DC Comics Web Site Review

Pros

  • Lots of pictures & videos
  • News is easy to find
  • Easy to find info on trademarked characters
  • Easy to share on social media

Cons

  • Can be very overwhelming, lots of stuff going on
  • Some of their content looks like Ads, so it makes the customer not want to click.
  • Their online store doesn’t have a large selection of merchandise

10 Recommendations

  • Section things out better, right now things are just a mish mash of pictures all vying for the customers attention
  • Add more branded merchandise to the online store
  • The section for comic book release dates is very hard to find anything- there needs to be a better sorted list than what is currently there
  • Header bar needs to be formatted for a wider screen, it looks to squished together
  • An expanded character wiki would be a good idea. While there is information on their trademarked characters, they’re missing out on connecting the characters to their film site.  They could up traffic by linking the two
  •  There should be a much larger “for kids” section of the site- more kid and family friendly titles and merchandise with games and such
  • Delete the “sign up for newsletter” button, the rss feed takes the place of a newsletter, most people don’t read them
  • While they have a great link to their social media sites, there could be a message board or similar section that will draw customers to the site
  • Change the font color on the news section- the blue that is used looks like an already visited link
  • When refreshing the screen, there should be new content immediately visible

SEO score for dccomics.com is a 77.8% (B) from woorank.com .  It seems like the biggest hit for the site is that the mobile version is very close to the desktop version and the key words are consistent.  Biggest miss is the meta description.  It’s too wordy and hard to read.

Personas

Norman B. Guy

Background                                     

Lives in Denver, CO

Works for a large electronics distributer

Demographics                                 

White Male

Mid 30s

College graduate

Makes 50k/ year

Identifiers                                        

Fairly well paying job with no children

Heavily uses technology and is an early adopter

Has disposable income and like to collect things

Steady customer for the company

Goals/Challenges

Tends to buy the same titles and doesn’t pick up anything new

Objections

Knows what he likes, doesn’t want to try anything new

Doesn’t want the products he buys to change too much

 

Tina Elle

Background                                     

Lives in Los Angeles

Works for a small fashion boutique

Demographics                                 

African American Female

Late 20s

College graduate

Makes 31k per year

Identifiers                                        

No Children

Heavily uses technology and is an early adopter

Has limited disposable income & space

New customer

Goals/Challenges

Wants a progressive product delivered in a smart way

Objections

Very socially/politically active- will not read anything objectionable

Has limited storage space

Marketing Message

Push new female-centric titles on smart phone/tablet

DC vs Marvel website traffic

DCComics.com

Global Rank- 27,235

US Rank- 13,994

Bounce Rate- 44.9%

Daily Page Views- 2.77

Time on site- 2:29

Demographics- Mainly Male with some College browsing from home

Country of origin- 42% US

From search engine- 28.2%

Marvel.com

Global Rank- 7,091

US Rank- 2,741

Bounce Rate- 51.7%

Daily Page Views- 2.86

Time on site- 3:08

Demographics- Mainly Female with some/no college browsing from school

Country of origin- 48.6% US

From search engine- 30.9%

 

Obviously Marvel has a more traffic on their site. DC.com is geared much more at males and actually purchasing comics, as opposed to marvel.com is a combination of their comics, movies, tv shows and there is not much push on sales.  All of DC’s sites are very segregated; their movies are on the Warner Brothers site, their tv shows are on the Cartoon Network site.  Were they to combine sites, they would see a huge upswing in traffic. This is also a good opportunity for them to target the female market more.

SWOT Analysis

SWOT

 

click to enlarge

 

Opportunities:  

Based on the companies opportunities I would suggest that the management team start focusing on an actual marketing campaign for it’s consumer products, such as tee shirts, home products etc.  Right now the company is majorly focusing on only toys for little boys. They are missing out on a huge market by ignoring the adult male/female demographics.  The majority of products that are available for adults have no driving campaign behind them and are not doing much to connect the Brand with the product.

Online Recommendations:

Yelp or Google Reviews wouldn’t be the best platforms for online reviews for the company as most of the products are books. However, some customized form of review/feedback platform would be a good idea.  Right now the company is relying on Facebook sharing to get reviews and feedback out in the online world.

DC Comics Background Information

DCComicsLogo

Name : DC Comics

Stock Ticker Symbol: TWC Owned by Time Warner Company

 

Company Website:  http://www.dccomics.com

Corporate HQ location- Warner Brothers Headquarters Burbank, California.

Number of employees- I couldn’t find an exact (or even approximate) number of employees because DC uses many contracted artists, writers etc.

Key Differentiator :Key differentiator is the brand’s character recognition.  Almost everyone has heard of Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman at the very least.  The company has been around since 1938 so adults and kids alike can identify with the company’s products.

 

Mission Statement: The best I could find was this-

DC Comics is home to the “World’s Greatest Super Heroes,” internationally recognized icons that continue to thrill generation after generation. Established in 1938 with the first appearance of SUPERMAN, the Man of Steel, and bolstered the following year with the debut of BATMAN, the Dark Knight Detective, this extraordinary world of modern mythology also includes legendary characters such as WONDER WOMAN, GREEN LANTERN, THE FLASH, AQUAMAN and the rest of THE JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA. – See more at: http://www.dcentertainment.com/#sthash.RhKWoMzN.dpuf