Last month (December 2009) I gave a short talk to TWBC Horsham about websites, specifically 5 Tips to Avoid a Woeful Website and I promised to write an article about it, summing up my talk.
Well – I am a bit wordy! – and that article has turned into a series. The first How Can Small Business Optimize Websites? is finished and there are more on the way… who knows maybe when they’re all finished and I’ve had some feedback I could turn them into a short ebook – now there’s an interesting thought!
The main point I make in this first article is to make sure that you know the purpose of your website and the purpose of each page on your site too. That will help keep the focus.
Imagine you have a shop in a huge shopping mall… or you have a website on the Internet… some visitors will know exactly what they’ve come in for and want to complete their business as fast as possible – imagine ‘popping into Boots’ and not being able to find what you’re looking for? SuperDrug here I come! Other visitors will be happy to browse – but even those people browsing will need some directions especially if your website has lots of pages – ever consulted a store directory in a department store (or been irritated when you couldn’t find one?). Thinking about your visitors and their journey through your website will help you design the best website for you and your business, by putting your visitors first… and that comes down to defining the purpose.
Three things I find woeful about websites:
- Website that take too long to load – Yes I have got broadband, but I’m impatient!
- Websites that have spelling mistakes and bad grammar – well, I like words you see – and as a consumer, I’m hard to please
- The ‘it must be there somewhere’ websites where it’s just very difficult to find out what I want to know. Thank goodness for online forums and blogs and all the experts who are better at giving me the information I need than the actual companies – this seems to apply especially to big technical companies, but also applies to small business too (WOEFUL!)
The rest of the series on avoiding woeful websites is ‘in production’. What would you like to see added? Tell me below.
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