Why Your Business Needs a Web Portal

Many business owners may think that their hastily assembled web portal offering is sufficient in meeting their various business and customer needs, but is that really the case? There’s a big difference between an in-house job put together relatively easily, and a professional-looking web portal that creates a much more effective online presence for your customers and for your staff.

But why is this the case? What’s the edge that a strong web portal delivers to a company or organisation?

Enhanced Communication

An effective portal that looks the part and is well constructed with a professional eye becomes a major cornerstone in internal communication. When the portal is well put together, an intranet portal becomes a go-to tool for communication instead of team members flocking to their own third-party solutions which creates a mess as people try to talk across different platforms and formats.

A high-quality web portal is one that is usable by all team members, which gets everyone communicating on the same page, literally. They can also feature great ways to communicate ideas and suggestions via discussion boards.

Faster Exchange of Information

Workers in many roles across different types of companies often need quick access to industry data, proprietary information, special reports and more. If your company has a well-organised, attractive and strong web portal, then your employees can access that information more easily and put it to good use. The same can be said for customers who are using the portal to access information perhaps that they have subscribed to or otherwise paid for.

You could be working customer service, or as an analyst for a major finance group, or as a salesperson…the need for data exists across many roles. The right tools in one place make life much easier and will be a boost to productivity as a result.

Better Integration

Turning more now to the customer experience in a web portal. A well-built web portal is able to offer customers a more personalised experience, which according to research is a key factor in helping make sure customers make purchases of your various goods and services. And it’s not just the personalisation that customers like, but the efficiency of the portal.

When a portal is well managed, attractive and accessible, it offers customers a streamlined and enjoyable experience as they navigate the site ordering whatever goods and services are on offer. The easier the portal makes it, the better. Speed is a big part of that. Poorly constructed portals take longer to load, which according to industry experts is a massive turn-off. Slow-loading sites push customers away. It’s a problem that costs companies US$2.6 billion in lost revenue each year.

Staff Training Made Easier

Returning to in-house benefits of a good web portal, those advantages also stretch to newly arrived members of the team, too. For instance, when workflows and communication are channeled through an effective portal, it becomes much easier to train up new staff members. Since they only have to master one platform, and will learn to perform much of their work through that same platform, then it’s a much simpler training process.

It’s much easier than having to train people across different software types and different applications. The unified web portal gives a one-stop shop to cover most or all duties that new staff members are expected to undertake. A company can also tailor their platform to align better with the known level of expertise among their staff. A system that is accessible and understandable to more team members is a better one, and you can ensure that with your own platform tailor-made for them.

Author:

Robin Wilson