In the digital world, user experience is more important than ever. For the first time, people are moving away from desktop applications and gradually using web applications on a more frequent basis. However, many companies are still not focusing on the user experience.
One such example, surprisingly, is MBUSA.com (Mercedes-Benz)
The site has multiple technical, creative, and business issues. Here are a few of them:
- Flash — the site is built entirely in Flash, where as it could have been built by using jQuery and HTML. If someone has an older version of Flash, the site will not work.
- SEO — since the site is built entirely in Flash, the site is not indexed by search engines like Google. On the other hand, if you search for “BMW,” Google provides results for the different product lines offered by BMW.
Google search result for MBUSA
Google search result for BMW - Open files — search engines are easily finding hidden files, such as this: http://www.mbusa.com/mercedes/data/pdf/fleet_summary.xdp. An XDP file is “Acrobat XML Data Package File” and should not be visible to the public.
- Load times – the home page itself is very large and takes a while to load. These extra seconds, could make the consumer walk away.
While these are just a few of the consumer facing issues for the site, at the end of the day, MBUSA is the losing party. The company needs to update their technology and make it easily accessible with minimal load times. Although the content is useful and frequently updated, a well designed website can have a huge impact.
