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Guidelines for Intranet Best Practice

IT Practice / By

Intranet Best Practice

Determinants of self-service take-up

Substantial funds have been invested by companies on implementing internal web sites, and more recently on developing HR competencies for the intranet to facilitate employee and management ‘self-service’. The aim is often to increase employee understanding of company goals and procedures and reduce workload on key personnel, enabling them to become more strategic. Furthermore intranets can provide a greater degree of flexibility for individuals and groups as well as assist in the creation of a ‘learning organization’ where change becomes easier. However, despite the potential benefits to both the individual and the organization, utilisation of these systems is generally low. This brief offers an overview of best practice in ensuring employees are motivated to use company intranets on an ongoing basis.

Best Practice Advice:

  • Ensure each business area or department that is being represented on the intranet are involved in the design, implementation, evolution and diffusion of their web sections. Better still, ensure they plan and define their expectations and use of the web to ensure goal attainment. The system is far more likely to be effective if it is business needs driven.
  • Ensure the end users are monitored and asked for feedback on the web sections and any later changes.
  • Ensure the intranet has enthusiastic support from the very top – and that this is disseminated in a controlled manner.
  • Ensure all information on the web is important, relevant to users jobs and of benefit to them in their work. It should also be up to date. If you can include aspects of work that they have to use, or will be motivated to use because it is simpler (such as forms of ‘self-service’), that will help increase usage.
  • Do make available a searchable, easy to navigate, repository of information. Whilst care should be taken not to overload people with too much information, research shows staff can become more productive if they do have easy access on the intranet to a range of company documentation.
  • Do ensure people are given recognition for any work published or pages developed on the web, this not only increases motivation but ensures changes can be communicated to the right person, increasing accuracy and reliability.

Technically the system must be fast, reliable, and easy to use. If staff have to invest time finding information and/or struggling with the system, they will give up. There are detailed best practice guidelines for the technical development of websites available, which include best use of colour, format and content presentation, identifying new items, ensuring no broken links, and reducing the number of clicks/ease of navigation. These should be adhered to.

Things to Avoid:

  • Do not leave it all to the IT department to organise. They can only take responsibility for the technical aspects, not motivating individuals or selling business practices. The strategic effectiveness of intranets can also be adversely affected if content and structure is left solely to IT.
  • Do not assume that staff will start to use it in time, or after a short initial training course. They will need good reasons for using the system as well as ease of use.
  • Do not use as a general data repository or an uncontrolled mass-communication device. People suffering from information overload actually reduce the time and effort spent on the system and can miss the information that is valuable.

Developing these areas of best practice should enable companies to ensure that investment in intranets is not wasted.

Alexa Tools – Five Tools to Monitor Page Rank

Business / By

Alexa Tools – Top Five Tools

The Alexa toolkit ‘Sparky’ is an add-on for the FireFox and Internet Explorer toolbar that show the overall rank, reach and viewing trend of any visited site. It is a nice tool but you should be aware that it collects information about your viewing habits and some aspects of the browser information it gathers is personally identifiable. This means that it is possible for authorities to legally obtain such information and trace your viewing habits. As authoritarian governments are likely to wish to control the internet more and more you may not want to give them this head start.

Alexa SEO Tools all to do with page ranks and comparing with other web sites.

Alexa :: Alexa has a range of tools for webmasters including their search bar, web search, widgets and more.
Alexa Page Ranking :: Provides a sites ranking based on the Alexa ranking system.
Alexa Rank Comparison :: Compare different websites ranking based on Alexa stats.
Alexa Ranking :: A tool which allows comparisons of websites however output is based on numerical rather than graph format.
Alexa Tool Bar :: Customizable tool bar for your site.

A Guide to Analyzing and Interpreting Website Traffic

Business / By

Analyzing and Interpreting Website Traffic

Analyzing your web traffic statistics can be an invaluable tool for a number of different reasons. But before you can make full use of this tool, you need to understand how to interpret the data.

Most web hosting companies will provide you with basic web traffic information that you then have to interpret and make pertinent use of. However, the data you receive from your host company can be overwhelming if you don’t understand how to apply it to your particular business and website. Let’s start by examining the most basic data – the average visitors to your site on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis.

These figures are the most accurate measure of your website’s activity. It would appear on the surface that the more traffic you see recorded, the better you can assume your website is doing, but this is an inaccurate perception. You must also look at the behavior of your visitors once they come to your website to accurately gauge the effectiveness of your site.

There is often a great misconception about what is commonly known as “hits” and what is really effective, quality traffic to your site. Hits simply means the number of information requests received by the server. If you think about the fact that a hit can simply equate to the number of graphics per page, you will get an idea of how overblown the concept of hits can be. For example, if your homepage has 15 graphics on it, the server records this as 15 hits, when in reality we are talking about a single visitor checking out a single page on your site. As you can see, hits are not useful in analyzing your website traffic.

The more visitors that come to your website, the more accurate your interpretation will become. The greater the traffic is to your website, the more precise your analysis will be of overall trends in visitor behavior. The smaller the number of visitors, the more a few anomalous visitors can distort the analysis.

The aim is to use the web traffic statistics to figure out how well or how poorly your site is working for your visitors. One way to determine this is to find out how long on average your visitors spend on your site. If the time spent is relatively brief, it usually indicates an underlying problem. Then the challenge is to figure out what that problem is.

It could be that your keywords are directing the wrong type of visitors to your website, or that your graphics are confusing or intimidating, causing the visitor to exit rapidly. Use the knowledge of how much time visitors are spending on your site to pinpoint specific problems, and after you fix those problems, continue to use time spent as a gauge of how effective your fix has been.

Additionally, web traffic stats can help you determine effective and ineffective areas of your website. If you have a page that you believe is important, but visitors are exiting it rapidly, that page needs attention. You could, for example, consider improving the link to this page by making the link more noticeable and enticing, or you could improve the look of the page or the ease that your visitors can access the necessary information on that page.

If, on the other hand, you notice that visitors are spending a lot of time on pages that you think are less important, you might consider moving some of your sales copy and marketing focus to that particular page.

As you can see, these statistics will reveal vital information about the effectiveness of individual pages, and visitor habits and motivation. This is essential information to any successful Internet marketing campaign.

Your website undoubtedly has exit pages, such as a final order or contact form. This is a page you can expect your visitor to exit rapidly. However, not every visitor to your site is going to find exactly what he or she is looking for, so statistics may show you a number of different exit pages. This is normal unless you notice a exit trend on a particular page that is not intended as an exit page. In the case that a significant percentage of visitors are exiting your website on a page not designed for that purpose, you must closely examine that particular page to discern what the problem is. Once you pinpoint potential weaknesses on that page, minor modifications in content or graphic may have a significant impact on the keeping visitors moving through your site instead of exiting at the wrong page.

After you have analyzed your visitor statistics, it’s time to turn to your keywords and phrases. Notice if particular keywords are directing a specific type of visitor to your site. The more targeted the visitor – meaning that they find what they are looking for on your site, and even better, fill out your contact form or make a purchase – the more valuable that keyword is.

However, if you find a large number of visitors are being directed – or should I say misdirected – to your site by a particular keyword or phrase, that keyword demands adjustment. Keywords are vital to bringing quality visitors to your site who are ready to do business with you. Close analysis of the keywords your visitors are using to find your site will give you a vital understanding of your visitor’s needs and motivations.

Finally, if you notice that users are finding your website by typing in your company name, break open the champagne! It means you have achieved a significant level of brand recognition, and this is a sure sign of burgeoning success.