marketing technology
Published on : Mar 26, 2025
Webarrassment: 30% of US e-commerce businesses are embarrassed by their website despite spending an average of $550,000 on marketing technology
New York, US: Storyblok, the headless CMS for brands that want to make a bigger, faster market impact, today announced research that reveals that US companies are losing an increasingly large sum of money each year due to poor website experience despite spending a substantial amount on marketing technology.
300 senior business leaders at large and mid-sized e-commerce companies in the US and Europe were asked a range of questions about their company’s website performance, accessibility, and marketing technology costs.
30% of US businesses said their website had recently embarrassed them in front of a key stakeholder or customer, however, only 1% said that their website did not meet their expectations. Revenue lost through poor website performance has grown from $72,000 in 2023 to $80,000 per year, with 22% of businesses estimating they lose more than $100,000.
Businesses invested, on average, $550,000 on marketing technology over the past five years, with 17% spending more than $1 million - up from 14% in 2023. Surprisingly, 96% of businesses believe they receive good or excellent ROI on their marketing technology spend compared to 90% in 2023.
Despite soaring marketing technology budgets, the time taken to maintain websites continues to grow. In 2023, companies reported an average of 4 hours per week spent on routine tasks; this has now grown to 5.8 hours, with 18% reporting more than 10 hours spent.
For the first time, Storyblok also surveyed website accessibility, finding that 59% reported having at least some accessibility functionality for people with vision, hearing, or mobility impairments. 20% reported having no accessibility.
Dominik Angerer, CEO and Co-Founder of Storyblok, said: “US e-commerce companies are losing a significant amount of money due to their websites failing to meet the expectations of their customers. At the same time, the cost of the technology underpinning their online offering continues to soar, as does the time lost due to maintenance. Counterintuitively, despite recognising these flaws, the vast majority of business leaders believe they are getting great ROI.
“To make sense of this research, we have to realize that many businesses do not understand that they can and should expect a lot more from their marketing tech. A new generation of composable architecture and solutions provides a much more cost and time-effective solution than inefficient legacy tech stacks that are increasingly unfit for their purpose. Nearly all the problems we uncovered in this research would be solved if business leaders raised their expectations and embraced modern marketing technology.”
Note
Storyblok conducted the survey of 300 business leaders and executives with OnePoll. The survey ran between the 3rd and 7th of March, 2025.
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About Storyblok
Storyblok is a headless CMS for marketers and developers who want to make a bigger, faster market impact. It frees you from the pain of legacy CMS platforms and empowers your teams to ship content quickly and build with complete flexibility.
Legendary brands like Adidas, T-Mobile, and Renault use Storyblok to make content management fun and collaborative. It’s Joyful Headless, and it changes everything.