The Reciprocal Consulting Blog

Is there such a thing as the most important web design element? Doesn’t it depend on your Web marketing and web design goals? Yes, it does. But it also depends on what you can use your website for and the current conventions. Right now, there is one Internet marketing channel that is considered the most effective channel of all.

I’m talking about e-mail marketing. Since it is the most efficient and most effective means of conducting online marketing, it makes sense to put an opt-in form on your website. I consider it the most important web design element.

Of course, you should put a lot of careful thought into the placement of your opt-in form on the page. Where do you want it to appear and what do you want it to look like?

Your e-mail marketing opt-in subscription form should be eye catching. You want the reader to notice it. But you don’t want it to be so noticeable that the site visitor fixates on it. It should be visible and inviting so that you increase your opt-in subscribers. But you don’t want it to take away from the information on your web pages.

Website design is a creative science. Nothing is absolute. However, if you consider that e-mail marketing is still the most effective means of marketing online, then an opt-in form for your e-mail marketing campaigns is an essential element for any website.

Web design has come a long way in the last 20 years. It used to be, if you wanted to build a web page, then you had one option – HTML. Hypertext Markup Language is the basic language of the Web. Today, if you are building a website of any kind, chances are you are going to incorporate HTML into your programming even if you use other languages.

But HTML is not the only language you need, by far. If you expect your web site to have some interactive features, then you’ll need more – much more – than HTML.

CSS, or cascading style sheets, is a language devised to help Web programmers build websites where design elements can be defined in a single document across multiple pages. Then you can use HTML for your content on each individual page.

PHP allows Web site designers the ability to add interactive design features into their web pages without jacking up the HTML.

JavaScript is another interactive and dynamic Web language with some useful features.

Microsoft has joined the web design game as well with its own programming languages and Web application framework. ASP is the basic Web language of Microsoft. ASP.NET allows you to build more dynamic web pages on a Windows server.

Other application frameworks have entered the market as well. One popular one in recent years is the open source Ruby on Rails, which is based on the Ruby programming language. Twitter, and a few other popular websites, was built on Ruby on Rails.

So, to answer the question, how many Web languages do you need for Web design? You really only need one. But if you want to build dynamic web pages that are interactive and keep visitors coming back for more, sometimes you need to incorporate several languages into a single web design.

Your first impression is a big deal. And you only get a chance to make one. That’s why your web design has to be top notch, not just good.

There are three types of web design companies:

• Search engine optimizers who also do web design
• Companies that only do web design
• Companies that design killer websites that are SEOd well

While web design is important, it’s not so important that you should forget about search engine marketing. In fact, a good web design actually takes into consideration the latest SEO techniques and tactics with search engine rankings in mind.

In truth, it’s a balancing act. You balance a beautiful image with great rankings. When you play this balancing act well, it will show in increased traffic to your website and your web pages ranking for the important content you want to rank for. It’s a two-tiered system where both parts are equal.

Web design firms that only do web design can make your site look good, but they won’t get you ranked. You’ll end up having to hire an SEO company to make it rank, and sometimes your SEO company has to make changes to the website.

If you hire an SEO to do web design, then you run the risk of a site that doesn’t leave a good impression. There’s no reason you can’t have both good SEO and awesome web design.

There are a lot of great websites that have been designed for businesses, yet many of them forget some of the simpler features that can make or break an online business. One of the simpler tasks you can do is create customized error pages. These are the pages that are shown to visitors whenever there is a problem with your site, or a problem with their search.

For potential customers, there is nothing more uninspiring than to land on a website only to see a “page not found” error, or worse, “server not found”. Think about those errors. A “server not found” error could mean you no longer exist so the visitor will look elsewhere. “Page not found” errors shouldn’t happen. This generally means the visitor has followed a link that arrives on a page that no longer exists. Either that, or the link is badly formed in the first place.

Customized error pages can actually help your visitors.  When customizing, a friendly message that states the page is not available at that time while suggesting alternatives can help direct traffic further into your site. You can also place a search box prominently so the visitor can search your site for content they are looking for.

Traffic is hard to get at the best of times. The last thing you need is to waste any traffic because it is arriving on dead pages. What you should also bear in mind is that if that visitor happens to be one of the search bots, and they cannot find your site, or your pages, then this can have an effect on your position in the search results. There are many website owners who have complained bitterly about being dropped from the front page of the search results, simply because their server was out of action. From the search engine’s perspective, your page could not be found so why include it in search results?

If you are having your website professionally designed, be sure to insist on customized error pages. They can save a lot of hassles.

If you were to lift a website from ten years ago and dump it into today’s internet world, it wouldn’t cut it. Business websites of today can be complicated beasts, or at least, they may seem that way. However, a closer inspection will reveal that their anatomy is actually quite simple.

Today’s business website needs to address several factors. Get the design and mix right, and your website will be the least of your worries. So what factors does a modern website need?

Optimized for search – it goes without saying that search is still the number one source of traffic for most websites – this includes both organic, paid, and local search.

Optimized for social – optimizing for social involves a few simple modifications to a standard website. Social buttons are the first factor to consider. Allowing comments or user feedback should also be considered.

Optimized for the user - uncluttered pages, clear call-to-action triggers, easy to follow navigation, and the ability to communicate with you, the business owner, are all important user functions.

Optimized for the Internet – today’s websites need to be slick, fast, easy to follow, and fairly straightforward. Shopping baskets and checkouts need to be smooth processes that are not complicated by over form filling or confusing processes. Today’s website needs to be streamlined in the way it processes users and their data.

Optimized for information – what is the Internet all about? Information and communication. We have communication covered so all that is left is information, and for a website, that boils down to content. Relevant, unique, up-to-date, easy to read, and of value to users – content is what drives websites and its content that attracts visitors.

Does that sound too simplistic? Perhaps you are trying to over complicate what should be a straight out process. The hardest task in building a website to satisfy everything on that list is the seamless integration of each component. If your web design team can get that right, you website is ready to do business.

They say that first impressions count, and when it comes to website design, it certainly holds true. In fact, since Google’s introduction of the web page preview option in search results, website design has probably become more important. The general theory is that you have less than 30 seconds to convince a visitor to stay on your site – that’s probably down to five seconds when it comes to Google Preview.

A quick check of your website stats will tell you how long traffic is staying on your site. If a high number of visitors stay for less than 30 seconds, and they don’t click through to other pages, then you need to start thinking about why – is it your website design that is at fault? There are a number of issues that you should be analyzing. These include:

• Overall look - does your website look too busy? One of the biggest issues that users complain about is how busy a site looks. From a user’s perspective, they just don’t know where to start.
• Navigation – is your navigation easy to understand and in plain site, or is it hidden towards the bottom of the page?
• Content - visitors come to your website because they are looking for something. Is it there in plain site, or is it hidden in amongst a myriad of ads?
• Advertising - speaking of ads, are visitors blown away by the number of ads that hit them, especially in the ‘above the fold’ section of your website?
• Friendly – how friendly is your website? Does is welcome your visitor and encourage them to stay awhile? Color, graphics, and issues like font size all play a role in making your visitor feel at ease.

While it may seem to be easier and cheaper to create your own website, the reality is often the opposite. If your website is not up to scratch, then it could be costing you money. While a professional website design team may seem costly initially, over time their work will repay you many times over. You’ve got 30 seconds to convince your visitor to stay – does your website achieve that?

We spend a lot of time talking about how to increase traffic to your website, but unless you convert that traffic into customers your efforts are often wasted. I know there are some sites that want traffic purely as online branding and promotional use, but many websites exist because of the business they do through the Internet. It’s your website that converts traffic into customers and it can take a lot of research and trial and error to gain the best conversion rates.

Online business owners can learn a lot from their offline counterparts. One feature of many offline businesses is the concentration on efforts to not win walk-in traffic, but to do everything possible to keep that traffic in the store for as long as possible. Every parent knows about the final marketing trick, the offers made at the point of sale – often targeting children. I notice some supermarkets now advertise checkouts that are ‘child friendly’, that doesn’t mean they don’t have point-of-sale marketing material.

Your website needs to follow the same principles. Once a visitor arrives on your website, you need to keep them for as long as possible. The use of video is popular now for catching people’s attention and increasing their desire for your goods or services. Video production now needs to be a little more sophisticated than in the past, but then, a professionally produced video is likely to have more selling power than a home-produced video.

Content is a website’s prime tool in keeping visitors on their site. However, content on its own is useless if visitors cannot find it. This brings into play your internal link structure, the placement of those links, and the anchor text used to promote those links. This is one area where trialing different placements and different anchor text can result in improved click-through rates.

A professionally designed website that makes use of modern features like video, infographics, and well-written content can work together to keep visitors on your website for longer periods. The longer they stay on your website, the more likely they are to become a customer. When it comes to point of sale offers, don’t be afraid to ask for email details for newsletters.  Is your website helping you to convert visitors to customers?

Looking around at many websites, they appear to have been created two or three years ago, and never updated. The Internet continues to grow and it continues to evolve. If you were to take a snapshot today and compare it with 2006, for example, you would notice quite a few changes. So my question for you today is quite simple – has your website’s design kept up with the latest trends?

What should today’s website look like? That’s a harder question, but I do suggest you consider some of the following:

Page loading speed – How fast (or slow) do your pages load?

Social integration – Social integration goes beyond just social ‘like’ buttons. Including or linking to reviews, incorporating Twitter feeds, allowing comments and linking to sites such as Facebook all help to open up that ‘social’ aspect of your business.

Video – Video has been a major player for several years now, but it is seeing a real growth when it comes to onsite publication on small business websites.

Overall aesthetics – Google Preview allows searchers to preview your site before clicking through. How appealing is your site?

Local Search – If your business services a geographic area, then local search brings requirements of its own. Having your address and telephone number on all pages and perhaps even a local map giving directions to your business will help potential customers find you, and do business with you (they also help you rank higher in local search)

The Internet continues to evolve on an almost daily basis. While your website’s design doesn’t quite need to be updated that often, an annual review is definitely something you should consider – perhaps you could make it one of your New Years resolutions.

What’s the difference between a geek and a marketer? I guess there are a million answers to that question. My thoughts are fairly straightforward – a geek will tinker with code to make a page look good while a marketer will tinker with strategies that convert a page into sales. There are many online business owners that fall into the geek category – their sites look fabulous. But when it comes to marketing, forget it.

Of course, we also have to admit there are a lot of people marketing their businesses well yet their sites are letting them down because they look horrendous. Which camp do you fall into? More importantly, can you do both? Most do-it-yourself online business owners do try all with varying success.  It is possible to do both, but internet marketing is becoming harder all the time. Sometimes, what is important is to understand your limitations and to concentrate on what you are good at.

In the main, online business people, if they come from a business background, are good at sourcing products, good at managing the financial aspects of their business, and often quite adept at the Internet marketing side of the business. Learning to create polished websites, while a handy skill, could actually take one away from what is the real core of their business – getting customers through the door.

Web design is one of those areas that is often best left to those who specialize in that area.  Having a professional custom web design doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg either.  If you were to price your own time at a reasonable rate, and apply that to what could be 20-30 hours of tinkering (if you were to do it), then a professional’s fees will look quite small in comparison. Of course, because of their skill, they can produce decent websites in far less time than most nonprofessionals.

Who is running your business? Are you a geek with a really well-polished website, or are you a marketer who knows how to get the traffic through the door? If you’re both, the best of luck to you!

The cost associated with building an online store can be anything from next to nothing to thousands of dollars, depending of course on how complex it needs to be.  There are alternatives that many businesses are having success with. Google and Yahoo! both offer stores and GoDaddy has a similar setup. You could opt for eBay, Amazon, or perhaps even Buy.com. The latest player that is having a huge influence is Facebook.

A number of questions spring to mind, the first being whether you need to include an online store on your site. With so many options available, wouldn’t it be better to use them instead? This is really a yes/no question since it depends on your product and who your target market is (and where they are).

Facebook is an interesting option. Being the most trafficked site on the Internet, there are potentially millions of customers just waiting for the right products – and they are shopping though Facebook. The potential for viral sales is huge – if you have the right product at the right price.

All that aside, having your own custom designed online site store hosted on your own website certainly adds more credibility to your business. The most successful online businesses are those that utilize a number of outlets, including their own, in such a way that they don’t diminish their own brand. Facebook is definitely worth investigating as are the Yahoo! and Google stores.

The best approach for your business is one that you can manage easily, helps to increase sales, and at the same time helps to promote your business.

Google have announced the introduction of ‘Instant Previews’ in search results and this could, over time, influence traffic numbers to many web sites. The feature allows users to preview the site listed in results without the need to actually visit the site. We all know how quickly web design can affect a user’s opinion of a web site. Put simply, if the user doesn’t like what they see, they will check out the next site listed in the search results. Are they going to like your web site?

All web site owners should, as a priority, check out their own web sites using the instant preview. Just enter a search for a term you know you rank highly on and click on the magnifying glass on the right of your search listing. While you’re at it, check out your competition as well. Put yourself in the shoes of an average Internet surfer – which site would you visit first?

Custom web design will become a key area in the future as web site owners try to outdo each other with striking logo designs and web pages that are easy to navigate and easy to find information on. One of the features of Instant Previews is that the section of the page where the search term exists is highlighted, placing it in context within the page itself.

What makes Instant Previews even more dangerous for those with weak designs is that a user only has to click on a magnifying glass once. From there the user only has to place the cursor over each magnifying glass to see a preview. They can quickly flip between a couple of sites before deciding on the one that suits their needs.

Logos will be important as will color and layout. The quality of your content cannot be underestimated given the focus it will receive for search terms. If you are running a business web site, have a good hard look at your web design – is it time to call in an expert to create a complete custom web design?

Of course, Instant Preview may not catch people’s attention and the effect on traffic and click-through rates could be negligible. While I wouldn’t panic just yet – I suggest you carefully watch your stats over the coming months.

There are always strange things going on inside Google. One can often imagine it looking like a mad professor’s laboratory except, instead of test tubes, it’s computer geeks glued to monitors. The latest offering from Google – mod_pagespeed. As the name suggests, it’s a module designed to improve the load speed of web pages.

The need to consider page speed as a ranking algorithm is a bit of a mystery in a way. Sure, we all want the Internet to burn along at the speed of light – but page speed itself is not a measure of quality. In fact, better quality pages often take a moment longer to load than those spammy made for Adsense content rip-off sites that abound. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be constantly assessing your pages for speed issues.

Pages that have modules that rely on external sources – for example, Amazon product feeds – can be a little slower, especially if Amazon is having a slow day. You will need to assess the value of having these modules against the effect they have on page load times. There is a way around this, however, and that is to look at a page the way a user does.

Your page’s design and the code behind it should be written in such a way that the content appears as soon as possible when loading. Blogs are notorious for having a left side bar that loads before the content. That is fine as long as the content in the side bar is loaded quickly – have one of those Amazon widgets and the main content can be delayed for several seconds. The key in that situation is to move all the slow loading content to the right side bar, or to have your theme written so that the main content is loaded first.

Should you use Google’s mod_pagespeed module? You will need to check compatibility issues; for example, it will only run on Apache 2.2. You will also need to assess whether or not it really delivers any improvements in page load speeds. If it doesn’t then ask whether you really need another layer of software around your site.

One of the most under estimated assets a web site can have is a fast and accurate site search engine.  First impressions count when it comes to web sites, but that first impression can sour quickly if a visitor cannot find what they are looking for. While a well defined navigation menu is important, users are becoming sophisticated and rather than scrolling through a category to find information, they are quite happy to type it into your search window – if you have one.

That is the first big mistake made by web designers – not including at least a very basic site search capability. The second mistake they make is to hide the search window, often buried down near the bottom of the page. Having site search can make a huge change to your site’s performance. Some of the benefits include:

Reducing bounce rates – visitors only have to click through to another page and they are considered not to have bounced.

Increasing page views – a search box enables visitors to find more content related to their needs, thus increasing the number of page views.

Increasing conversions – a simple rationale – the longer a visitor stays on your site, the more opportunities there are to catch their attention. They may not convert today, however, there will be a brand impression left on them and a return visit probable.

Developing authority – the greater the amount of quality content that a visitor is exposed to, the more they will value your site.

Increase brand awareness – the longer a visitor is on your site, the more often they will see your logo, your business name, and the branding details of your site. The more often they see it, the more it will imprint on their memories.

It’s a very simple principle. Make your content easy to find, and your visitors will appreciate it. Make it hard to find and they will find it elsewhere. If you’re a business then you cannot afford to have that potential customer walk away. Be sure your web design includes a well placed site search engine in its web design – your visitors will most likely be looking for it.

Most website design elements do not help you with search engine marketing, but that doesn’t mean that some elements of web design can’t help you. There is evidence that paying attention to website design elements can improve your chances of ranking in the search engines.

The most talked about example of web design and SEO is the use of Flash presentations. While Flash is beginning to be a crawlable element now, this is still a brand new development where search engines are concerned. That means the crawlability of Flash is still limited. I would not build a website that is created entirely with Flash elements.

Other things to consider with web design and SEO are:

• Placement of excessive links in your footer
• The use of excessive code
• Navigation elements
• Using alt tags with graphic and photo elements
• Hidden links and redirects can hurt you in the rankings
• Use an inverted pyramid style for information and presentation elements
• Use external files as much as possible for extraneous code like JavaScript

There are many more ways that web design can affect SEO. You would be doing yourself a favor to learn and study SEO and web design to some reasonable degree before you build your website.

At this juncture in Web history it is pretty commonplace for a business to own at least one blog. I think it will someday be commonplace for many businesses to some day own and operate several blogs. As the Web becomes more and more competitive, there will be more websites and blogs targeting specific niches, and niches within niches. That will undoubtedly make the search and social marketing stakes go higher.

One of the points of differentiation for any business with a website is design. Not only can it distinguish you from the competition, but it can also brand you, your company, and your products. Blog design, of course, is no different.

It has already been established that blog design is important. But does it matter for each blog? Does every blog have to have its own unique design, or can a company have a branded look to which each blog and website under the corporate umbrella must conform? My answer is, of course, yes.

Yes, to both. Either is acceptable.

When deciding on a design look for your blog, keep in mind your company goals. If you want all of your Web properties to have a consistent look for branding effect then that’s an easy decision. But if you want each blog to have its own design and branded look then you’ll have to make some hard decisions for each. Either way can be effective. You just have to narrow down your ideals.

If you look at some of the most popular websites online you’ll find that a lot of them have some things in common. Let’s take a look:

• Google – Long known for its simplicity, Google’s home page is a search box with a couple of links on a white page. Nothing fancy. And Google is a top tier website with one of the highest usage rates in history.
• Twitter – Twitter started off with a very simple design. Just a few months ago they upgraded their web design, but it didn’t change much. It is still simple with its two-column approach.
• Facebook – Facebook might look complicated, but it’s not. There’s a news feed and two sidebars – a right and a left. That’s pretty common these days. The design gives Facebook a familiar look and most users can find what they want with no problem.
• YouTube - YouTube’s design has been simple from the beginning. The current design, while not the original, still employs simple design elements while showcasing some of the best videos in a variety of categories. When you move to channel pages, the design becomes even simpler.

When it comes to web design, it doesn’t have to be complicated. Often, the best designs are simple. Simplicity works.

Web design is very important if you want to achieve traffic and draw people to your brand. But how do you do it? What’s important and what’s not? Today I want to discuss one small aspect of web design – graphics. Are they important?

Graphics are important for one reason and one reason only. They keep your text from being boring.

How many times have you visited a website and seen nothing but text. Did you stick around for long? My guess is, probably not. And the reason is because there was nothing there to draw your attention and hold it.

Text is good. Textual content is a necessity. If all you have are graphics on your website then people will stop and look but then what? Content sells. In other words, the graphics on your website keep people glued, or anchored, to your web page. The content persuades them to take action.

So you can see that content – textual content – and graphics work together to deliver a total user experience. But by graphics I don’t necessarily mean just photos and images. It could also be videos or multimedia presentations. It can be anything that breaks up the text on the page.

So, in short, break up your content with great graphics and watch your visitors stick around longer.

Web design is not as easy as it looks. There are specific mistakes and pitfalls to avoid and specific web design elements that will almost always be preferred over others. Here are 3 bona fide mistakes to avoid when designing your next website.

• Irrelevant information, or information overload – This is a fairly common mistake. You design your website and it looks pretty, but you have put too much information in your site. As a result, it is difficult to read and visitors do not want to spend the time it takes to read every word. Sometimes, less is more. Only say what is absolutely necessary to get the business. Get in, close the sale.
• Lack of visual elements – A web page with nothing but text is boring. Break up the text with images, videos, and other multimedia graphics. Make your pages look interesting and people will stick around longer.
• Complicated navigation structures – Navigation is one of the most important aspects of web design. Make your site easy to navigate and the information easy to find. Otherwise, you’ll lose your visitors.

If you avoid these 3 web design mistakes then you’ll go a long way to improving your website and increasing your chances of closing the sale.

One of the best developments in web design over the years is the technology called CSS. CSS stands for cascading style sheet. With a CSS file you can make updates to your websites in minutes, updates that used to take hours prior to the development of style sheets.

CSS allows you to make changes to your website across an entire section or your entire site. Rather than go page by page to make changes that affect each page of your website, with CSS you can change the element one time and it changes across your entire website. Isn’t that cool?

There are still some web developers who design pages entirely by HTML using tables. This is a very primitive way to design websites, but it can be done. However, I’d recommend using CSS when practical and possible.

With CSS you can influence the following types of changes sitewide with a single update:

• Navigation menus
• Page background colors
• Font styles and types
• Link attributes
• Page layout
• Column width
• Header and footer details
• Mouseover and hover effects
• Special effects like drop shadows and rounded corners

There’s plenty more you can do with CSS. In fact, you can get quite creative with it. If you are designing web pages today then you must consider CSS in your design strategy. Pages built strictly with HTML are quickly going by the wayside.

Simply placing your opt-in box on your website and hoping you get sign ups isn’t a very effective plan. Lots of website owners have found out the hard way. Instead, why not take the time to learn the optimal place for your opt-in box so that you can increase your subscribers and increase your revenue?

Is there an optimal place?

To be sure, it is relative, but that doesn’t mean inconsequential. There have been eye studies that show where most website visitors view a web page and where the human eye is more likely to go. In essence, the two hottest spots on any web page are on the top left and on the bottom right.

So does that mean that is where you should place your opt-in box? Not necessarily.

The general rule of thumb is to put your most important content in the hot spots and fill everything else around them. You want your web pages to “breathe”. That is, you don’t want them cluttered. So make sure there is some white space.

However, you want to make maximum use of the space that you do have. And that means putting your most important content items in the hot spots and placing other items around them ensuring that your overall design is attractive, uncluttered and puts your visitors’ eyes right where you want them most.

Web design is about more than just making your site pretty. It’s also about making it functional – and profitable.