Verizon : Dropping service

Some corporate audiences are less favoured than others.

The Site

Verizon, a US-based telephone and internet services provider, combines corporate and customer sites on a common platform but gives the former fragmented treatment.

Verizon’s dotcom site presents new arrivals with a global landing page showing large signposts to the three main areas of Verizon’s business: Residential, Business, Wireless. Smaller Corporate links for Verizon and Verizon Wireless are offered lower down the page. Whichever option is chosen the destination mini-site displays within a common frame that is topped by three tabs for the customer mini-sites.

The bottom of the frame features a universal string that includes links for About Us, Contact Us and Careers along with ‘housekeeping’ items such as Site Map and Privacy Policy. There are no links for the other Corporate sections (Investors, News Center and Corporate Responsibility) or for Verizon Corporate or Verizon Wireless Corporate.

The Takeaway

Verizon’s use of a common platform for its customer-serving mini-sites and corporate site is a standard configuration, though the portal page is a more unusual embellishment. It makes sense and works well as a quick links device given that most arrivals should be able to identify which path to head down, including those looking for corporate content. Where it breaks down, and away from the ‘common platform’ model, is beyond the global portal. From this point on corporate-content seekers are no longer treated as an identifiable group but as a secondary and fragmented audience.

Whatever the focus of their enquiry they are downgraded to the universal footer rather than provided with a ‘corporate’ tab at the top of the page, where customers can always find a link readily including in corporate areas. More seriously, anyone wanting news, investor or corporate responsibility information will be equally starved of help at the bottom of the page. That they are not the primary focus in customer areas is understandable, but that the company should give the impression it has lost all interest in serving them (but not, apparently, jobseekers) is damaging and self-defeating. Either a ‘corporate’ footer link or the inclusion of all corporate links would provide a satisfactory continuation of service.

First published on 03 November, 2011