If you’ve got a small business, you need a website – that much is clear. But don't go off hiring a designer until you check out Corey Perlman’s five website design tips to help your website not only look good, but make your business money.
If you leave your website’s look and feel strictly to the designers, be prepared to get a beautiful, sexy, artistic site that does everything but make you money.
Why? Because they know website design, but they do not know your business. The five tips below will help ensure that you not only have a website that looks professional, but a website that’s open and ready for business!
Five Design Tips for Your Business Website
#1 – Keep your important information above the fold
64.9% of people don’t scroll. And 77.3% of statistics are made up on the spot.
So forget the statistics, just remember that your phone number, physical address, “Buy Now” button all have a greater chance of being clicked on if you don’t require people to scroll down to click on them. Make sure all of your important information is eye level and consistent on every page throughout your site.
#2 – Include an Opt-in Form on your Website
By securing a person’s contact information prior to them leaving your Website, you’ve ensured that you can continue to communicate with this person down the road.
This is critical to your success via the Web. As you know, people are very protective of their information and will be hesitant to give it away. To increase your chances of having a successful opt-in box, offer something of real value so people feel good about giving you their name and email address.
Remind them that you will only email a periodic eNewsletter and that you will NEVER sell or give their email address to anyone else.
#3 – Link Clarity
Another rule of thumb: if the user doesn’t feel confident they know where the link they are about to click on is taking them, they won’t click on it. So take the guess work out of it and make your links abundantly clear. Contact Us. Yep, that’s pretty clear.
#4 – Color Pollution
Remember when your mom thought anything you brought home from art class was the most beautiful masterpiece in the world? Well, no offense, but I’m willing to bet it fell into the category of color pollution. Color pollution is simply more than three primary colors on a page. Any more than three and your brain slowly begins to turn to mush. This is crucial when it comes to your website because you want your user’s attention to stay focused on the content, not that odd shade of mauve.
#5 – Include Key Words in your homepage content
This is not your web designer’s job, so you can’t blame them for not doing it. Again, they don’t know your business and wouldn’t have the slightest clue what words would make the most sense to include on your homepage. Key Words are those words your users will type in search engines to find you…or your competitors. You want any word or phrase that they might type in to be scattered throughout your homepage as the search engines will give you credit for those words and that will increase your likelihood of a higher search engine ranking.
Author Bio:
Corey Perlman is the author of the #1 Amazon.com bestseller eBoot Camp: Proven Internet Marketing Techniques to Grow Your Business. The book provides easy-to-do strategies and techniques to help you market your business on the Web. It covers topics such as social networking sites, Web site optimization, online articles and press releases, video marketing, and much more. To learn more about eBoot Camp or to purchase a copy, go to www.ebootcampbook.com.
Photo Credit: billaday
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This really great post. I even didn’t know about this so that I am so thankful for your post. It really give me an idea how to improve my website.
@Julia
There are some really good tips here, I’m glad you’ll be able to incorporate some of them into your website.
Thanks for coming by,
Matt
Great advice! As to number 3, I especially like the Adsense ads that show visitors the URL that they are being taken to also.
Great article, it is nice to have some simple but often overlooked words of wisdom. Thanks for sharing.
Make it great,
Matt
Perfect timing, I was just working on a new site.
It’s good to reconfirm your goals with each site that comes to existence. After all, it’s like fine tuning a machine in order for it to perform seamlessly and realize the call to action laying within.
Good advice. As usual.
@SunTrust
You know, that is something to think about. I use Adsense sparingly on this site (just above each individual post), and I’ve left the URL off the ads more from a space perspective than trying to “hide” anything…but maybe I should rethink that.
Appreciate your comments, thanks for coming by.
Matt
@Matt
Simple is the new complicated – Doesn’t have to be hard to be effective!
Thanks for coming by,
Matt
@agent_luke
So true, without goals your site can meander and that becomes confusing to the viewer. Good luck with the new sites.
Matt
While this is great advice for someone building a website with no training, all five tips are basics for professional web designers. Web design is not just about eye candy, it’s about usability and getting the most out of your most powerful marketing tool (your website). There are a lot of people doing web design, but they are not all professionally trained. Those of us that ARE professionally trained know how to design a site that WILL reach your goals and make you money.
These are true and effective tips to create your own business sites. Always make sure that you would have a user friendly interface so that your users won’t get confused. Don’t forget to test it with bugs and dead links.
@agent_luke
So true, without goals your site can meander and that becomes confusing to the viewer. Good luck with the new sites.
Matt
OH! You’re my new favorite blogger fyi
@Kate
I’ve seen a lot of so called “professionals” get these basic elements wrong. Not understanding color, composition, and hot spots where users are likely to look and click are things that a business owner need to understand and then make sure their web designer is paying attention too. For a lay person (and most business owners are lay people when it comes to web design), a flashy website can hide the fact that they aren’t getting a very useable product.
Appreciate your comments,
Matt
@Jasper
Good point…the interface needs to be friendly and intuitive. Confusion leads to frustration, and frustration doesn’t lead to business.
Thanks for coming by,
Matt
@Matt
I totally agree with you. As I pointed out TRAINED professionals will not miss these things. Check credentials – a trained professional will have degrees and certificates. I find it very frustrating that so many people claim to be “professionals” in my industry and yet they are not. Their poor work makes potential clients distrust those of us who really are trained professionals. Small business owners need to get real results – they can’t afford to be ripped off by people who claim to be professionals yet have no training.
Thanks for your response – I like what you’re doing here! Small business owners need to stick together and help each other out!
)
Kate
Great post. A lot of the websites I’ve been doing were for businesses that already had websites and wanted stuff added. After we looked at the site and I explained things like this (although I need to keep it this simple), we agreed to start from scratch.
Thanks
@Will
I think it’s natural to want to add more, more, more. With all the cool stuff you can do on the web, I know I’ve tried to cram it all into a site on ocassion. Your strategy is right on though, look at the site, keep it simple, and don’t add every bell and whistle.
Matt
Those are indeed good tips for a newbie like me in the internet.Have already digged your page. Thanks again!
One piece of info I would add if I may is in regards to tip #1. When testing your content for being above the fold, be sure to test it in the 1024×768 screen resolution as this remains the most popular size. You can actually put that to the test by reviewing the google analytic section of visitor properties.
Hope this helps. Thanks!