Your business website should be the definitive go to resource for all public information about your company.

In many cases, a company’s website is what makes the initial and lasting impression on new or potential customers. Websites have allowed businesses and organizations to go global and become available around the clock, yet without a creative, professional web design, the business could appear lackluster or unqualified. The following are a few key components that should appear on every website:

Contact Information

On many websites, contact information is buried in fine print on the bottom of the page or contained on a hard-to-find page. This requires users to hunt for information that should be prominently displayed. Place your phone number and/or email address in the page banner or just below the logo, making sure that visitors’ eyes are drawn to this valuable information. On a separate “Contact Us” page, include all important mailing addresses, emails, phone numbers, and even instant messaging contact names. Also consider having a feature on the contacts page where users can send emails directly from the website.

Professional Web Design

The appearance of a website speaks volumes about a company or organization. Today’s savvy web users can spot a poorly constructed website a mile away, which reflects on the owner’s competence and professionalism. Through the use of professional web design software or the help of an expert, websites can become vibrant, interactive, and sleek by including Flash plug-ins, Java applets, and a user-friendly structure. First impressions are important when attracting new visitors to a website, so make your web design look professional.

Press Releases and Recent News

This is an opportunity for you to brag on your website about what your company or organization has been doing recently. Sharing this information draws traffic and attention to your website and also instills confidence and legitimacy in the company.

Blogs

Blogs are a great way to add a personal touch to the website and inform visitors with up to the minute changes and news. Blogs are efficient because they can quickly relay information to visitors without having to make changes to the overall website, and they provide a platform to ask for feedback or respond to complaints. In most cases, blog features can be updated easily from any computer, making it a simple way to reach out to your website’s visitors.

Social Media Links

Use the power of social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube to drive web traffic and showcase information. Setting up and maintaining Facebook and Twitter accounts are incredibly easy and they provide you with everything you need to link your account to your website. Announcing special offers and posting product demonstration videos on social media sites has become the hottest trend in cyber-marketing, so make sure every visitor to your website is enticed to become your friend or follower on other social media sites.

Downloads

Think about what information is requested the most by your customers. Whether it is a location map, pricing guide or instruction manual, have the file posted as a PDF and available for download as a convenience to your visitors.

Frequently Asked Questions

The more information that is provided on the website, the fewer phone calls and emails you will receive inquiring about information that should have already been addressed. Serious brainstorming should go into thinking up the questions and responses in the section, making sure each response is clear and straight forward. At the end of the page, direct users to the Contacts page if any questions or concerns still exist.

Case Studies, Portfolios, Work Examples

Depending on your line of work, your website can give visitors a glimpse into the services or work you have done in the past. Reviews and recommendations can only say so much about what you do, so consider letting your work speak for itself by displaying it on your website.

Resources and Links

While your main concern is keeping visitors at your website, sometimes it is not feasible or practical to have every link on your website. Design a page that only contains highly reputable resources and make sure to update the links as they change to keep your visitors on the right track.

EVERYTHING!

If you want your website to be effective and efficient, it must contain everything a visitor would be looking for. There is a fine balance between being concise and complete, but never make the user have to look elsewhere for more information. The more complete the web design, the more satisfied your visitors will be, and happy visitors make good recommendations.

The process of finding a domain name for yourself or your company does not seem like it should be complicated. The details involved in establishing a domain name can become confusing, especially if you are unfamiliar with them. However, this should not discourage anyone from starting their own website. There are some basic guidelines to follow and general information that will help get you started.

Decide on a domain name

First you need to come up with a domain name you would like to use. Ideally, this would be your company name, but it is possible that a site with that domain has already been registered. You may be able to register part of the company name, or something related to your business. You may be able to use your company slogan as a domain name, but make sure to keep the name as short as possible. You want people who are searching for your business to find your website easily, and passing along the website will be easier if the domain name is simple and easy to remember. Keep in mind that people will need to type the name of your site as your email address as well. The whole idea of having a website is to make your business more convenient to your customers, so keep the domain name simple. You will also want to include any keywords that you want your site to pop up on search engines with, which will allow you to find new customers online.

Register the domain name

Once you have found a domain that will work for you, you need to register it. There are a number of sites that will assist you in finding and registering your domain name at a reasonable price. However, be wary of some of these sites. Some companies offer all-in-one deals which include domain registration, hosting, and web design. This usually allows someone else to register your domain name under their name. This enables them to hold onto your domain name, even if you want to take down the website. Be sure to read the fine print in the contracts when you register your domain name. One site that will register your domain for you at your request is Korby Domains, a sister site of Korby Imagery.

Top level domain

When registering your domain name, you will ideally want to get the .com address, because it is the most widely used top level domain for websites (other TLDs include .org or .net). It is easier for clients to remember, as well. However, when you register your domain name, you may want to purchase similar or matching domain names to prevent others from taking them.

Cost of registering a domain name

If you are the first to register a domain name, it is less costly to you. Depending on who you use to establish your domain name, it can be registered for as low $1.99 a year. If someone else has registered your domain name already, you may be able to buy it, but the person who owns it can charge whatever they want to. For instance, in 2009, the domain Insure.com sold for $16 million, and prices that high are not uncommon (you can check out other pricey domain names at http://most-expensive.net/domain-name).

Beware of domain buying bots

There are bots that purchase domain names that have been viewed but not purchased. If you add a name to your cart and do not purchase it, someone else will. So the best way to eliminate competition from similar sites (or confusion from people trying to find you and getting directed to a different site) is to buy these domain names so no one else can.

Register the domain in your own name

Register the domain name in your own name under your business name. By registering under your name, you have the power to make decisions about your website. You will also want to register for as long as you can. The maximum period of registration is ten years (though most companies renew on an annual basis), and is renewable after that point. You need to be aware of when you need to pay to continue using this designated web space, because if you do not renew, the domain name can be registered to anyone else. As long as you keep up with the renewal payments, the domain name can be yours for as long as you’d like.

Once you have initially registered your domain name, it will be available for use within 72 hours. Keep in mind that your domain name needs to be simple, and make sure you register it in your name. Once you have registered your domain name, just keep up with the renewal fees to ensure you remain online. If you need any assistance, find a good website (such as Korby Imagery) to help with you with the process.

When starting up a website for your company or business, it is important that it is dynamic and easy to use. These days, there are so many websites out there that do not meet these standards of quality. A website of poor quality increases a company’s chances of becoming a failure. Therefore, it is important that a website has the necessary features in order to be of great service to its visitors.

Professional Design

A professional design is a must have feature in order for a website to be a success. If you have some knowledge about CSS and HTML then the process of designing a website template may not be an arduous task. However, if you are new to website design, then you may want to hire someone to complete this task for you. A professional website template and interface will have positive effects on your visitors. People are more likely to sift longer through a website that has a user friendly design.

About us or FAQ

The one feature that no website should exist without is an about us page. Not all websites are that easy to comprehend at first, so it is a good idea to write a short “about us” page that will inform visitors on what your site is about. Include the purpose of your business and some background information as well. By providing this information, visitors are more likely to trust your business. A business’ contact information should also be included on the website. This information is very important and is usually separate from the “about us” page.
Whether a site is focused on selling items, providing answers to questions, or offering a service, it is vital that there is a site search feature. This is a little search engine widget that will allow visitors to search for the exact items or answers that they are looking for. This search engine is unique in the sense that searches pertain only to the content on your site. It is a good idea to include this feature near the top of all of your pages.

Site search and resources

A help resource is an important feature that all websites should have as well. If you want to save both time and money then be sure to take the time to develop a customer support section. This is especially helpful if you have a great deal of visitors. First, brainstorm all of the questions that you think visitors will frequently ask. Don’t worry about including every possible question because the list will become longer and more distinguished with time. Eventually, you will get numerous email about a certain issue and then you will know to include the answer to that specific question.

Downloads

If your site offers a certain feature, then it is a good idea to include some free downloads. These downloads will draw in more customers and will keep them returning to your website for longer periods of time. Free downloads are not usually important pieces of software, but provide users with a sample of what that software has to offer.

Switching from a custom designed website to a CMS or Content Management System like WordPress can have many benefits. SEO, easy updates, having a blog as part of your website and not having to buy software are a few. A huge benefit is keeping the content separate from the design. You can change the design later without changing the content too much, thereby not affecting your search engine rankings or inbound links. The best part is you can still have a customized design.

There are a few things you should know before deciding to switch to a WordPress CMS, especially if you have purchased Dreamweaver to edit your site in-house.

This is a brand new site.

Your website will be different.

Nothing will remain of your old site.

Editing and file management will change.

Images and linked documents will be handled differently.

You don’t need Dreamweaver anymore.

New hosting may be required.

There is a learning curve.

Are we clear?

Good.

Be aware that your file structure may change. If your pages were all at the root level before, they will be in an organized file structure with WordPress. This means old links will need to be updated and some pages may need to be placed differently or go away altogether. All pages now can be one click away from the home page through the drop down menu navigation.

The way you create page-to-page links will change. The ability to browse for a page or drop a target on a page to make a link are gone and will be missed. Instead, open a second browser window or tab to the page you want to link to and copy the url from the address bar. In the edit window of the page you are creating the link from, select the text, click the link icon, paste the link.

Images and linked documents will be handled differently. If you use numerous PDFs or other attached documents that need to be removed from the server regularly, this needs to be made clear up front. One folder can be set up to contain all linked documents to make clean up easier. If you do not set this up from the start it will not be easy finding and deleting old files because you no longer have the option to find orphan files or broken links. These features of Dreamweaver I would really like to see built into WordPress.

You will no longer have to open Dreamweaver for every little change. You can make changes through the admin panel by logging into your web browser. This is good news for people who have had to drive to work through bad weather just to post the weather cancellations. The admin panel is easy to use but has a slight learning curve. It is closer to Word than Dreamweaver, but resist the temptation to revert back to Dreamweaver.

Adding images is easier. With WordPress you can easily add images or image galleries.

It is easy to add pages and posts. You will be able to do most edits on your own. Navigation is still handled differently from website to website, but you may by able to add new links to the navigation on your own just by adding a page.

The home page of your website is probably one the most important page of your website. It’s the page that most of your visitors will come to when they find you and so its need to be very well designed to give an excellent first impression. The design of your home page needs to communicate what your website is all about in 5 seconds flat. If it fails to do this you are going to loose visitors.

One of the things your home page should have is all your important points or “hooks” as they are called above the fold. These are the things that should work in order to hook your customer into purchasing from you. All the eye catching graphics and information should be above the fold and clearly visible. Many visitors won’t bother to scroll down the page if they think it’s not worth their time. Placing important information above the fold ensures that your visitors don’t conclude that your website is not what they are looking for.

Many visitors are going to access whether or not your products and services are any good just by visiting your home page. If they feel that your home page is not well designed and not professional they are not going to do business with you. This is despite the fact no matter how good your products may be. This makes it all the more important that you spend more time on your home page.

Your home page should be able to steer up interest in your products and services. It should motivate the visitor to click on your other pages and see what you are offering. Also all special offers, discounts and limited time offers should be the first thing that grabs the visitor’s eye when they arrive at your homepage.

Did you know that 99% of people who visit your site will make a decision to stay on your site within four seconds of clicking on your link! People who surf the internet have a short attention span, usually when they visit your website one of the things that makes them stay on and go through a website is the graphics and layout of your website. Even people who are non technical can spot an unprofessional looking website and decide to move on. Since pictures speak a thousands words the way your website is designed will mean the difference between retaining the attention of those thousand visitors or simply loosing them.

Over the years the importance of good web design has increases especially with thousands of websites coming online each and everyday. People have so much information to sift though that they don’t have the time to read your text and what you have to say, you can only get them to do that if your website does the following things:

1. Loads fast enough so that they don’t click the back button on their browser.
2. The theme and design of your website reflects the niche you are targeting. So for instance if you are a financial consultant and your website graphics look like a cartoon website you are going to loose visitors.
3. Once you have your visitor’s attention your website now has to be easy to navigate. If people cant find the buttons to get to where they want to be they don’t care how ecstatic your website looks because they will leave.

A majority of websites simply cease to exist because they don’t get enough traffic. Even high budget businesses fail because they are unable to retain their visitor’s attention online. So it’s only common sense that you get a professional who understands how good web design works in order to design your website and tune it for maximum performance.

Web accessibility defines a set of rules which when implemented will make a website user-friendly for people with disabilities that prevent them from browsing the web normally. Not all but some countries do have web accessibility laws but how stringent these laws are varies from country to country. Talking about the United States, there are no laws as such that binds corporations to make their website compliant with web accessibility norms. However, the government and government-supported organizations are supposed to abide by Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1998. Private business concerns need not follow these. In the UK, however, the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA) states that any organization that provides goods or services online is legally obligated to make their sites accessible by disabled people.

Even though there is no strictness as such from the legal perspective in most countries to follow web accessibility norms, it is important for the organizations that are planning expansion in their respective fields of business to ensure that their website(s) are designed and developed keeping the web accessibility norms in mind. It makes good business sense as quite a few people suffer from disabilities and they definitely are potential customers for businesses selling products and services online.

Web accessibility permits easy access to people with all abilities and disabilities that include physical, speech, visual, auditory, cognitive and neurological impairments. A meaningfully coded site with useful links can make a great difference. The chief objective of web accessibility is to offer access and opportunity to those who, in spite of their disabilities, can take part in and benefit from the internet at equal levels.

Globally, there are millions of people with disabilities. Today, internet plays an important role in providing information and services related to all key aspects of life like shopping, education, recreation, healthcare and others. With websites following web accessibility norms disabled people will be able to actively participate in the online world.

Web accessibility can substantially benefit your company too. If you are engaged in e-commerce, you can tap huge market potential that the web accessibility can provide you with. For an additional 10% cost, you can improve targets for your website. If you let your site be easily accessible, you would only make it user friendly and formulate criteria so other companies may be able to make their web initiatives standards compliant and user-friendly.

To make a website accessible, there are seven components that must be kept in mind. These include content, web browsers and media players, assistive technologies, users’ knowledge and experience about web, developers, and authoring tools. Web accessibility helps a company get more loyal customers by ensuring that their websites are easy to access. Companies can also avoid legal complications by following the web accessibility norms which have become law for many businesses. One can easily check or test accessibility of one’s website through the following link – http://wave.webaim.org/.

Test your site for accessibility now

The best approach to make your website follow web accessibility rules is to hire a company that knows about it all. You can simply hand over your web design and development project to them.

Designing is an integral part of websites that involve using flash animations, graphics, text and other elements. A lot of website owners don’t know is that too much of designing can weigh down your website, especially using software like flash. Basically using flash can result in a lot of search engines not being able to index the site as they are unable read Flash format at all. Flash can lead to a lot of other problems in the website too, and you should be aware of these factors before using it. This article discusses a few.

It’s slow.

Long load time makes your visitors cry.

It has been seen that flash can get the CPU to become heavy and makes it very slow. So, you can imagine the extent of reduction of speed for your website. Flash restricts different usability and creates other problems too. Replicating usability interfaces in flash can be a tedious task. There are buttons and scroll bars everywhere that make the process more confusing.

It’s annoying.

The loading time with flash is very high and this can make users impatient. The longer time your site would take to load, the fewer customers would revisit it. Longer time in loading also means loss of time for the user and hence they would prefer avoiding seeing it once, let alone visiting again.

It’s expensive.

Complexities of the flash pieces also exist because these are not pictures that you can cut and paste with animation filters. Flash sites require specialized skills and are not affordable for organizations with limited budgets. Why get into frivolous expenditure when search engines don’t prefer it. It is best to not use flash for the sake of creating something different for your website. Flash should be used only if the website formatting and structure demands it.

It’s not accessible.

Using Flash wisely can enhance the visual appeal of the site making it very welcoming for the users. But a complete Flash-based site can lead to huge business losses as it would mean poor search engine rankings and hence less traffic. Another factor that you should remember is that with the facility of accessing websites on your mobile phone, you would further restrict the usability of your website by using Flash. This is because Flash is not mobile friendly and all those who are using mobiles for accessing the internet would not be able to access your website, or at least get an impression that you might have imagined.

Search engines hate it, too.

A lot of individuals use Flash on the splash page but fail to understand that this makes their site look outdated. Technically, splash pages had gone out of vogue now. Your home page should be focused on providing information about the website, its contents, additional features, etc. Flash can just prove to be useless for your website, and in some cases it can cause more harm than good, as stated by most search engines.

To summarize Flash does not provide you with any additional benefits, but can only add to the size of the website. It reduces the speed of the website, wastes user time, and most importantly does not add any value to your website, physically and even financially.

Navigation structure of a website is very important for its success. Success of a website means that the users are comfortable using it i.e. they know where to go when they land on the home page. A weak navigation structure can make the user frustrated and reduces the time which a user spends on it.

Handling your site navigation is vital because you would not want a website that appears clustered or confusing to those who visit it. This would simply mean that if your navigation bar is standard, then users will be familiar with it, and they would be able to access the site without much trouble. However, using tools or navigation bars that are relatively confusing would make your site more complex for the users.

Website links must be well organized. Links of all main sections like About Us, Services, Portfolio and Contact us etc must be placed on top navigation bar. Other important links can appear on left navigation suitably. The name of the links must be clear. Don’t place important links on bottom navigation as the users might miss important sections.

One of the suggested techniques is the CSS dropdown menus that are good for SEO purposes too. Hence, you should try and implement the navigation structure in the site accordingly. It is suggested to keep the navigation consistent on all pages so that the user does not have to continuously search for buttons or alternatives for using them. It has been seen that a lot of website owners keep too many links for top level. However, having too many links at the top level would only make the website more complex and clustered for the user. As an alternative, drop downs should be used because they are easily understood and standardized. It should be remembered that a clean layout and neat navigation provides ample white space and enhances the features of your website.

To avoid such errors try and make the site navigation ready before designing to prevent the cluttering of the forgotten links later on. Try to keep a site map or section contents to help the user. Make the navigation flexible to accommodate additions of pages on a periodical basis. Using drop-down menus or section home pages becomes mandatory in such cases. Try to position the main links together or try to create a separate home or splash page if you like intensive graphics.

Search features is quite user-friendly and a must have for websites with many pages. The visitors can simply type a search keyword and find relevant information. This also helps you track what your visitors are looking for. You can also have textual links within the web content of your website. If placed strategically they benefit both users and search engines. They are a perfect way to help end users cross reference information and also increase the click through rate of the website that helps enhance rankings. By keeping these few web navigation tips in mind, you can surely enhance the usability of your website.

Overview

These are the days of e-business where more and more people are turning to Internet for their buying needs.  As a result, the number of websites is increasing in leaps and bounds. With so many sites competing with each other, your need is to draw the attention of the net surfers to your website and convert their visit into a business opportunity.  How will you be able to increase the traffic of visitors on your site in order to increase your sale, whether it is a product or service. What will attract people to your website? Doing business on Internet is very interesting as well as rewarding provided you keep in mind the below-mentioned points.  We will try and give you an insight on how to optimize your business on Internet, through your website. Usability is very important and you are advised to never ignore or overlook this simple fact.

Your main objective is to first take steps to increase the traffic on your website and the second objective should be to retain the customers and clients who visit your site. Usability quotient should always be considered and it should also be your priority. Make sure you are able to wise up the users once they visit your site. This is possible only if your message on your website is clear, your product is good and you are able to deliver on your promises. This article discusses some important website usability guidelines.

Navigation

Your website should be simple, straightforward and uncomplicated. People should find your website easy to navigate. The more complicated you make your website the more people will avoid coming to your site. These days you have to value your client’s precious time.

Navigation needs to be consistent, clear and intuitive. You must understand that web users don’t have much patience so it is important to have clear cut navigation. Most importantly, all navigation links must work. Having a sitemap also helps users especially if it is a large website with numerous sections and subsections. Planning of website architecture is a must and must involve expertise.

Content

Your message should be easy to understand. Instead of confusing people with redundant information your main objective should be to tell them what your site is all about from the home page itself.  Make them understand (as much as possible) the meaning of the entire deal/ product/ services in very simple, interesting and attention grabbing ways and means. For example, if you are selling a product try and focus on one product at a time instead of giving them various options. This will confuse your client. Try and give as much information about the product as you can in order to allow the customer to arrive at an informed decision to make the purchase without any hesitation.

Readability of your site also needs attention. The content on the website must be well-written, well-presented and useful.  You cannot afford to have language errors or wrong facts if you want to impress you users. Text presentation is also important. Use suitable fonts that are easy to read. Long paragraphs can discourage readers from reading. Bold, large fonts and italics can be used to emphasize on important content. Also pay attention to headings, bulleted lists, and text spacing.

Website Design

Design and layout of the site is equally important as good content. It is the first thing that catches users’ attention and must be simple, straightforward and uncomplicated. The main pages of the site should not be hidden deep inside. They should be not more than three clicks away. The website layout should be consistent and the look and feel must match the website theme.

Use of Colors

Colors should be used very carefully on the website. Stick to blues and grays for a corporate look while pinks and yellows can be used for a funky site. Again website background colors also need attention. Soft and vibrant colors can be used for a site related to kids.

eCommerce website

An eCommerce website needs careful planning as it needs to display content and products both. Make sure that content and product images must complement each other. Their presentation and website layout is also equally important. It must have a customer support feature. Important information such as pricing and shipping must be clearly displayed and not hidden. Product images must be clear. Shopping cart must function well and must support all commonly used credit cards. Inform the readers that shopping on the site is completely secure and that their information is safe.

Other Key Aspects To Impress Your Website Users

Honesty and Transparency Pays

Never take your clients and customers for a ride. Transparency and honesty is paying and rewarding. Always deliver what you promise, never give your customers a chance to complain or doubt your company’s integrity. Never compromise on quality, whether it is a product or a service. Your clients should get what they see on your website. This creates customer loyalty and people will start re-visiting your site at regular intervals. They will also propagate your website name and page name to their near and dear ones. This word of mouth publicity is the best thing that can happen in an online business. Your sales will soar and your income, needless to say will increase manifold.

Client is the Boss

Your website should contain information from client’s perspective. Try and entertain and if feasible incorporate (in the website) suggestions of your client. This will give you loyal clients and customers. You are advised to value their time. It is therefore recommended that you have simple and easy-to-navigate websites. The moment the client finds your website to be a little confusing, he or she will leave your website immediately without doing any business on your site and in all probability will never re-visit your site again. Try to develop a rapport with each your users/clients by having useful and interactive content, customer support, live chat, prompt replies.

Update your site on a regular basis

This is another very important factor that has a direct bearing on your sale and increase in traffic. Your site should have latest and up to date information; the message and information should never be obsolete. In case you have outdated information on your site then you can be sure that people will never visit your site again. It is very irritating to know after going through the site that the information that you have just read is obsolete and outdated. It is therefore recommended to keep updating your site on a regular basis and always provide the latest information to your clients and customers. This is of utmost importance. One of the easiest ways to do this is with regular blog posts.

Conclusion

There are many people who have been earning a lot by doing business on Internet and they succeed because they follow these simple usability tips. Don’t forget to test for usability. If you want to prosper online, it is advised that you follow the above-mentioned guidelines as a thumb rule. You can earn a decent amount if you do business on Internet provided the basic rules are followed. You will also prosper the way others have flourished and prospered in this business.