If you have been following us for some time, you already know that Webflow has been our flagship CMS for several years. And as digital enthusiasts, we know how important it is to remain attentive to key data in our sector. This is why today we invite you to look at a recent study conducted by Webflow on “the state of websites in 2024” and to give a short overview of the key points of this report.
Conducted in the United States and Canada among 500 marketing leaders working in a large number of different sectors, this online survey provides us with an interesting and very revealing overview of the state of the current market.
A website is both the first point of contact with your potential and existing customers, a reflection of your brand identity, and a digital business card containing all the important information about your business, your projects and your offers. So, it's no longer a secret: having a well-executed website is crucial for any business.
However, 93% of marketing managers surveyed believe that their current website could be improved and a large portion also reports that it doesn't entirely match their brand identity.
Another problematic observation revealed by Webflow:
” Marketing teams spend too much on web development resources ”. The website would in fact become an increasingly expensive and time-consuming asset, with an average annual expenditure of $1.6 million in software and staff.
So what are the main challenges for marketing teams to overcome for a successful website? We're taking stock!
92% of respondents say that their marketing team is driving customer experience initiatives in the company. And since the digital customer experience is essential, it's easy to see why half of the executives surveyed say that the marketing team fully owns the website and that just over a third would also like to implement this.
However, the Webflow study reveals that 81% marketing teams are confronted with difficulties with owning their website. In particular, they report feeling restricted by developers and other teams, which can hinder their ability to achieve their goals.
Overall, it seems that marketing teams are not in a position to manage the website due to several obstacles: creative processes, the web development process or even the computer processes.
The study also shows that these collaborators do not have the capacity to claim full ownership of the website because of the current organizational structure of their company. Cross-functional collaboration processes, team organization, or operational flows set up by businesses can prevent marketing teams from making updates and changes to the website independently.
This of course raises the importance of collaboration, which is considered to be a major challenge for the majority of respondents. Indeed, an impressive figure: 91% of respondents believe that their marketing team and web developers could collaborate better.
To better understand the previous point, note that 77% of the managers surveyed have hired web developers internally whose only role is within the company, 21% have hired web developers internally but this is only part of their job, and only 2% outsource their collaboration with web developers (agency/service provider).
Moreover, according to this study, regardless of the size of the company and the number of people working on the website, the main challenges remain the same: in particular managing several teams that must collaborate on the website.
Unfortunately, these difficulties can lead to several problems:
All these results therefore underline the need to improve collaboration and alignment in all areas. Likewise, using the right tools makes it possible to achieve drastic changes, such as going from one month to 2 days to create a web page for example!
The Webflow report reveals several surprising figures: 60% of marketing managers surveyed are not satisfied with their current technical stack, which does not fully meet their needs. And more than 50% of businesses are struggling because of their current web infrastructure.
Despite the time, money, and resources that organizations spend on their websites — and how important those websites are — 55% of traditional CMS users think that their current website is fragile and likely to crash. Respondents' level of concern about this instability varies depending on the platform used and is higher among digital experience platform (DXP) users.
Marketers have a number of priorities to manage, but it's clear that the website is one of the most important, if not the most important. While businesses face numerous challenges in improving the efficiency and impact of their website, many are prioritizing technology to get there in 2024.
In fact, when asked about their priorities in 2024, 40% of marketing leaders say they would like to take greater advantage of technology to provide a better customer experience, and 38% would like to improve the integration and use of tools and technologies. These statements reflect the importance of change management in companies in order to constantly adapt to new technological developments and succeed in trusting each other with new tools and uses.
Faced with these challenges, 65% of businesses have turned to no-code or low-code tools and 30% plan to do so in the next 12 months. Moreover, among marketing teams that have already implemented no-code or low-code solutions, 50% are already seeing improvements in the way they work and in the customer experience they are able to provide.
Among the main advantages cited in using no-code solutions, we find:
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With this report, Webflow therefore reveals that current businesses face significant challenges when it comes to developing, maintaining and owning their websites. So what can we learn from this study?
Marketing teams face both financial and organizational hurdles. These can generally be overcome by using a smarter approach to the selection of technological tools. Flexible, agile, and more cost-effective solutions now exist to create a memorable customer experience on your website.
Using, for example, no-code and low-code solutions not only provides economic benefits and greater control over workloads, but also promotes collaboration and efficiency. To achieve sustainable solutions, businesses need to develop an operating model that integrates teams, technology, and processes in a way that promotes innovation and efficiency.
Technology is only part of the solution: to effectively own and manage the customer experience, marketers need to be able to meet the ever-changing needs of their customers, starting with the website. Websites are complex levers that marketing teams must be able to maintain and modify reliably to also meet business needs.
Success requires more than secure and scalable technological tools: it is also necessary to set up appropriate processes, an effective operational model and to ensure the implementation of good practices for managing a website.
This includes ensuring that the website is truly accessible, implementing security measures, complying with GDPR and data regulations, optimizing SEO and site performance, and ensuring that the site is responsive.
To remain competitive and always create new customer experiences, businesses need to focus on web development models that are more flexible, agile, and profitable. The use of reusable components and certain development processes, such as the design system for example, will allow teams to stay up to date.