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SEO Isn’t Everything – Great Web Design Gets More Sales
The internet marketing industry is in a funny state these days. With the economic downturn it seems every time you turnover a rock underneath is a SEO “expert” or web design company that can “Guarantee” your site on page one in Google. For the sake of brevity we will overlook the fact that most of these guys are salesman who can barely find the power button on their computers, never mind get your site ranking for competitive key words. A major point many SEO “experts” overlook when giving their schpeel is what happens after the client has spent all of that money and successfully landed an organic search visitor on their website. Virtually all of the effort is wasted if the visitor does not convert to a sale in one form or another. Now lets be clear, a “sale” can take many forms depending on the goal of your website, including a contact form submission, a referral, a subscription, a phone call or a monetary transaction to name a few – but getting that sale instead of a bounce depends heavily on the design of the website. How attractive is it? how fast does it load? Is the website easy to navigate and does it greet visitors with what they expect to find? A well-designed website will need to to all of those things effectively to produce the best results.
A growing trend these days with budgetary pressures from all sides, is to go with a templated open source app offered with many hosting accounts and pack it full of keywords to strain for search engine ranking. While a site like this may cost little and may eventually begin to rank for some keywords it will produce a low amount of conversions or visitor loyalty, and many times if the design is substandard compared to the competing websites may actually work to subvert the image of your company.
To create a truly successful website a well rounded approach must be taken. SEO is a major component of any successful site but only a component, other factors that must work well are excellent usability, attractive design and content your targeted visitors will find useful or entertaining. By going the extra mile and having a professional design that reflects our company and your message visitors will reward your website with greater conversions and repeat visits.
Glenn Williams founder of IMAGE Web Design is a small but very experienced internet services, design and marketing company focuses his energies on managing and growing the capacity of his company to reach new levels of development and provide new services for his clients such as website marketing and search engine optimization. A graduate from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh and many years of experience in design and programming, Glenn applies his knowledge and expertise across IMAGE Web Design’s client base on a daily basis.
Why Your Club Needs a Well-Designed Website
Ten years ago, having a website to represent your club was a luxury. Five years ago, having a club website was nice, but not essential. Today, your group’s website is critical for the growth and success of your club. In fact, we’d wager to say that, nowadays a club that does not have a website, is destined for extinction.
According to “the experts” any website has just 8 seconds to engage a visitor and make them want to click on, read further, or find out more about the organization represented. Yowza! Eight seconds – Poof! Statistics also tell us that if a visitor is confused, overwhelmed, or completely disgusted with their experience on a site they are likely to never return. For clubs struggling with dwindling membership and waning member interest, that first impression had better be pretty dang awesome!
Think of a website as a well-decorated home. (We’ve just been through a move, so “decorating” is getting a lot of attention around here.) Just like a home, websites that are busy, with too many elements and colors, make visitors confused and make their interaction with the site stressful. Likewise, sites that are sparse, or outdated (animated gifs, for example) fail to build trust or convey the essence of the club.
Just like designing a home, there are elements that are “tried and true” for website presentation. Here’s three to consider:
The Foundation – Site Layout
* Consistency is paramount with any site. You want your site to have an identity that represents your club, so the “feel” of all the pages (backgrounds, color schemes, navigational tools, headers, and banners) should be the same. Often, we see sites that have been updated, and yet still use the old design for certain pages of the site. It’s like walking through a brand new ultra-modern contemporary home and suddenly finding a room with Victorian decor and furnishings. It’s confusing and makes you wonder exactly where you are! Keep it consistent.
* Important information should be visible. As enjoyable as it is to explore the Fun House at a carnival, a website should not take visitors through a series of mazes or hidden entrances to find what they are looking for.
* Adhering to standards. The internet has been around long enough that there are certain things on any website that visitors have come to expect. For example, if a text is underlined, users expect it to be a link.
* Colors, Font and Alignment. It’s easy to tell an amateur website attempt because often each sentence has a different color or font, and some sentences are left-justified, while others are centered. This is distracting to visitors and does nothing to hold their interest with the site.
The Front Door – Home Page
* The home page is like the front door for anyone visiting your site, thus, they should be able, at a glance, to see what your site is all about, it’s resources and features, and how it is laid out. Ideally all of this should be visible on a single fast-loading screen that requires minimal scrolling.
* Each home page should have a title – the name of the club and logo in a prominent position on the page.
* Likewise, there should be a brief text segment describing the scope and purpose of the club. This summary needs to pique the readers’ attention and be an impetus to encourage them to click and find out more.
* Since most club sites serve a dual function of attracting new members and sponsors, as well as informing current members, it’s a good idea to have an Announcements area on the home page so that members can be kept abreast of club events and activities.
The Hallways – Site Navigation
* Navigation is one of the most important elements in any website. It doesn’t matter how good a site looks or how much information it offers; if there is not a sensible, logical navigation scheme, the visitor will get confused, and ultimately give up.
* The Navigation Bar should contain brief titles of pages within the site. They should be easy to understand in the context of what the site is all about. This is not the place to get cutesy or overly verbose with page titles. Short, sweet and to the point wins the prize.
* There’s no place like Home. Each page of the site should include a way to return to the Home page of the site. There’s nothing worse than clicking through a site and getting “stuck” on a page. It’s like hitting a dead end in a maze. We design our sites with the “Home” button as the start of the Navigation bar.
So whether your club chooses a traditional, stately appearance or a modern, trendy look, these basic design principles are applicable.
Your group’s website is your club’s home. I once heard it said that home is a place where it feels right to walk around without shoes. That’s what we strive for with each site we build. We want your site visitors to easily find all the great things your club has to offer. We want your members to use your site as a place to communicate with each other, show off their accomplishments and keep abreast of all club activities. We want everyone that visits your site to feel comfortable enough to kick off their virtual shoes, hang around and come back often.
Designs Leading To Success
A website, to become a success, requires a good website design. And required to match the needs of the users and to cope up with the stiff competition online. A good website proves to be beneficial and serves you with an advantage over competitors.
Online business depends on quality of web design for your website. The competition on internet has gone to an extent that a website is also needed to be properly marketed and is used as an advertising tool. All types of firms and institutions, whether business firms or social units, have websites of their own and require good and attractive web design for their website to be a success. These websites provide the desired information on a click and acts like a useful marketing tool.
It is must to carry a well designed website to survive in this modern era. Moreover, being attentive to every small factor of your website is essential for building up a good web design. Otherwise, even the smallest of mistakes, if noticed by the potential customers can result in loosing visitors to other familiar website.
While designing the website, here are some vital factors that are worth consideration:-
• First of all, the idea of what you want your resources to do should be clear in your mind. Planning it and notifying it on paper serves you to design your website in a better way.
• Clarity is the most important thing you should pursue as too much of suggestions and ideas tend to confuse you. Therefore, gathering the ideas that matches your purpose and then sticking to it is the best way to grab a clear picture of your web design.
• For designing, the services of experts like web designers and graphic designers can be hired to make a qualitative and effective web design for your website.
Therefore, to match the competitive level, the websites are needed to have a good web design that focuses on attracting visitors. Web designing aims to make your website appealing and tend to create a good impression over the internet. Vital components like company address, company logo etc. should be mentions to develop a brand name of yours which proves to be beneficial, creating brand familiarity.
Hence, focusing on your web design helps you to create a well organized website, boosting up the number of visitors and hence, boosting your business.