Build a Better Website Blog

Don’t spend alot of time convincing prospects that you have the best products or services known to man, but then forgetting to make it easy to get in touch!  Display your contact info prominently throughout the site, but add a contact page with all of your info and show a map to help them find your physical location.

Contact Us
Make it easy for people to contact you! If you are not selling items directly online, this is the most important page to drive traffic to. List all possible ways to contact your company, including phone, email, fax, Twitter, LinkedIn, mailing address, physical address and office hours. If you have several departments, provide instructions for contacting each to prevent confusion.

Contact Us page

• Email contact form – make it easy for visitors to “fill in the blanks” and select items they are interested in. Include fields for their phone number and required email address.
• Never ask for more information than you need – be careful not to turn off visitors. Once there is a commitment, you can request further details.
• Photo of owner or smiling staff members on the page again shows that you are real people who care about your customers.

Location or Directions
Make it easy for people to find you! If you want people to visit your main office or branches, display directions online.

Directions or Map page

• Driving directions from various points.  From north or south, from neighboring towns.  Use landmarks such as “turn left at the Exxon gas station”
• Map showing your location(s). Even an outside source such as Mapquest is handy to allow changing of a map’s scale.
• Photo of the facility or your signage so it can be recognized from the road or parking lot.
• Office hours and instructions on any sign-in procedures.
Include contact info or links for help in case of confusion.

Contact Webmaster Ray for more ideas related to your own website.

Your home page should motivate visitors to click through to the particular product, service or contact page to they can successfully find the solution to their specific need or problem.  Depending on how many categories you have, there may be one overview page or simply links to any category of interest.  That Products/Services page needs to contain enough info to drive them to “buy now” or contact you.

Products / Services Overview
Display a brief summary of each product or service line. Then link to the individual item detail pages. This page can help visitors quickly narrow down exactly what they are looking for while motivating them to learn more.  Give just enough details to lead prospects to the next step of the sales process.

Products page - restaurant menu

• Name, photo and brief description of each item.
• Lists of sample uses or top features for each item.
• Links to individual item pages.

Product / Service Details
Each item (or sub-category of items) can have it’s own sales page with photos, descriptions and specifications along with a call to action to purchase now, email for more info or call now!  Additional info can be included using links to it so that it’s optional to be bombarded by the specifics.

Services page

• Begin each page with a brief summary of the product/service. When people search for information, they want it immediately
• One or more photos or a video demonstration (it’s fine to use You-Tube)
• Description including any available options or choices (colors, sizes, package deals)
• Customer reviews specific to the item.
• List of sample uses, actual customers, features or benefits.
• Prices (specific or range), terms of use, warranty information.

Before / After or Case Histories
Besides a sales page for each product or service, you may want a page of real-world samples of your work for prospects to more easily identify with than generic descriptions and sales copy.

Before & After

• Before/after photos or slideshow or video of an example project
• Description of the problem, customer requirements, timeline, difficulties overcome, and final solution.
• Names of satisfied customers along with testimonial.

Always use a call to action to prompt visitors to next step of the sales process.

Contact Webmaster Ray for more ideas that relate to your project.

There are many possible secondary pages that can help close the deal for visitors to contact you or request information.  “About Us” isn’t critical to your product or service, but the information you include can help to set you apart from the competition or give visitors “another” reason to contact you.  Stand out from the crowd and explain what makes you special!

About Us
This page (aka “About Us” or “Our Company”) may include any kind of background information to make visitors more comfortable with you. Company history, mission statement, introduction of staff members, awards and honors, or explanation of what separates you from the competition. On the surface, you may provide similar products or services as others, but certain secondary facts displaying your unique qualities can close the deal. Maybe you assist a charity that’s important to some potential clients.  Maybe you’ve won an award.  Maybe you have a unique certification.

About page

• Photos of owners or employees – show that you are human beings and not just “brand x”
• Logos of industry affiliations, chambers of commerce, well-known vendors and even large customers
• Mission statement, warranty or guarantee, message from President
• Background of the company and certifications earned – use this page to brag about yourself! Include miscellaneous items that don’t fit on other pages.

News Page
News or “Announcements” pertaining to your products, industry or company can be a great way to show that you are active and conscious of keeping customers informed. Web surfers will often view to check for the latest information. It is another opportunity to tout your accomplishments or show involvement in the community.
Stay current, to prove that you’re on top of everything

News page

• Announce new products, product lines or improvements.
• Press releases, new testimonials from customers, related topics
• Sales, special deals, promotional offers
• Honors received, partnerships formed, new staff members

Events Calendar
Events list or ‘Upcoming Events’ or ‘Schedule’ can provide details of meetings, trade shows, seminars, or any type of events that occur on a regular or periodic basis. You may wish to include a page of past events as well, to possibly include photos and a recap of the activity.

Show people how involved you are in the community and how you provide great support.  Show people that you’re busy!

Events page

Contact Webmaster Ray for more ideas.

Each page of your website contains elements that contribute to it’s overall success.  They must complement each other in achieving your goal — a call to action on the part of visitors. Home page is the main portal, and therefore deserves extra attention.

Home page of Attraction Web Design site

Maximize the value of each website page
Every page of your website contains elements that contribute to it’s overall success.  They must complement each other in achieving your goal — a call to action on the part of visitors.

Avoid Splash pages
Some sites start with a “front page” or “landing page” containing merely a brief video or static image, along with an “Enter” link.  In most cases, this is unnecessary and requires surfers to click again to get to the information they came for.  This can be frustrating to people and a page like this contains very little information for the search engine tigers to chew on!  Skip this and get to the point right away…

Home (index) page
The home page is by far the most important part of any site.  It is the main doorway to your organization by which the vast majority of visitors will arrive at.  First impression is key to help them decide to view internal pages.  You have 3 to 7 seconds to capture attention and convince visitors to stay, so the initial appearance, site title and headline should draw them into reading a brief introduction to your company. 

   • Official company logo – use similar colors and design as printed materials
   • Website title or company name – state your topic or name of organization
   • Main Headline – grab attention with a question or solution to a problem
   • Text – at least one or two paragraphs of introduction to your company and what you can do for your customers (or members).  Squeeze in as many “search terms” as possible without making copy hard to understand.
   • Images – one or more photos or graphics should reinforce the text and be a visual representation of how the site will help visitors
   • Slideshow or video – if a picture is worth 1,000 words, moving pictures could be worth a million!  Use your very best images to tell your story
   • Contact information – all pages should make it easy for visitors to request more information, but it is imperative that a phone number, email address or mailing address be visible to people ready to contact you based on their first glance at your site!
   • Current info – update home page regularly with a news item or mention a recent event to prove to visitors that your site is actually current.
   • Bullet lists – to avoid overwhelming visitors with lengthy text, use concise lists of features, benefits, samples or reasons for people to delve deeper into the site.   
   • Newsletter sign-up – Opt-in area for eBulletin, free gift, or membership to capture contact information for additional marketing opportunities.

All of these features should drive visitors toward a specific “Call to Action”. Failure to convert potential customers into sales leads is mostly due to homepages lacking primary and secondary calls to action. It may be a link that states, “Contact us for details” or “Tell us your situation and we will set up a conference call.”  Guide web users along your sales process to convert more of them into customers.  Read more tips!

Are you sure that all of your website visitors see the same thing when coming to your URL? There are many different viewing possibilities such as browser, screen resolution and individual PC color and contrast settings.  View your site in various combinations to be sure that everyone receives the same experience.

Strive for cross-browser compatibility
The same web page can appear differently when viewed in different browsers.  Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, and others each display code differently, so you must be careful to view pages in each before going live.

Do we all see the same page?

Usually, you can find common ground by utilizing code (stylesheets/CSS) that all of the major browsers recognize, but there may be cases that you should create distinct versions of the same page(s).  Issues that may arise are the use of features such as image maps, frames, javascript, java applets, or operating system-specific controls.  Test in as many environments as possible!

Layout and design for multiple screen resolutions
As mentioned earlier, another challenge is to make your pages attractive at various screen resolutions.  The vast majority of PCs display 1024 x 768 pixels while most laptops are set to 1280 x 1024.  There are still a number of surfers using 800 x 600.  Setting pages to show a set page width of 800 pixels will display the same on each of these, and if centered, will simply have larger left and right margins to those with greater resolution.

Be careful with the code

Validate your HTML code
After designing pages, it’s a good habit to get into using HTML Validator software to reduce errors that could cause display problems in some browsers and penalize you in some search engines.

Here are some bad ideas—things NOT to do when designing a website. You can annoy visitors to the point of driving traffic away forever.  Large files slow down pageloads.  Pop-up windows create more work and confusion for visitors. Splash or “entry pages” serve little purpose on most sites.

No pop-up windows
Don’t annoy visitors with automatic pop-up windows.  It is fine to allow new windows to open when links or text or images are moused over or clicked on, but let the viewer control that decision.  And provide a “close” button if the window does not disappear by itself.

No spaces in file names
Filenames (including page files and images) should not contain spaces.  Some servers do not support spaces.  The underscore may be used. 
These are good:  “bob3.jpg”, “about_us.html”.
These are not good:  “bob 3.jpg”, “about us.html”.

Audio must be controlled
Sound files must be used with caution.  If appropriate, automatic sound bites or background music can add to viewers’ experience. Give visitors control to turn on and off.  Music can seem very unprofessional for most business sites.  Even on more casual websites, it must be remembered that many viewers—particularly at the workplace— have speakers turned off.  Sound files can also cause delays in loading pages if not properly optimized or incorporated.   

Optimize image files
Compress image files which can cause slow page loading.  Especially if a viewer is using dial-up, a 25 KB image loads more quickly than a 200 KB one, and a 2 or 4 MB photo (right out of a digital camera) can cause severe delays. Don’t make your customers wait! 

Reduce file size of images

Once you or your webmaster learns how to crop photos and resize them to proper width and height for the web, adding new photos will be quick and easy.  Open the image in editing software such as Photoshop, Windows Picture and Fax Viewer, or another program that came installed on your PC or came with your digital camera, scanner or printer. Specific procedures for using Microsoft Paint are listed at http://www.AttractWeb.com/images.php. You should “Save As” a different name, so that you still have the full size original.

Don’t overdue multimedia
Beware of excess multimedia – too many cool effects can cause confusion and hurt search engine rank.  Multiple blinking or moving images can make your site look like a circus.  Even an expertly created Flash movie can detract from nearby text if it commands too much attention.  Keep visual effects as subtle as possible, unless you happen to be a circus, or children’s site or rock band.

Avoid “Splash” or entry pages
Stay away from “Splash” pages unless it’s vital for you to convey an artsy or glamorous feel and can afford the risk of losing visitors. An entry page is usually the index or main page that directories and search engines would review and refer visitors to.  If there is little more than a movie or a handful of words, the search engine tigers will be furious for being given so little content to eat.  Visitors who are pressed for time may not be happy to have to click ‘enter’ to get to the meat of the site either. 
If at all possible, try to combine your impressive introduction to the website with the general overview of home page material.  In that way, your video, Flash movie or slideshow is directly supporting the words of description on the page.

Don't be too Flashy

Do not overuse Flash
To make websites more visually appealing and interactive, many designers specialize in using Adobe (Macromedia) Flash software.  Flash movies may be integrated into pages or entire websites may be constructed with Flash.  The danger is that more Flash means less content as far as Search Engines are concerned.  A completely Flash site offers no text for the tigers to feed on since it is all just movies and images on each page.  Even the internal links can’t be seen, so Search Engine “spiders” fail to see (and index) all of the pages on the site. 

Flash is fine if used on pages or websites that visitors are already aware of or directed to from more search engine friendly pages.  They can offer video game types of visual experiences that are attention grabbing for artistic or entertainment related themes.

Don’t use Frames
By designing a site with “frames”, certain sections of a page remain in place while others (usually the main section) can scroll up and down.  This is useful for maintaining a navigation area on the screen while reading long pages.  But search engines have difficulty indexing pages, so they are not worth the effort.