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Websites are no longer optionalAround 1982, we installed a fax machine at the office. As two people lifted it into place, somebody said, “What good will that be?” That’s the person who, two weeks later, was using the fax machine several times a day. Before the early 1980s, fax machines were for big companies. Smaller companies needed a phone number and an address. Overnight, perceptions changed and any company that didn’t offer a fax number was deemed not to be serious about business. Today you’re required to have an e-mail address. The next “must have” is a website. People expect you to have a one. It’s where they’ll look for your address, your phone number, and the hours you’re open. They’ll expect a map, driving directions, and a way to contact you. Smart marketers know that a business is what people perceive it to be. If you’re seen as a minor player, that’s what you are. But today even minor players are expected to have a website. Think, then do.A website may improve your company’s visibility, or it may be endless frustration. A website that’s just thrown together gives visitors a negative message. If you can’t commit to creating a website that enhances your business, then don’t commit to a website at all. Before you even register a domain name, know what you want your website to do. A website that offers products for sale will differ technologically from a site that is solely informational. When visitors want to contact you, will you have them click a link that opens their e-mail program or an information request form? What happens to requests? How will you respond – and how quickly? People expect responses to be fast, if not immediate. Even on weekends and holidays you should reply to any request in 24 hours or less. You may want to consider an “autoresponder” that provides an immediate response with a promise of more information to come. Your website should properly represent your company’s image and philosophy. A site created for a medical practice would be inappropriate for a grunge band. And vice versa! What will your visitors expect? What about the size of your website? Will everything fit in 3 pages, 30 pages, or 300 pages? Larger sites need more planning to avoid the expense of fixing problems that may appear on hundreds of pages. Consider where the website will “live” – on a server in your office or on a shared machine at a data center? Except for giant companies with IT departments, renting space is almost always better because the cost will be lower and the service will be more reliable. Who will maintain your website and how often will it be updated? An informational site for a small business may need freshening only a few times a year, but outdated information – announcing a September sale in March of the following year, for example – kills credibility. Examine competitors’ sites and those in other business sectors. An idea you see on a consumer website might adapt well to use on your business site. Once you’ve sorted out the details, register a domain name. Short names are easy to remember, but longer names can work, too. One good example of a longer name is PowerDirectMarketing.com. If you’ll be renting space at a data center, find a reliable provider. Most domain registrars offer hosting, but companies that do nothing but hosting usually provide a richer selection of options. Avoid hosts that want you to pay for a year in advance. Expect to pay $5 to $100 per month. You can do as much of your own website development as you’re comfortable with, but remember that the website may be a prospective client’s introduction to you. The site should look professional; spelling and grammar must be flawless. Website designers offer advice, structural design, graphic design, writing, and editing services. The best designers ask enough questions to understand your needs and then translate those needs into code on the website. Essential components.Some information belongs on every website. Your contact information (address, phone, fax, and e-mail) should be on every single page. Make it easy for anyone who wants to write, phone, fax, or send you an e-mail. Failing to do this is one of the most common of website annoyances. You may also want to add a company history, company policies, downloadable reports or forms, frequently asked questions, hours of operation, a map and directions to your office, your mission statement, newsletters, phone numbers for individuals or departments, press releases and contact information for the news media, prices, references, a site map, special pages for clients (login required), your strategic plan, and so on. Other topic areas that you may consider …
Designing a professional look.It’s easy to overlook important points when planning a site. While the planning and development may seem to be needlessly complex and cumbersome, it’s easier and less expensive to get the site right the first time – or at least close to the mark you’re aiming for and then fine-tune it as you go forward. Will you register the site with search engines or buy advertisements on a service such as Google? How will people find your site? How important is it for you to learn about visitors to your website? Will you want to know how long people stay on your site? Which pages they view? How will your website be organized? How will you make it easy for visitors to find what they’re looking for? Commit yourself to designing a website that works well on most screen sizes, with most browsers, and with the major operating systems. If you lack the ability to view the site with several browsers on Windows machines, Macs, and Linux computers, identify friends and relatives who can help. You may have a broadband connection, but some of your visitors may not. Make sure that all of your pages load quickly, even on a slow connection. Use clip art sparingly and only when it’s appropriate to the site. Avoid garish graphics, images that are too large, and clashing colors. Choose typeface size carefully. Because a typeface must be present on each user’s computer, you can’t be certain that any one particular typeface is available. In practice, your choices are limited to “generic serif” and “generic sans serif”. Serif faces (the ones with the little “feet”) are almost always better in print, but many designers feel that the lower resolution of screens makes sans serif faces better on the Web. Be careful to choose colors with enough contrast for the text to be read easily. Use bold and italics with care. When everything on the page shouts, nothing says anything. Underlining should be avoided in most cases. Write clearly and briefly. Say as much as you need to say, but don’t ramble. When you’re writing for the website, answer the questions you would have if you were visiting the site for the first time. If you have a lot to say, consider saying it on a lot of pages. This article is all on one long page, but it could have been broken up into several pages worth of text. Some designers suggest keeping pages to 250 words or so (about what you’d find on a double-spaced page of typewriter text). Think of the home page as the sign above your door. A quick glance at the main page should tell the visitor exactly what you’re about. This is particularly crucial if the visitor has arrived from a search engine – in that case, you have about 5 seconds to convince the visitor to stay. Websites that have more than a few dozen pages probably need a site map to help visitors find what they’re looking for. By the time a website has grown to 50 pages or so, you should seriously consider adding your own search function. All major areas of your website should be accessible directly at least from the main page. Avoid forcing visitors to backtrack when they want to move from one section to another. Tips from the professionals.Good website design avoids “under construction” pages or links that go nowhere. Every website is always under construction. When you add information to the site, add links to the new information; don’t add the links before you add the information. Good websites have consistent navigation and always provide a clear, direct path back to the main page. Professional website designers usually avoid “click here to enter” pages. These are usually pages with little or no useful information and they often keep people from entering. A well designed website will display properly on most major browsers. Pay attention to standards set by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) instead of using the latest “gee-whiz” features from any particular browser. Good website design ensures that pages look like they were all designed and written by people who talk with each other. Colors, design, and layout should be consistent from one page to the next, from one area to the next. Websites with time-sensitive information should carry date stamps on each page to show when the content was last updated or reviewed. Professional websites have privacy statements. In most cases, there is no legal requirement for the privacy statement, but you should still have one. HTML provides a special “title” tag for text that appears at the top of the browser window. In most cases, this text should be different for each page and should indicate the content of the page. The title is one of the key places search engines look for information and that’s why it’s so important to think about the title. Keep it short, though – about 50 to 60 characters. Use frames only if you can’t achieve the effect you need any other way. Frames are problematic for search engines. Professional websites never have a visible counter. Nobody cares if they are the 10 millionth visitor to your site and counters that show “0000173 visitors since September 7, 1994” look ridiculous. If your website displays your fine designer apparel, hand-made door knobs, or your resort cottage’s furnishings, make sure the photographs you show bring out the best. In other words, hire a professional who understands lighting, cameras, lenses, angles, and composition. Whatever you’re selling is no better than the photograph you’re using. Make your site search-engine friendly.Give some thought to how people will search for you with search engines. You want the search engine to find the most important search terms near the top of your page. Large companies hire search engine optimization specialists, and you may want to consider this. Avoid, though, spams from people who promise “top ten” ranking. Consider creating several “landing” pages, each optimized for a specific phrase. You’ll want to do this because it’s nearly impossible to optimize a single page for more than one or two search terms or phrases. Visit SearchEngineWatch.com for information about how search engines work. Creating links within your website makes it easy for visitor to navigate the site, and it offers the additional advantage of making it easy for search-engine spiders to navigate your site, too, and index all the pages. The monthly newsletterClients receive a monthly newsletter by mail. That newsletter is available on-line, too. Topics range from website management to spam prevention, with occasional looks at the future of technology. Past issues are in the archive. Philosophical essaysOccasionally I write a philosophical piece. The topics are eclectic, to say the least. You may even find that one point of view is diametrically opposed to another. The articles are in the vault. |
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