A Case For Chips: Hartley’s Potato Chips

The potato chip market is a $15+ Billion dollar a year industry. There are a few leaders, such as Lays, Pringles, Cape Cod, Zapps and Wise, but there are also a lot of smaller companies out there that have a distribution range of a hundred miles (if that). These companies can use the Internet to increase their sales and distribution.

People who grew up in Lewistown have a fondness for Hartley’s Potato Chips. If you meet someone from there and ask them what their favorite food is, there’s a good chance they’ll say “Hartley’s”. And also take into consideration that there are potato chip aficionados (you think only cigar’s have them?) who are always looking for a new chip to try, and you can see how expanding beyond your area code can really help to spur sales.

The SMB Digital Media approach was used to evaluate Hartley’s website and would like to start by saying “Nice Site”… BUT…. It could use some help with regards to driving more traffic, more sales and generating a customer base that can help them expand their distribution footprint. This exercise is not intended to critique the look and feel of a site (except with regards to how it affects the user experience). This is a good looking site. If you’ve ever seen a bag of Hartley’s, you’ll feel right at home with this site.

META TAGS
One place to start with ensuring that people “find” your potato chip company’s website (hartleyspotatochips.com) is with the meta tags. The text of the organic search listing is disorienting to people and could be improved by using a company description in the page’s meta tags. Something along the lines of “Since 1935, Hartley’s Potato Chips have been the favorite kettle cooked potato chip of Lewistown, Pennsylvania” as an example.

FLASH
The Flash intro file used to load the company logo loads slowly (it can take more than minute to load on some computers). No call to action for visitor to follow that indicates how to enter the website. These are little things. But they matter. A simple “click to enter” on the bag would help. An optimized Flash file would help speed up the load as well.

Of course, some SEO purists would insist that Flash will greatly diminish your chances of showing up on a search engine at all. We agree. But people like Flash. It’s here to stay. An HTML / Flash hybrid would have a lot more success showing up on search engines while still providing the desired user experience. So be sure that the page loads quickly and the navigation path is clear for the visitor.

WEBSITE NAVIGATION
Currently the homepage defaults to news page with small font. And the news is not up-to-date. (this is probably due to the fact that the site is all Flash and you’d need a Flash programmer to make the update.)

It is best if the homepage has a welcome message, possibly in the form of a message from the Hartley’s team. A brief message, with some keyword-rich content along with a specific next step (shop) would probably help to improve your online sales.

Hartley’s should also consider including an email subscription or Facebok link to start building a dialog with existing and potential customers who can buy online, tell others about Hartley’s and ask their local stores to start carrying Hartley’s Potato Chips. The link to buy online should be more prominent (you have to click “Products”.)

The store is a little hard to navigate. Unless you looked at the demonstration in the “Products” section, you may not know how to add products to your shopping cart. There are many “Off the shelf” shopping cart tools. It might be worth exploring.

A few final thoughts: What does this all mean for you? Well, if you’re a potato chip company, look at what we’ve said and see where your site stands. If you’re any other kind of consumer goods company, think about how we can help. We focus on all points of entry and with turning visitors into customers. Then turning those customers into evangelists for your brand.

Looking for this type of intelligence to improve your online product sales. Contact us.