In this edition of the Golden Nugget, I've written a quick review of a retail jeweler's website to show you how a website might backfire on you without regular updates or simply looking at it.
I found Weiss Jewelers when searching Google for "jewelers Greeley, CO." Their website is:
http://www.weissjewelers.com/
First Impressions
This is what the home page looked like when I visited:
(click to enlarge)
The first thing I saw was the "Diamonds & Chrome Car Show July 24th Register Here" notice in the top right corner. That event was 3 months ago (it's the end of October as I write this) and they still haven't removed the notice from their website. Not only does this look bad, but it's also a clear sign that they have not updated their website.
Their home page has an invitation to write a Google Review, and I like that. However, what they don't realize is that the WordPress widget they are using for that Review invitation is old and broken. It looks like they've had that widget since this version of their website was launched in early 2015; sadly, that widget probably broke sometime in April 2015. In early 2015, the Google Review system was part of Google+, but not anymore. Anyone clicking that review invitation today will still go to Google+ but they won't be able to leave a review.
This review issue is a good example of why it's important to click around your website to look for broken or unexpected results every once in a while.
Broken Google Maps in Footer
Although the review problem might not be so obvious, they do have a very obvious WordPress Google Maps error visible in the footer of every page on their site. They installed another widget to show Google Maps, but it's not working. The visible error message says "In order for your map to display, please make sure you insert your Google Maps JavaScript API key in the Maps->Settings->Advanced tab." I'm surprised they didn't notice the message and fix it yet. This is another hint that tells me that they don't look at, or update their website.
Here's a screen shot of the error message:
Footer Layout is Lacking
They WordPress template they've chosen allows for a 4 column display in the footer, but they are not using the first column as you can see here:
Each of the 4 columns has a heading that makes sense for that column. The second column says "Like us on Facebook" and it has the Facebook widget. The third column says "Pages" and it rightfully has a list of all the pages. The third column says "Jewelry Designers" and has 4 jewelry designer logos in it.
I'm not sure what's supposed to be in the first column that says "Visit Weiss Jewelers Today." This might be a better location for the Google Maps widget, if it was working. It might also be a good place to put the store hours and address.
It's also possible that they didn't know what to include in that box, so they left it blank. The better approach would be to remove that area completely and just have 3 boxes in the footer.
Although WordPress themes are usually easy to set up, many of the business owners I talk to spend too much time trying to find something for every part of the theme. Even though these 4 footer boxes are part of this theme, it's very easy to modify the theme to hide that unused box.
Avoid empty space on your website just because you can't figure out what to fit into the theme. Just shift things around to make it look better.
Social Accounts are Lacking
They've had a website since 1999, which makes Weiss Jewelers an early website adopter. This current version of their website was launched in early 2015. From what I can tell from the social networks it looks like someone helped them set up their Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Google+ accounts when this new site was launched.
Sadly, it looks like the accounts were set up with good intention, but without any plan or follow through.
I only looked at their Google+ account because I clicked the link to read their reviews. Instead of finding reviews, I found a mostly unused Google+ account. In fact, the only time they used Google+ was to announce the Car Show they sponsored in July.
Their Pinterest account was set up with 3 pins and then they didn't use it at all.
Their Twitter and LinkedIn accounts have even less activity. They set them up and haven't posted a single update to them.
These unused accounts should not be linked from the header of their website as shown here:
It looks like these icons were also built into the WordPress theme, but as I said before, a slight modification would be able to remove unwanted theme elements. Hiding the unused social networks is better than leading people to blank profiles.
Meanwhile, it looks like they've paid at least 2 different companies to manage their Facebook page.
Conclusions
I will give this 10+ year old jewelry store a lot of credit for being an early adopter of websites, but they need to figure out how to become more relevant for today's customer.
They do spend time updating their Facebook account several times a week, but it seems like no one is paying attention to updates on their website. It seems like they have not realized that consistency is the key to making their social media and their website work together. Simply having all these online properties set up doesn't help them in the long run, they must learn how to tie it all together and cross share the right information.
That's it for this week; I'll see you next time...
FTC Notice: I randomly choose this website and won't be telling the retailer jeweler that I'm giving them these flop fix ideas. Unless someone else tells them, they will only find out about this Nugget if they use Google Alerts or examine their Google Analytics and Google Search Console. I'm not doing this to solicit business from them, but rather as an educational exercise for everyone. This #FridayFlopFix is completely impartial and all my comments are based on previous experience in my website design and marketing agency, and from my personal research data.
