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PLEASE BE AWARE: This is an old article, and while we think there are still nuggets of good advice included here, it may be out of date. Things move very quickly in the world of Digital Marketing, Lead Generation and Conversion Rate Optimisation - so please see our latest news for the most recent advice on how to get more out of your website and online marketing.
In a world that is increasingly online, where people walk around eyes glued to a small plastic box in their hands, chatting away to equipment lodged into their ears or sit sweeping their hand along flat screens to read classic literature, it cannot be denied that the internet has well and truly taken over!
As a primary source of research, and a person’s first port of call to see what a company is a like, a website has never been more important. In fact, it is integral to a businesses development and survival. This is why it is important to have one that is designed to perfection and represents your business well.
At Xposure we are asked daily, what makes a good site, and although there’s no magic formula for this, with some skill and a little help from Xposure, you can get a website to be proud of. A website that shows your business at it’s best, and helps you to increase profits.
Here are Xposure’s top tips for website design!
1. Your brand is very important to your website, and keeping your colour scheme, font, and writing style consistent is essential. Your website needs to represent your brand in the best way, and having consistent colours, fonts and writing styles will help your audience to recognise you whether they are, online, in posters, adverts or brochures.
2. Always include your snappy and on-brand tagline at the top of your site. Grab the users attention from the start with a catchy phrase that they can associate with your business. The use of this phrase on your website and all your other literature, will again help your audience recognise your brand in a saturated market.
3. Don’t make the site too text heavy, as it can put people off when they arrive seeing an intimidating amount of words on each of your pages. Keep the text on your site short and sweet, and have pictures throughout to break it up, and keep it looking interesting. Your pictures could be anything from the office, the business, staff or examples of what you do.
**TOP TIP**
Don’t forget SEO! Make sure you know what your keywords are and that you use them in text on your website! Include keywords on every page and in the ‘alt tags’ on pictures to improve your ranking on Google.
4. Having your contact details on every page is a must. Whether you include it in the main body of the text, or at the bottom in a footer, it is important that the user knows how to get in touch with you. This way you can get to know your customers, and get them buying!
5. If your pages take more than a couple of seconds to load, this can be a real turn off as internet users are notoriously impatient, and won’t give a slow loading site the time of day. Keep all your files sizes small on your site, including pictures and PDFs as these can all contribute to a slow load time.
6. Keep it simple to use by having clear and concise navigation, and a bar that shows different pages of your site at the top or bottom of the website at all times. Nothing is more annoying than a site that you can’t find your way around, leaving you lost in a myriad of pages unable to find your way out! If a user has got lost on your site once, they won’t be back to do it again!
7. Site maps can also assist with navigation on a website and improve SEO. Generally written in a hierarchical order, a site map can be on your site as a web page or document.
8. If, on the off chance, there is an error on your website, make sure that you personalise the message your user will see. Simply having “error occurred” doesn’t help the user at all, and can leave them feeling a little irritated. Think about a personalised message with links to important areas of your website that will make it easier for users to find their way back.
9. Search bars are another integral element to your site navigation and are important to help those who aren’t necessarily the most Internet savvy, find areas of your site relevant to them.
10. Although you do want your site to look good, remember that whilst the latest developments in web design can deliver that, not everyone who will be accessing your site will have a computer able to run them. This will result in your site not loading property, or stopping working altogether, if it’s covered in JavaScript, Flash and AJAX. Keep it relatively simple, so it’s effective and successful for anyone who visits.
If you’re still not sure, let us take the stress away and build your site for you. Our dedicated designers, developers and copywriters are just a phone call away… The best web design in Mansfield!
