How do you avoid having one of the 90% of business websites that don't bring in more business? By understanding and avoiding these seven common website myths that stop your website being profitable:
The home page is usually the most popular page on your website. But most first-time visitors will spend less than 30 seconds reviewing it. So you don't have long to convince them to stick around and explore the rest of your content.
A home page has several important jobs. It must communicate who owns the site and what it's for. It must establish credibility and trust. And, most importantly, it must convince visitors not to leave the site.
Here are five tips for creating an effective home page that sets the scene for first-time visitors:
Some website design schemes make it impossible to know what's a link and what isn't. So visitors end up mousing over text and graphic elements hunting for a link, before they give up in frustration.
Here are three important guidelines for links:
Most people go to a lot of effort to make their home page a welcoming entrance for first-time visitors. But in reality many - if not most - visitors will bypass your home page and enter your website on an interior page via a link in a search engine listing.
When you consider every page on your website is an entrance, you start to view your pages differently. You start to think of every page as a "home" page which must entice the reader to stick around, read the page and, hopefully, click a link to explore your site further.
A good rule of thumb for web pages is to put the most important content "above the fold". But what does this mean?
The term "above the fold" comes from the newspaper industry. Visualise a stack of broadsheet newspapers at a news stand. Because the paper is folded, all you can see is the top half of the first page. This section became known as "above the fold".
Editors realised that in order to sell more papers they had to put the most interesting stories above the fold to attract people's attention.
In website terms "above the fold" refers to the top part of the web page that readers can see without scrolling. Most users will not scroll unless they find something of interest above the fold.
Deep linking is creating a link to an interior page of a website, rather than the home page. Deep links can be found on websites, search engine listings, pay per click ads, and in emails.
Unlike generic links to a home page, a deep link points to a page containing specific information. They are designed to direct readers to additional information that's relevant to the page they're reading.
For example, an article comparing various cars would link directly to each model's information page, rather than the car manufacturers' home pages. This linking of information is central to the philosophy of the World Wide Web.
The implication of deep linking for website owners is that visitors can enter their site on any page.
From my experience many business owners don't realise search engines index individual web pages (not websites) and deliver a list of pages that are most relevant to the searcher's query. Thus, a lot of search engine traffic bypasses your home page.
When people arrive at your site for the first time they have a few questions on their minds, such as:
Visitors scan and skim to make a quick assessment of the page. So you need to include enough information above the fold to provide answers at a glance. Otherwise they'll hit the back button immediately.
The elements visitors use to orient themselves on a web page are:
These elements must work together to communicate quickly and clearly what a page is about and why a visitor should keep reading.
To create good website content you first have to understand how people read on the web.
People don’t read websites word for word – they scan the page looking for the information they want. Therefore your website content should be written for scanners:
Here are some alarming statistics for every business owner and marketing manager who is responsible for building or managing a business website:
A report released by Sensis in August 2007 stated that:
Source: Sensis e-Business Report - The Online Experience of Small and Medium Enterprises
What this means is only one in 10 websites delivers a profit-generating benefit to the business. In other words, 90% of websites just sit there and do nothing! That's right… no sales leads, no new customers, nothing.
You'll win much more business if you show your target audience how you can solve their problems.
What's the one thing every person is interested in? The weather? Politics? Health? Sport? Religion? Shopping? Sex? Money? While many people are interested in some of these things, not one of these topics holds universal interest.
The one thing that everybody on the face of the planet is interested in is…