Is Your Website Being Read? Why People Don’t Read Your Web Page

by: Sherman Cheong

As the world virtually shrinks into the window on your computer screen, the web site is the best and a must-have tool for any business. Not only can it reach a global audience, it will boost your local exposure exponentially—at a minimal cost. However, your business web site isn’t, and shouldn’t be, just an electronic version of your product/service brochure. It could also be another potential revenue-generating source. Just like a printed brochure, your web site doesn’t get read by your visitors from top to bottom. At least not initially—and not until you get them interested in what you have to offer. First Impression As the saying goes, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” And nowhere is this truer than on the Web. Your prospects form an instant impression of you and your company the moment your home page displays onto their computer screens.” In a mouse click, your prospects determine who you are, how they feel about you, and decide if they want to do business with you. Is your web site creating the impression you want? Your business web site acts as a silent salesman for your business. Knowing this, wouldn’t you want to “dress” it to WOW your customers? Web Design vs Web Creation Being able to draw doesn’t make one an artist. Just as having written an essay doesn’t make one a novelist. At least not without years of practice and training. Similarly, and with the widespread availability of professional software, you as a small business owner may choose to design-it-yourself (DIY). You may think you could create your own artwork, “design” a promotion flyer, build a web site. However, to design something to visually communicate effectively and compellingly, you have to consider its clarity, font usage, readability. Other things to consider are: * Your business communications * Branding and marketing mix These are business communication problems to be addressed. You also need to consider its consistency, identity, colour, professionalism, integration, innovation and emotional impression. Usability Have you ever gone for a drive with a map someone else made and it is poorly drawn or just wrong? We all hate the frustration of getting lost. A difficult or inefficient navigation would break your web site as quickly and easily as it was created (by yourself). We evaluate the consistency, innovation, linkage, usability and presentation of the design. We also evaluate the resolution requirements, complexity, consistency, usability to test the effectiveness of the web site layout. How We Really Use the Web In his book, Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, web usability guru, Steve Krug, writes: “When we’re creating sites, we act as though people are going to pore over each page, reading our finely crafted text, figuring out how we’ve organized things, and weighing their options before deciding which link to click. What they actually do most of the time (if we’re lucky) is glance at each new page, scan some of the text, and click on the first link that catches their interest or vaguely resembles the thing they’re looking for. There are usually large parts of the page that they don’t even look at.” How we really use the web site Krug adds that if one wants to design effective Web pages, there are three facts about real-world Web use to consider: 1) We don’t read pages. We scan them. Why? Because: * We’re usually in a hurry. * We know we don’t need to read everything. * We’re good at it. 2) We don’t make optimal choices. We satisfice. Why? Because: * We’re usually in a hurry. * There’s not much of a penalty for guessing wrong. * Weighing options may not improve our chances. * Guessing is more fun. 3) We don’t figure out how things work. We muddle through. Why? Because: * It’s not important to us. * If we find something that works, we stick to it.

About The Author
Sherman Cheong Pagethinker is all about web design tips for online marketing. Helping online marketers create effective websites using simple design principles; increase the user experience of your visitors to your website; attract customers and links; sell something! http://www.pagethinker.com

Wise Words: Analyse Keywords For Better Website Positioning

by: Paul Coupe

Good analysis and research is the main criteria when it comes to sorting out your keywords. Easier said than done though in the great majority of cases. Engaging an expert is possibly one of the best moves you'll make, as they'll run rings around any amount of work you'll do on your own. The difference between the best keyword analysis software and the freebees can be colossal. The best tools will unearth some real eye openers you'll never have thought about. One elementary yet very common mistake is to gather together a bunch of keywords and to copy them across an entire website. This will drastically reduce the effectiveness of pages. If instead you focus and carryout research upon 2 to 5 words per page the results are likely to be much better. It's worth remembering that keyword spellings can obviously vary from country to country. If we consider some of the most outstanding differences between English speaking nations such as England, the US and Australia, a whole new batch of keywords may be worth further analysis. Not only are spellings possibly different but also entire words will have their alternatives (eg pavement and sidewalk). Complete phrases may also be regularly used and understood in one country but not in another. Particular phrases can even vary greatly on a much more local level, especially if we consider popular sayings and slang. That said one of the best policies you can adopt is to check your keywords regularly. All things web related tend to change fairly quickly. What works today could be desperately out of line tomorrow. Once you feel you have a good set of keywords together, you'd be best advised to carryout some basic search engine tests. Testing will illustrate: * If keywords are correct for the niche of the page concerned. * Competitiveness of keywords and the strength of the competition. * If sites ranked for particular keyword searches are really competitors or have any relationship to the area in which you compete. OK, now's the time to hit you with a big one – Latent Semantic Indexing otherwise referred to as Latent Semantic Analysis. Gosh where did that one suddenly come from? Well it's possibly too much to adequately detail in this brief article, but worth mentioning nevertheless. If you want to get serious about your keywords and SEO in general, then some additional research around LSI will do you the world of good. Wikipedia lists LSI as a "technique in natural language processing, in particular in vectorial semantics, of analysing relationships between a set of documents and the terms they contain by producing a set of concepts related to the documents and terms". Well no one ever said it was simple, but basically from a search engine performance point of view we are interested in the relationship, grouping, positioning and variation of terms. Occasionally the right mix can just be stumbled across but most web designers wouldn't really be aware they'd got it right or wrong. First understanding and then using this mix intelligently can set your pages leagues ahead of the competition. As pointed out at the start it's perhaps best leaving the whole business of SEO and keywords to the experts. This is assuming you can find someone who's competent and has your best interests in mind. If your budget is only small or you site performs so badly that anything is an improvement, then the best advice is to keep it simple. Sorting out your keywords for a site that has previously coped reasonably well without will make a big difference. Don't expect overnight success. The top search engines move at their own pace, so it's not uncommon for site modifications to take several weeks to filter through to an improvement in search positioning. This article is free to republish provided the resource information remains intact

About The Author
Paul Coupe is lead designer / developer with Zoom Online. Zoom Online - Providing total online solutions. Contact: paul@zoom-online.co.uk http://www.zoom-online.co.uk/e-marketing/Wise_Words_Analyse_keywords_for_better_website_positioning.htm

Choosing An Effective Web Design Company

by: Phill Bernier

Here's the scenario... ..You're a business person, you know all there is to know about your industry and your products. You felt the time was right to expand your business by harnessing the power of the internet. You know that with the tools available today, just about anyone can throw together a website, however, you also know that there are many issues and pitfalls that can turn a good idea into a complete disaster... time to call in the professionals. Good plan! But here's the problem... There are hundreds of them!!! Prices range from £50 to £5000 for seemingly the same product, there are big companies, small companies and freelancers all selling web design services. Your friends grandson who just left kindergarten can do you a good deal if you're prepared to pay in cash. In my opinion, if you are going to buy something...anything...you need to have a basic understanding of the issues surrounding it: The good points, the bad points. Acceptable and unacceptable concessions. Consequences and benefits. In this article, we are going to attempt to show you how to avoid getting ripped off by providing you with the necessary understanding required when choosing a web designer. Once you have read and inwardly digested the contents of this article, you should be confident that the web design company you choose will build you a web site that will fulfil the vision that you have for it. Step 1: Choose a Few Reputable Web Design Firms The first step when choosing a web design company is to shortlist a number of prospects. The best method possible is to choose a selection of companies based on personal recommendation. Many business people know other business people who can supply referrals. Given the benefit a well developed web site can have on your business, it is well worth taking the time to tap into your network of contacts to get the name of 3 or 4 satisfactory web design companies to choose from. In the event that this doesn't work for you, use a local directory, the internet or a newspaper to make a list of potential web designers. (Remember that anyone can pay an internet marketing firm to get them at the top of a search engine such as Google so a company's ranking does not mean that they are capable of delivering a good solution.) Step 2: Check Out the Web Design Companies Own Web Site It stands to reason that if a company is capable of creating workable web sites or solutions then its own site should be beyond reproach, so take a look at their own web site as well as a couple of sites from their portfolio, if portfolio items are not available, simply e-mail them and ask. The Design of the Web Site The following are a number of things to look for when choosing a web design company from your shortlist:- Are there apparent errors (spelling errors, missing pictures, broken links etc.)? Attention to detail is vital in web design. What you see on a web page is the result of a great deal of complex interaction beneath the surface. If that which is visible is full of errors, it stands to reason that the same level of care has been taken over the code which makes the site function. Spelling and grammatical errors will harm your credibility and a dysfunctional web site will frustrate your audience. Can You Easily Find the Information You Are Looking For? This is critical. If you find yourself on a web site, the chances are you were looking for something in particular. Ensure that the elements of the designer's web site are easy to find. Check that you are able to quickly and easily spot the contents of the pages and move freely between pages. Other design considerations are as follows:- - Is the text clear and easy to read? - Are the pages uncluttered and easy on the eye? - Are there elements such as excessive animation distracting the user from the main text? - Does the site appear quickly? - Does the colour scheme and design fit in with the brand of the company (take the logo as a benchmark)? The Technical Bits Now this is important! Why? First, because there is legislation in both the UK, the US and a variety of European countries that requires your site be accessible to disabled users. Failure to adhere to this will result in your having to hire a third party company to re-code and possibly redesign your entire web site. Secondly, if your web site is not coded using standards (set by the www council) it may not function correctly when viewed by different people using different equipment. Finally, it is a well known time-proven fact that if your visitor is kept waiting more than 10 seconds for a web page to appear, they will move on. SO HOW DO I TELL ?! I hear you cry in desperation! Well, you don't need to be a geek or even know the first thing about web design, html or programming. All you need are the addresses of a couple of useful websites and an explanation of how to use the tools found there. A web page has been created for your convenience that contains links to these sites and detailed instructions on how to use the tools provided and evaluate the results. The link appears at the foot of this page. It should be noted that evaluating these elements will give you some idea of the technical ability of your chosen web site design companies. There are many many more issues that a web site designer should be aware of, and in fact should take care of without you even knowing about it. The points listed here are, in our opinion, those that will have the greatest impact on your business and are so often ignored by less scrupulous web design companies. Step 3: Contact the Web Design Firms Now you should have pretty much narrowed down the possibilities you can go ahead and get in touch. Most companies will jump at the chance to talk to you and convince you of their product offerings. However, what you are interested in are the facts, not the sales pitch. You have already established their design and technical capabilities, now you are interested in their ability to fulfil your needs and provide you with efficient service. Ask for some references from their most recent projects. Ask for the web addresses, contact names, details and completion dates. In approaching them in this way you ensure that you're not getting the one or two satisfied clients that they have serviced in the past, you are getting up to date clients and up to date projects. Once you have their details, call the referees. The following are some idea's of the kind of information you might want to extract from these people:- Verify the details you have been given in respect to project completion dates. Find out about the quality of service the client received Ask how able the web design company was in establishing and anticipating the needs of their client. Discuss deadlines and timely delivery Try to establish how effective the site has been in achieving the original goals of the client Ask if the client has any complaints Don't be afraid to speak frankly, whether satisfied with the service or not, most people are happy to be given the opportunity to sing praises or vent frustrations. Step 4: The End Well, having done all of this you should have a pretty good idea which company is going to provide a solution that's going to work for you. It may seem like a lot of work, but not only are you about to part with a substantial sum of money, but if the web site you receive doesn't do its job properly, you could well be missing out on new business or worse still convincing potential clients to go elsewhere.

About The Author
Phill Bernier is the owner of Adira Limited, (http://www.adira.co.uk) a web design company based in Winchester, Hampshire, UK. Phill has a degree in Business IT and 5 years experience of running his own company. Phill has given talks at a number of events and has published a number of related articles.