- Color: Color is very important to your online success. Color evokes emotion in your visitors that will either turn them on or turn them off. When choosing color it’s important to keep a few things in mind. first you want to keep the continuity going by keeping your website uniform with your traditional marketing material. Your website in nothing more than your online marketing brochure, unless you have a store of course. When designing a site you should keep in mind the acronym CRAP.
That’s right! CRAP – Color – Repetition – Alignment – Proximity. This is the fundamental principle to web design.
If you don’t have a color scheme for your marketing material then here’s a hint: Microsoft and large online companies spend millions of dollars to find out what colors make people want to buy. Let them pay for the research, you can use the researched findings for your own online ventures. Your site should, obviously, be pleasing to the eye. We make sure to choose colors that suit your content and your visitors. Please understand that we will make suggestions based on what our experience has taught us works. So if your website is dull and has no contrast, or the colors don’t blend well together, we will discuss making the necessary changes to make you a more successful website.
- Images: Using images that show people enjoying themselves converts at a much higher rate than just a picture of your product. The right images can make a big difference in how you perform online.
They can make the difference between a person browsing or clicking off your site. Group 5’s expert web designers know these important strategies and has access to thousands of images that can help bring life to your website.
- Call to Action: Call us, e-mail us, get us involved!
When people search for something online they are trying to fulfill a need or want. There is a conversation going on in their mind that you need to tap into. As we build your website we have this in mind. You don’t want to leave your visitors hanging by not telling them what to do after they have reached your site. A strong call to action can make them pick up the phone, fill out a form, or take the time to email you in an effort to fulfill their need. We know this and therefore apply this technique to every website we build for our clients.
- Accessibility: Anyone should be able to access your site, including persons with disabilities. Understanding what it takes to make your website accessible to all your visitors is vital to your online success. We make sure that every page is easy to find by making sure your navigation and inner linking structure is set up in the proper way. Making sure your visors make it to as many pages as possible is our goal for your business.
- Usability: Is it easy to navigate your site? Can visitors understand your navigation? Are you using words and phrases that are unfamiliar to even the most seasoned web user? Keep it simple. Make sure that your navigation and inner linking is understandable so as not to confuse your readers. If your "Contact Us" button says something like "How May I Help You" your visitors may not make the connection. At Group 5 Web we understand these principles and make it easy for your visitors to understand and navigate every page they land on.
Find out more about web design in Tampa – Call Group 5 Web
Did you know Google likes faster-loading pages! Are your pages loading fast enough?
Well, it’s true, in web-based business, less is more. If you’re a business owner with a website, it’s likely you are unaware of the way Google ranks your site. Does your page take a long time to load? Have you been waiting desperately for a page to load only to find that suddenly you have grandchildren? Many business owners do not know that the longer it takes a page to load, the higher the user turnover, and thus the lower ranking.
We all know from experience that eternal-loads kill the initial desire of the customer. It has also been scientifically shown that slow loading webpage can hurt your visitor experience. Avoid having your pages loaded with Flash. Cut down on the bells and whistles. If your pages have lots of graphics, or your server is regularly down or slow, then you have a major customer attraction and ultimately retention problem.
No one benefits from visitors promptly leaving a site. You want to keep your pages lean and mean so as to cut down on load time and keep your business pages indexed. The longer the load time, the longer it can take the search engine spiders to index them or, of course, they may not index them at all. It’s up to you to keep your pages efficient.
Slow load times is one of the 200 signals that Google uses to algorithmically rank a specific page and site within in its index. When a page loads slowly it causes Google to penalize your website thus making you go down in the rankings.
The slower your webpage loads the higher your bounce rate is going to be. The ‘bounce rate’ is determined by how many visitors come to your site and leave right away. A high bounce rate is a sign of poor page quality; most likely load time. According to Search Engine News, this policy is already in effect in Google Adwords. They state, “…site and page load times have been a factor for determining quality page scores for Adwords advertisers since March, 2008.”
It make sense then, that if Google is doing this in Adwords, they are also judging organic listings. For example, let’s apply this to a situation where a consumer is looking for dog beds. After clicking on a listing for dog beds in the organic search results, he or she sees an ad ranking at the top of the SERP’s (search engine results pages) but that URL is loading so slow time seems to stop. It happens all the time. What do you think that web surfer is going to do? Think about what YOU would do. You’re either going to get a load of laundry done (if you are patient) or like most of us you will find a page that loads right away.
When it comes down to the bottom line, load times and consumer ease of use are what makes or breaks an online venture. Google has provided a distinct advantage by allowing businesses to update, customize, and tailor their pages to the consumers, the end result is a local search engine that is accurate, easy to use, and provides the fastest, most qualified results to its audience at all times. Should you capitalize on the tools available with Google, you will receive more phone traffic and online orders.
Mr Jones will end up finding Fido’s new dog bed somewhere. You want that somewhere to be your site. Unless your page is stream-lined and fast, it will eventually drop in rankings and your competitors will jump in to provide Mr Jones with that bed and maybe even a brand new doghouse too.
To keep the Mr Joneses of the world shopping at your site, try to keep your load time down to four seconds. Every item of importance you wish to display should be up and visible with in 4 to 6 seconds of the user clicking on your webpage. If you are unsure about your page load times you can check your load time using this free tool. If you are coming up slow, you’re going to want to either optimize your pages and graphics or get a better server.
Remember! Google has lots of tools to make the most of your business. Every little bit of time you spend spiffing up your online advertising, you are investing in the future of your company. Like most good things, it works if you work it. The more you are willing to do the more you will be rewarded. There is an old adage that states Successful people do what unsuccessful people are not willing to.
What are you willing to do to succeed?
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