1. Keep your text READABLE.

It’s one thing to want to make sure that search engines know what you do, and to ensure that you appear highly in them for the keywords that are important to your company. It’s another thing altogether to make your site a collection of unreadable, poorly formatted keyword paragraphs. Many people don’t even realize the way their content comes across to site visitors, because they haven’t taken the time to read it themselves, or to solicit feedback from individuals who don’t know the company or the industry well already.

How to do it.

Ask friends and neighbors to read through your most important few pages or products, and to give you honest feedback. After reading each page, would they know more than they did when they started, or would they have a headache trying to make sense of what is written?

2. Keep your text FRIENDLY.

No one wants to be talked at, in person or on the internet. Does your text have a friendly demeanor, or is it boring? Does it inspire people to buy from you, call you, e-mail you, or does it inspire them to look to the next web site?

How to do it.

Don’t take yourself quite so seriously. Yes, you sell an important product or service, and yes, people need to know more about it. But friendly costs nothing, doesn’t hurt the quality of the message and makes people feel like they are doing business with a human, not a computer. Note that this doesn’t mean you should tell jokes about your products or showcase your items in a ridiculous way, it simply means adding a personal touch.

3. Keep your DESIGN friendly.

Is your web site solid black, or bright blue with yellow text? Is the text large enough, the menu noticeable and easy to navigate, and the color scheme one that makes people want to stay on the site? Do you have a bunch of meaningless flash animation, with dancing letters or loading screens?

How to do it.

Be very aware of how your site design is perceived by others. Does it make them feel happy or sad? Lethargic, annoyed, or intrigued? Try asking a select group of non-company related individuals to use five words to describe your site design, and see what comes up. Also remember that if you are selling products, white sells. There’s a reason Ebay, Amazon, Target and all of the other large, successful online retailers accent their web sites with white. It emphasizes the product rather than the web site, and it makes people want to buy. What colors are you using?

4. Keep your content FRESH.

Seeing a news headline that invites visitors to a conference in Cleveland scheduled for two years ago, or a Merry Christmas message in the middle of April is a dead giveaway that you don’t pay attention to your web site. What does that mean to the visitor? It means that you may not be paying attention to keeping your product cutting edge, either. People want to know they are getting a new product with solid innovation behind it. If your site shows signs that it’s old and outdated, people could easily assume your product is as well.

How to do it.

If your site allows it, put “end dates” on your time sensitive articles. Our customers use SE’s built in date function to allow articles to disappear before they get too old, so there’s never a concern about having a conference invitation that has long expired, or reference to a holiday that has long-since passed. If your site can’t do this, then keep a note on your calendar to remove these old items the day they become dated. Another note, if you don’t have a lot of news, make sure your articles don’t mention the date. Nothing says “never updated” like an article with a post date of 2006.

5. Make it EASY to reach you.

It always amazes me when I see a web site with tons of great information, a clean design and… absolutely no way to contact the company.

How to do it.

This one’s easy. Place your phone number prominently in the top-right hand corner of your site header (studies have shown that this is the first-looked to location for contact information), and have some sort of simple and obvious link or button that directs people to your contact us page. Speaking of, you do have a “Contact Us” form, don’t you?

A simple, clear and concise contact us form is much easier on the visitor than a simple e-mail link. Instead of having to open their e-mail program (or give up if they are on a public computer without access to their account), the visitor simply needs to enter a little information and press send. Having a well-built contact form also prevents spammers from getting your e-mail address and using it to their advantage (aka sending you spam). Just remember, the more fields to fill out, the less chance someone will do them. If your contact us form has 20 fields to fill out, expect your e-mail box to be lonely.

Taking it further.

Did you like this article? Need some clarification, or want to know how these principles apply to your business and web site? Send us an e-mail and tell us what’s on your mind.

1. Customers have to click on, or wait for a flash animation to finish before being able to see your site.

This is not attractive, it’s annoying. Customers don’t want to waste 15 seconds of their life seeing a boat bouncing through faux water, or watch your logo spin and land on the page to click on, they just want to get to you and get moving. It’s been said that you only have three seconds (tops) to catch people’s attention before they leave your site. If that’s true, wouldn’t you rather catch their attention with your content?

2. You play music or sounds on your website automatically.

Unless you are a musician (and even then, we’d recommend you make it optional), no one wants to hear your site play music, or sound at all for that matter. 90% of people browsing the internet fall into one of two categories.

1. They are listening to music/TV already. In this case, now all of a sudden they are listening to two songs at once, and neither one of them sounds good. So what do they do? They immediately close your web site, shake their heads, and continue about their normal business. Your loss.
2. They don’t want to listen to music. That’s why it’s not on already. Either these people are at work, and don’t want the sound of music blaring through their speakers to alert all those around them that they are browsing the internet, or they have no interest in hearing noise while they work/play on the internet. Turn the music off, or risk turning your customers off.

3. You wonder why no one is calling or e-mailing you.

Visitors are not going to tell you your site is bad, they are just going to go away. If your business has slowed down since the launch of your new web site, or if it hasn’t shown significant gains, the chances are your site isn’t helping you sell yourself online. Take the hard-learned advice to stop relying on your neighbor/son/daughter/cousin/friend to do your web site, and turn to someone who can make your site shine. It doesn’t have to be us, but find someone who will take care of you. It’s too hard to tell a family member or friend when something doesn’t look good, and too easy to accept that often sub-par work as “good enough.” Let that person know this isn’t personal, and take care of your business.

4. You direct a caller to your web site for advice, and they get quiet or say “thank you” and hang up.

If a customer has been to your web site and is calling you, it means that they didn’t find everything they wanted to know from your site. Directing them back isn’t going to help, and could easily direct them out the door and to your competition (you know, the one with the good web site). Instead, ask these customers if they have been to your web site, and if they have, find out what it is they had trouble with in finding the information that they needed. It could be as simple as a poorly formed menu. Take these customers as important contributors because they are in the minority. Most people look at a site, and if they can’t find what they need immediately, they leave. Those who bother to call you for more information could provide valuable insight into what you’re doing wrong, and what you can do better.

5. No one finds you from your web site.

If the people who are coming to you are all referral-based, or from phone books and other forms of advertising, chances are your site is all but invisible to search engines. Try typing in your company name in Google. Do you come up? If so, where? If you aren’t at the top, or at least in the top 3, it’s time to get worried. If you are, then it’s time to start looking for other keywords related to your industry. Use some common sense here. If you are a local company who sells electronics, don’t expect to be on the front page for “Sony” in Google, it’s just not going to happen. But if you create custom lawn furniture, you could look up “custom lawn furniture Atlanta,” or wherever your location may be. If you aren’t showing up, it’s time to get some help.

Want to learn more, or to see first hand how your site measures up? We have lots more advice that could help you to raise your rankings. Send us an e-mail and let us help you get back on track.