“42 Rules for a Web Presence That Wins” by Philippa Gamse provides the reader with a compact, but very insightful introduction about essential business strategies for website and social media success. Especially, when you have not spent that much time with really thinking about design, content and structure of web presences, yet, you will definitely experience many “aha” moments.

As each single rule in this book has its right to exist, it is difficult to point out specific rules for being considered as the most important ones. It always depends on the perspective of the reader which rule needs to be followed and took into consideration in more depth. Nevertheless, as the book is divided in basically four parts, I would like to specifically address some rules of each part.

Part I: Management-Level Issues
Appointing a web ambassador (Rule2) who sits on the management board of the organization and ideally reports directly to the CEO is crucial for the success of a web presence in order to align the business strategy, marketing and customer service plans, etc. with the web presence. As it is nowadays quite common to have a CTO, there is no reason why a web ambassador should miss. One might think that a CTO could be the web ambassador at the same time, but considering rule 8 “weigh high-tech against high-touch” indicates why appointing a web ambassador makes sense: “Sometimes technology can’t solve everything!” Especially in terms of customer service and in order to create and maintain a high retention rate, a more personal interaction with customers via phone might be more beneficial to an organization than embracing most recent more impersonal web technologies – this can be seen as one example for a decision in which the web ambassador could be involved in.

Part II: Setting Strategy and Tactics
Rule 15 clearly says that “one size does not fit all” which means that there are various approaches available for maintaining a successful web presence and if one approach worked for company W in business X does not necessarily imply that it works for company Y in business Z as well. In line with that, when developing strategies, content and structure of a homepage you should identify all of your online audiences (rule17) which, besides customers, also include your competitors, employees & potential employees, bankers, suppliers, advertisers, et cetera. Based on that, and after having identified all potential visitors, one key element for a successful web presence depends on your ability to create an emotional connection with your visitors. Therefore, personifying visitors (rule 18) will tremendously help you to see the web presence through your visitor’s eyes in order to get an understanding about what appropriate adjustments need to be made for the web presence. In addition to that, and further putting emphasize on meeting the customer’s needs, constantly getting feedback (rule 23) from your visitors by asking politely for it, is essential for improving the webpage on the one hand and also gives the audience a feeling that their voices are being heard and considered.

Part III: Creating Content That Makes Connections
Rule 26 points out the importance of the “About Us” site as how you present your personnel and your company heavily influences the ability to create an emotional connection with your customers. It is no secret that venture capitalists, such as Eric Hjerpe from Kepha Ventures, state that they always focus on the “Team” first before thinking about the team’s business idea and business model. Thus, putting personnel’s photographs and information about the company’s history on the “About Us” site offers an opportunity for enhancing the relationship between the customer and the company and helps gaining customer’s trust. When a visitor lands on a website, it is of utmost importance that he/she immediately understands what this site is about, what the company offers and what differentiates them from competitors (Rule 29). Hence, making the right impression on potential customers by formulating and communicating how the company creates unique value for their customers is crucial for keeping the visitor on your webpage and gaining him/her as a customer. Philippa Gamse talks a lot about creating and maintaining an “emotionally connected” web presence. In line with that, one must always consider that people buy emotionally and not intellectually in the real world and that this also needs to be transferred to the cyber world. Thus, communicating that your company understands the needs of their customers and that you are committed to meet these needs, engaging in discussions with customers, asking and considering their feedback, ensuring them that customer service is of utmost importance to you, et cetera will help you to create the above mentioned emotional connection that drives an emotional buying behaviour. The rule behind this is to avoid unexpected roadblocks (Rule 33) caused by e.g. frustrating site search results, not participating on customer’s feedback or missing clickable calls to action.

Part IV: Measuring Results
Making intelligent use of software such as Google Analytics helps you to understand what is really happening on your web site. Thus, only looking at e.g. the number of visitors is not sufficient, but you need to drill “below the dashboard” by interpreting the available data correctly with the help of carefully set key performance indicators in order to adjust the web presence or even to set the future strategy. Finally, the last rule I would like to point out is rule 39 “Segment Your Visitors for Deeper Understanding”. It does not make sense to put all visitors in the same category when evaluating traffic data. Doing so, could lead to massive misinterpretations. For example, when your company runs a two-sided business such as a travel reservation service, it is obvious that you need to segment between e.g. the travellers and the airlines. Furthermore, there is also a need for segmenting within the different airlines as their product offerings, corporate culture, target group, etc. might completely differ.

In sum, a proper company’s web presence can be seen as one of the main pillars of nowadays digital marketing and this book helps the reader to get a good overview about critical elements that need to be considered very carefully when creating and maintaining a web presence as the author finally states: “You must have a clear strategy for your web presence at all times” (Rule 41). Nevertheless, if you want to dig deeper into the subject of creating and sustain a successful web presence, further readings are recommended.