THUMBS DOWN: Financial Firms Not Investing in Web Sites

InvestmentNews

BusinessWeek

Physician-investors looking for abountiful financial services Web sitemay be hard-pressed. According to, the most recent"Internet Standards Assessment Report" revealed that financial servicessites are not up to snuff in terms ofWeb site quality. The judges for thereport calculated a score based ondesign, innovation, content, technology,interactivity, copywriting, and easeof use. Each factor is worth a possible10 points. The financial services sitesaveraged a score of 47.4 for 2005, puttingit below the average score of 52.2for the 81 industries involved in thestudy. They averaged a score of 6.6 outof 10 for each category, putting themin the basement at 68th out of the 81industries. These results are disappointingfor many, as the financialservices industry has long been at theforefront of online access. Despite thelow scores, the Web Marketing Association,which released the study,named the Merrill Lynch Gateway Website (www.ml.com) as the best financialservices site and Online (www.businessweek.com) asthe best investment site.