Forget the dub dub dub
[May 2006] What address does your website use? What happens if your visitors leave out the www at the start?
It's common for organisations to have a web address like this: http://www.group.org.nz. Your group probably has a website at an address like that.
The web's been around for a decade or so now and Internet users are getting quite savvy. Most now know that when you type in an address you don't need the 'protocol': the http:// part. Why bother with that extra bit of tricky typing when you don't need it?
Many have also realised that the www. part is often also optional, so they are coming to expect to be able to type your website's address not as www.group.org.nz, but instead as group.org.nz.
But what happens when they do that? A well-behaved website should just show up, but if it's not properly set up (in what's termed the 'Domain Name Server'), the visitor may see an error message instead.
Check your website address; see what happens when you leave off the www.. Talk to your web team and ask them to make sure it works, whichever form your visitors use.