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TECHNOLOGY ARTICLE
10 TIPS FOR KILLER WEBSITE DESIGN
BY JAN PETERSON
Does website design make a difference in how long people will visit your website or if they'll stay and shop? You bet. You've seen the websites that scream "bad idea" and you know those folks are losing potential customers to their ineffective website design. Whether you are an internet newbie or an experienced marketer, you should understand that good website design is part of the success equation.
So hëre are my 10 tips on how to create killer website design that will invite potential customers in instead of scare them away.
1. Easy Navigation- The Road To Success
When people come to your website they are usually searching for something in particular. It might be recipes for a healthy low fat diet that takes less than 30 minutes to prepare or what is the best business to start online. Whatever they want, you need to have the answer. So ask yourself, why do people come to my website? When you know that then you know you should make it easy for them to find it.
I have been on countless websites that make it difficult for me to do business with them. And you know what my first response is? "Next!"
I am onto the next website to see if they can answer my question. People don't want to waste their time hunting for things that should be easy to find.
So, if people come to your website to find widgets, have a button easy to see and locate that says "Widgets". People have been trained to look to the left of the website for the navigation bar.
2. Flashing Gizmos - The Exit Ramp To A Dead End Street
You've seen those sites where the elephants are dancing and the poker chips are running across the screen asking you to clïck on them; the only thing they have ever done for me is give me a headache and to reach the "let me get out of hëre as fast as I can" button on my computer.
If you are a running a professional site, please don't use flashing graphics. Guaranteed you are encouraging people to leave your site. People have come to you for information. Not to clïck on an ad or have their brain scrambled.
Make your website a pleasant environment for the customer to be in. Just like a store. Think about when you go to the mall. You want to go in a store that is clean, well laid out, has good customer service and the products you are looking for. Your website should reflect this. If it is what you expect in your shopping experience, then isn't it reasonable that your customers are looking for this in your website.
What about music? Well, it depends. On most business sites I would suggest not. But let's say you have a realtor by the ocean who rents out homes for summer vacations. They have music that sounds like the ocean is lapping at the foot of your desk. I think music is appropriate in this venue, but I would definitely have it "off" as people log onto your site and give them an option to turn it on. Don't forget many people are surfing in their office environment and don't want the boss to find out. If your music is loud or on as people log onto your site and can't find a quick way to turn it off, they will leave your site faster than a cat that just saw the jaws of a Doberman!
3. Color - Enhancing The Highway Scenery
Color is an individual preference, but studies show that colors have an affect on people's emotions. Look at the top sites like Amazon; their layout is simple and so is their color scheme.
My recommendation would be to go with the flow. If you have a financial investmënt site, then conservative colors seem to follow. If you sell beach items, then lots of fun colors apply. If you have a bridal showër website, I would say soft pastels. Think about your audience and you will know the color scheme.
4. Page Links - I-95 To Your Destination
This is a no brainer but make sure all of your buttons are hyperlinked to a page and the right destination page. No one including Google likes broken link pages. It can be tedious but do it anyway. As you hover over the button and look down in the left-hand part of your screen, you will see the hyperlinked page. Just verify that yours are correct.
5. About Us - Is Your Map Reliable?
People usually want to know basic things before they do business with you. Who are you, how do I get a hold of you, what is your product or service guarantëe, will you resell my email address, what is your privacy policy, when will I get the product, etc. You need to answer these questïons to create trust between you and your potential customer.
6. Sitemap - How Do I Find My Way Around This Big City?
Let's say you have a lot of products or pages and resources. A sitemap helps people to find what they are looking for quickly without have to rummage through your whole site like a lost soul. They are not hard to create but are useful for large sites. It also helps the search engines to know what you are about very quickly.
7. Fast Loading Pages - All Lanes Are Go!
There is nothing worse than slow loading pages. You can optimize your graphics for your website. People hate to wait. You can chëck your page load time and page rank on Alexa.com. Slow pages equal death to an online business.
8. Shopping Cart - Need To Buy Some Souvenirs
If you are selling items or services, you need a reliable and well organized shopping cart. I have seen some websites that have a zillion products listed and to email them for orders. What a nightmare! Yes, the shopping carts will charge you a fee, but it is worth it for them to handle the transaction. There are many good shopping carts available and I would research them based on your business' needs.
9. Templates or Original Design- Chevrolet or Porsche
People often think that to have a website designed is going to cost thousands. So they opt for the templates and throw together sites. There is nothing wrong with this approach except I can tell the difference between what I call a "canned" site and one that was created from scratch. While I don't think a website that uses templates will turn off a customer, I just think it may not be as appealing.
Have fun with your online business. You can go to any number of photography sites and download professional photos from cows to race cars. This will make your site look more customized.
Again, I recommend that you shop for a good web designer. I paid around $400 for a basic site to go up. I know others would have charged me $1000 or more. That's why you need to shop and see examples of their work.
10. Customer Service - The Finish Line!
Okay so how is customer service a website design? Well, customer service should be written all over your site. From tips, to frëe reports, to guarantees, to fast and reliable shopping. People want to know you know what you are talking about and can deliver the goods they want. Give a little and I guarantëe you'll get in back tenfold
About The Author
Jan Peterson founder of GoldStarReview.com researches and reviews business
opportunities including internet marketing, real estate investing, affïliate
marketing, financial investing and more. Over 400 FR-E-E reports available.
MARKETING BUSINESS ARTICLE
HOW TO BECOME A BETTER BUSINESS MARKETER
BY Abe Cherian
It's a fact that business these days is more competitive than it's ever been. To stay alive, you can't just offer a quality product at a fair price. You have to know how to market effectively. And as you know, marketing goes hand in hand with advertising.
Unfortunately, most business owners have no idea of how to get the most out of every marketing dollar they spend. You should demand that you get the best possible results from every dime you drop into marketing.
Does this seem too obvious? Look through your yellow pages. Pick them up right now and glance through them. Answer this question: are most of the ads telling you what benefits you get if you become a customer? Or are the ads telling you about the companies, where they are, how wonderful they are, what they do, how great their quality is, how great their service is, and all about them?
Around 95% of the ads are totally focused on the business and not on what the business can do for you, the prospect. Pay attention to advertisements in newspapers, on the television, and on the radio. You'll find the same thing happening in those places, consistently, every day. This type of selfish advertising falls into the terribly wasteful category of "institutional" advertising.
Institutional advertising produces, at best, deferred results. At worst, institutional advertising is ineffective, unproductive, and a wasteful expense that accomplishes no profitable purpose whatsoever. You know it's institutional advertising when it tells you how great the company is, or how old and stable they are, or some other frilly, fancy, cutesy and other non-compelling foolishness. Your selfishness is what kills most of your marketing. From brochures to flyers, sales letters to advertisements, your marketing message should let your prospects know that you are concerned only with what they want. Anything about you should always come last. Your customers should always come first. All marketing materials you create should focus on what the prospects want and need. Every sentence should show that you understand their wants and needs. Until your marketing efforts focus on the prospects first, your marketing is handicapped.
businesses
out there never precisely determine who their market is, and what the desires,
needs, wants, and passions of the prospects in that market are. This is a
grave mistake.Determine who your market is. Ninety percent of the The successful
marketer can tell you precisely who he's marketing to, and what they want
in a product or service.
He can tell you his best prospect's approximate age, location, education level,
income level and other critical information. You must know the who first,
and then you can focus on the why. Why do your customers buy from you? What
do your customers want or need most in the products or services you offer?
Remember, you need to focus on discovering what the "why" is so
that you can focus your marketing efforts on showing your prospects that you
can meet the "why" in the most satisfactory fashion. Think about
it. How can you expect to adequately fill someone's needs if you never take
the time to understand them? It's simple, yet few companies ever bother to
work at meeting their customers' needs.
Companies that is successful with their marketing understand their customers' needs and attempt to satisfy those needs better than the competition. If you want to own your market, find out what your customers really want. Discover their desires. Search out their passions and needs. Once you have this information, you will be armed to corner your market. Capture Your Customers & Prospects Names And Addresses.Of all the terrible marketing mistakes made, I feel that this one has caused companies to lose the most money. I'm talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars every month. Why a company would spend hundreds and thousands of dollars to get a customer in the door and then let them walk out without getting their name and address and other vital information from them is beyond me.
I can't understand it, but 90% of the businesses in America don't ever bother to keep track of their loyal customers, let alone any prospects. Your mailing list, or customer database, is your biggest source of lifetime profits.keep track of every customer and every prospect. According to Fortune Magazine, it costs five times as much to generate a new customer than to resell to an existing customer. Existing customers are almost as good as money in the bank.
Your existing customers already know and trust you. They bought from you and (hopefully) had a positive experience with you. They know you'll deliver on your promises, because you've done it before with energy and promptness.All you need to do is develop a systematic way of keeping track of them, and then ask them to buy from you more often. By establishing a long term relationship with your customers and prospects, you can maximize your business success. Especially if your products or services help solve your customers' problems.
About The Author
Abe Cherian is the founder of Multiple Stream Media, a company that helps online businesses find new prospects and clients, who are anxious to grow their business fast, and without spending a fortune in marketing and advertising. http://www.multiplestreammktg.com
FROM THE EDITOR
Dear our subscribers !
We are glad to see you again. There are simple words always teach us that great success future is depended for our action today. Abe Cherian is the founder of Multiple Stream Media said to us that running marketing business is not as easy as our imagine. " your marketing efforts should focus on your prospect first , if you want to be success. His article " how to become A better business marketer will tell you everything how to gain prospect. How to design website make a difference in how long people will visit your website, also a strategy how to gain prospect in your business. Jan Peterson will tell you in his article : '' 10 Tips for killer website design "
For all of our subscribers who haven't successed yet in business, don't be desperate firts. Try think big and act big, we are sure all of you will success so soon. And don't forget to remember , action and action !
Best Regards
Erny Setyawati ( Editor / Publisher )
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