. Great is the strapline which is read straight away as it is in the correct top left hand corner (correct because that is where all of us in the western world begin reading). I know exactly what CloudBuy do as a result, namely “Buying made easy”. What I don’t like on my screen size is that the biggest words on the page are “Massive Cost” in the bottom left of my screen. “Savings” unfortunately falls below the fold! Social media share buttons, navigation etc. is all spot on but a video instead of the screen shot as a main image would have been far better. What do you think to our site? http://www.futurepurchasing.com
Nick @ Market Dojo eSourcing
February 10, 2014
The CloudBuy site looks great. Compelling strapline which sums up their solutions very nicely. Agree with MarkFP that a video superimposed on the screen-shot would be a good idea, helps to bring the product alive. The white/blue combo is neat as well, very clean and peaceful colours. All in all, very impressed.
Future Purchasing: I thought the name rang a bell, we recommended you someone recently. Hope something may come from it.
As for making tweaks and maintaining the site, with a modern CMS it’s extremely easy. We can make tweaks to our website in 2 minutes using a mobile phone whilst in the car. Multi-language can present a challenge, but responsive design makes that task a lot easier, as well as helps with mobile/tablet devices.
Couldn’t agree more that the website has got to have a clear message, be neatly presented and have clear calls to actions. I hope we’ve addressed these points??!
MarkFP
February 11, 2014
Thanks Nick, appreciate you thinking of us
Daniel
February 14, 2014
I agree on the Massive Cost bit, but it looks like that could be fixed with a simple font size change by changing the tag to h3 instead of h2 (Header size 3 instead of Header size 2 font), or if you reduce the width of the quote from John Thompson, that would give more space in the table for the full Massive Cost Savings to fit.
Like Nick says, with a modern CMS that shouldn’t be too difficult, unless the tables are fixed.
I also really like the Twitter feed on the homepage, that’s really cool!
We updated our website last year, but still keen to get feedback on what you think:
http://www.unimarket.com