Leaders & Laggers | Online Support

Although most companies view online support as a cost-saving mechanism, these zones actually play critical roles before and after a purchase. Potential customers visit support zones to identify current problems and sample how effectively a company supports its customers. Current customers rely on these facilities to quickly deliver the answers they need.

siteIQ evaluations track and measure over 90 support-related features and capabilities. Based on our recent evaluations, the best and worst performers in the online support category are:

If online support is your cup of tea, Sun.com, Adobe.com, and Microsoft.com are the 5 star sites to emulate. All three meet over 80% of the online support criteria on our benchmarks.

Having all of the ‘right stuff&rsquo, however, doesn’t necessarily mean that a site puts them together to best effect. When this is the issue, Sun.com wins hands down by rating as a "Competitive Leader" while Adobe.com & Microsoft.com end up in the "Competitive Lagger" range. Bottom line: Sun.com currently has the best online support — and you need to take a tour before it goes off the airwaves.

Industry laggers in this category are Insight.com and NewEgg.com, both in terms of benchmark performance (neither broke the 30% barrier) and usability, which came in at an alarming 8% (out of 100%). Juxtapose Insight.com’s and NewEgg.com’s scores to Dell’s ecommerce and support leadership and you have the story. You can buy plenty of products at these sites, but if you want to obtain world class ecommerce AND after sale support, the better choice is Dell.com.

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