My wife wants to visit someone in the hospital today. So she goes to the hospital Web site to check the visiting hours.

Today’s challenge: Click that link above and try to find visiting hours anywhere. I dare you.

This is one of the worst Web site usability issues I’ve seen in a long time. I have to think that among the phone calls a hospital receives in any given day, “What are your visiting hours?” has to be among the top questions operators deal with.

Why isn’t there a link to “visiting hours” on the home page? Why aren’t visiting hours listed on the contact or directions pages? Why doesn’t a site search for “visiting hours” return a relevant page with this sort of basic information?

It’s a great example of a site that’s about the entity creating the site, not about the people using the site.

Takeaway for marketers: If you’re working on a Web site, think like your site user and anticipate their needs. Then fulfill them. Duh.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 19th, 2009 at 7:26 am and is filed under Internet Stuff, Marketing Takeaways.