Coaching For Success
Posts tagged web Development
In Web Design Cool Doesn’t Pay The Bills
Oct 8th
Does your internet business web site landing page have every possible bell and whistle so that it looks like a visual feast for the eyes, so much so that any visitor would be mesmerized by what they see? Are your conversions a lot lower than you’d like, meaning your ROI isn’t looking good compared to the cost that probably went into building your landing page? If this is you, or, rather your internet business, you’re losing money and were probably complicit in your own lack of online success because you went along with your creative design team and sacrificed conversions in favour of the “coolness” factor.
Yes, your baby is beautiful, no doubt, and you’ve probably grown very fond of it, but how did you get to this point? Let’s take a look at the origins of this type of situation and see how it can be avoided.
Your aim, when all said and done, is to acquire and convert visitors through the most efficient landing page or process you can get. The way to get to that is to put all considerations to one side except the interests of your visitors, because they’re what really matters, since, without them, you’d be out of business.
Clarity Is The Key
When a visitor reaches your landing page, its objective should be crystal clear so that your visitor is in no mind as to what their next step should be, which should be the action you want them to take to convert from a visitor to a customer or subscriber. The stillness of your landing page should be patent and the path to conversion simple.
Unfortunately, the opposite is true for many web site landing pages, since they can be a total visual assault on the visitor’s senses. The poor visitor is left trying to sort out which of the incredibly striking elements on the page is the most important for them. This can often lead to frustration and ultimately the visitor clicking on the dreaded close button, probably never to return.
Visual Excesses
When it comes to their design, graphic designers take pride in producing work that’s unconventional and challenging for them. They don’t like to be told what to do or be constricted in any way, preferring to be allowed to give free reign to their artistic tendencies. Which will no doubt make them feel good, but could wreak havoc with your web site landing page.
Here are some of the more common visual excesses committed in the name of art:
- Wild colours for the background
Many landing pages use dark or dramatic colours as their background, with large sections of the page or whole backgrounds being black or totally saturated in bright colours. This creates a dark, brooding atmosphere that would probably only appeal to video game junkies.
- Garish-looking text
Creativity may be the cause of the outlandish-looking text on the page, but the result is nauseating and ultimately annoying, as text and headlines are placed seemingly randomly on the page, font sizes are enormous and the whole mess made even more messy by the use of drop shadows, edging effects, fill patterns, etc.
- Visual flourishes and embellishments
It seems like everything on the page has some kind of visual embellishment associated with it, even such simple elements as boxes have edges with glow, drop shadows or some other effect, while simple buttons in lists are replaced by icons such as graphical checkmarks. Even seemingly innocuous space to the sides of the page end up filled with images, patterns, etc.
- Video or animation
All other landing page sins pale in comparison with the excessive use of animation and video. Pages with video and animation may have full-motion videos that play automatically, images and text that pulse and throb and complex animation that flashes before the eyes. This makes for a powerful visual presentation, but basically wastes what few seconds you have to convert your visitor, and usually ends up without the desired conversion result.
Results Not Artistry
While having a visually impressive landing page might feel good and look good on the graphic designer’s resume, the most effective landing pages are simple and direct, making the call-to-action stand out thanks to the visual stillness of the page. Graphic designers should follow minimalist design conventions that focus on conversion rather than window dressing when it comes to landing page design.
“Boring” may not be exactly cool, but it works and makes more money, so that should make it pretty exciting.
If you’re about to embark on your business’s internet journey or are considering changing your current web site, using the services of a professional web development company or consultant will get your project off on the right footing and give you a landing page that will give you what you need, internet business success.
Take Care Of The Four C’s And Avoid Failing On The Web
Oct 2nd
Planning on turning your offline business into an internet business? You’re probably so excited, you just want to see your site out there on the web and see it skyrocket your business to the kind of success you could only previously dream of. And therein lies the root cause of most web site failures; in the excitement to rush out and get their web site launched, many companies forget to focus on four areas that are fundamental to online success: cost, culture, customers and complexity.
Let’s look at the Four C’s, which, if poorly managed, can result in web failure, and see how they can be addressed to give your business a head start in turning your investments in web site development into a positive return.
Cost
Pricing strategy for a traditional, brick-and-mortar type of business is one thing, but, with the global exposure of a web site courtesy of the internet, establishing the correct pricing strategy for your web site puts a completely new twist on the traditional approach.
Look at the analysis you’ve done on your market, positioning and competition, and re-examine your marketing strategy, in particular the four P’s: price, product, place (otherwise known as distribution), and promotion. Otherwise, if pricing isn’t handled correctly on your web site, you may end up undermining your strategic goals.
Culture
Part of the planning for your internet business should be good old-fashioned audience analysis, so, since we know you’re planning for success and not failure, this will already have been done and should be used to define the culture of your web site’s visitors.
It comes down to understanding the preferences of your audience as regards your web site’s subject, tone, language and visual presentation, a factor particularly important for web sites. If you get this down, you will be able to communicate effectively with your audience by identifying content and selecting design options that are appropriate. Omitting this particular “C” or missing the mark with it may result in your web site repelling the same visitors you’re hoping to attract.
Customers
You may think you know your customers through a few generalities you’ve noted regarding the culture of your target audience, but you couldn’t be more wrong. It’s not enough to define a few cultural traits that differentiate your customers; the definition of the customers you need to attract to your web site can be found as part of your strategic framework.
As you did when determining cost, refer back to your marketing and positioning analysis, because, unless you tie your design and development planning directly to your marketing strategy, you’ve practically doomed your commercial web site to failure.
Complexity
Even if the products and services you offer are complex by nature, you should strive for simplicity in your web site presentation. While you should keep your audience’s needs and interests in mind first and foremost, you should also keep your site as clean and elegant as possible, at the same time anticipating expectations, questions and potential areas of confusion so as to create a space that’s interactive but which presents the information in as user-friendly a way as possible.
Remember, while you want to cater to your audience, making things overly complicated can result in your visitors having to put too much effort into finding the information they want. This may cause them to leave your site before they take the desired action, leaving the possibility open that they’ll seek what they want at one of your competitor’s sites.
Even though you want to keep your users’ experience as straightforward as possible, the design choices you make are important as far as reinforcing and building your brand are concerned, so choose wisely and make sure your offline and online marketing communications are coordinated. If not, the brand equity you’ve worked so hard to build may quickly evaporate.
It’s one thing to acknowledge that cost, culture, customers and complexity, the Four C’s, need to be considered when looking at web design and development, but giving each their due care and attention in the planning stages will ensure that your internet business web site is set up for success, and not failure.
Professional Web Development – Finding The Right Company
Sep 4th
Having made the decision to get your business online and take advantage of the power of the internet the next step is to get your web site designed and developed. If you have the skill and the knowledge in house to do this, all well and good. But, with most companies trying to keep costs down the trend is to hire a professional web development company or individual to complete the task.
Of course, there’s much more to being successful online than having a good, high performing web site, but, without that, your chances of success are greatly reduced. So, let’s take the first step and look into finding and hiring the right web development company to get your online presence off to a flying start.
Finding The Right Company
The first step is to make sure you check several companies carefully before deciding on the one you’ll use to perform your web development. There are many factors to consider before making your decision, but these are the most important traits of a good professional web development company:
- They can provide an in-depth analysis of business need, and, if appropriate, of current internet presence
- Determine your marketing goals and set objectives to meet the goals by understanding your company’s target segment, developing a profile of your company and establishing your product or services competitive edge as compared to your online competitors
- Help your company stands out from the competition by creating a plan that details target audience, search engine optimization and customer retention
- Provide honest, candid advice as to what works and what doesn’t as far as web site design and development are concerned, and what’s appropriate for your particular company and business, even at the risk of losing the project
- Be prepared to work with you until you’re satisfied with the results provided, regardless of how long it takes. Your satisfaction should be their main concern rather than just turning out a web site as quickly as possible
- Be a full service provider, offering not only web design and development services but also search engine optimisation, assistance with understanding web analytics, etc.
Hiring The Right Company
Now that you’re armed with what you need to know to make the right decision as far as selecting the right web development company for your project, the question then becomes “How do I find the right development company for my project?”.
Here are some tips to follow in finding the company that’s right for you:
- Check with friends and business partners who have established web sites as to their satisfaction with their sites and how they’re performing
- Check search engine results (search for “web development companies”, “website design” and it is always best to add your location i.e. web development company UK or a region like London if you want to be more specific) and research the first 20 or so results, examining the ones that make a good first impression more deeply for the quality of their own site and reviewing testimonials, portfolio, etc.
- Verify the companies short-listed meet the requirements noted above
- Contact them for a quote and note how much information they request upfront and whether or not they request a consultation in order to gain greater insight into your goals and requirements
- Note the speed and detail of the response; a good company knows they’re not the only one in town and will do their utmost to respond fully and rapidly to any request for a quote and/or service submitted to them
- Ask for and check references and verify the quality of the projects they’ve worked on previously
Finding and hiring the right professional web development company is not an easy task, but it is a vital one that should not be taken lightly or entered into without thorough investigation, since the right company can mean the difference between online success and failure for your company.
Professional Web Development – What Is It?
Aug 27th
You’ve decided to take the plunge and get your company or business on the internet, so now what? Well, “now what” is getting a web site designed and developed, preferably by a professional web development company. But, we’re not talking about just any old web site here; we’re talking about a web site that looks and feels professional and that is designed and built to achieve your short and long term marketing and business goals.
Laying The Foundation
Professional web development, when conducted and executed correctly, is a process, not a one-off event. To that end, the first thing that needs to be done is to determine the goals and objectives, both short-term and long-term, of your business, whether that be in the area of e-commerce, online lead generation, etc. Knowing and understanding your business goals combined with a professional approach are the key ingredients needed to help establish a strategy to ensure online success.
Once a strategy has been established, the rest of the pieces of the web development puzzle (systems, applications, marketing, content and technologies) can be put together to reach the previously established goals. Having no goals makes the whole process much less professional (how do you know where you’re going if you’ve got no target to aim for?), and makes such things as feasibility, ROI (return on investment) and Cost-benefit analysis pretty much pointless.
It’s essential to know the goals of any internet business endeavour in order to be able to map out a web development plan from start to finish, from the online marketing means and methods to the applications essential to the project’s success.
Web Development Cycle
The primary goal of any web development project, however, is to get traffic to the site, since, without visitors, nothing else really matters. You can have the greatest, snazziest web site imaginable, but, without traffic, it may as well be a blank screen. Therefore, a major component of any web development project must be a marketing methodology, which is, sadly, ignored in the launching of many online ventures, but should be tightly intertwined with web development to ensure the success of your online business.
Begin With The End In Mind
The one who ultimately determines the success, or otherwise, of your investment in professional web development and, more importantly, your online business success, is the end user, or customer. So, knowing who your customer is and what their needs are is vital, which necessitates extensive research and analysis, so that your web site is set up to anticipate your customer’s needs and, crucially, to speak the language they understand, making them feel comfortable and maintaining their interest.
Establishing and maintaining relationships with your customers is essential to your long-term online success, and this can only be achieved by reaching the highest visibility possible and providing your customers with the most powerful and user-friendly site available in your particular niche or industry. Having content on your site that keeps visitors coming back for more has always been and continues to be one of the basic essentials of web site success.
Applications Specific To Your Business Needs
That having been said, while content is still king on the internet, the function of a business web site has evolved into more than just an information delivery platform to include web based services specific to their customer base. A good internet business web site should, as a bare minimum, provide services commonly used in that particular industry. But, in order to stand out from the crowd, a truly superior web site should go one step further and offer new and innovative services to make the site the most useful in that field.
Which applications are applicable to your site will depend on the type of business involved and the needs of your customers. The applications needed can vary widely, but their functionality should be driven by your customers’ expectations and should integrate seamlessly with the overall web development strategy established previously.
Content Is Still King
A web site with many high quality pages of relevant content is still looked on very favourably by search engines, so constantly updating a web site with quality, relevant content is vital to maintaining visibility with the search engines. However, the source of such content has changed from the company to the end user, with most web sites now providing the capability for their customers to not only add to, but, in many cases, dictate the direction of new content being added to a web site through the use of a content management system (CMS).
Expandability And Flexibility
As mentioned earlier, professional web development is an on-going process and not a static event, so any company providing such services should not only actively seek the input and contributions of the major stakeholders in the project, but allow enough flexibility in the web development plans and strategy to ensure that the system is expandable to permit ease of addition to and modification of the web site not only in the near term but in the long term.
Business needs and requirements are a constantly moving target, so any web presence established should be flexible enough to be altered, revised or modified as the needs of the business and customer change, whether this is performed by the web development, or in-house by members of staff of the business enterprise itself, an option which should be made available to your business.
Professional web development is an essential part of any serious online business endeavour, and, as such, should be regarded as a major investment in both time and money. It’s an ever-evolving, on-going process that, if done correctly, can mean the difference between success and failure for your online enterprise, so making the right decisions in this area is vital to your future success. Hopefully, armed with the information presented here, you’ll be in a position to select the right company to take your business to the levels of success you desire.
Good luck and Happy Web Developing!
