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Taming Technology ~

It has been said that, ". . .owning a word processor won't make you a great writer, and having web-publishing software doesn't mean that the pages you create will necessarily be attractive, or even usable."  Harsh words, but unfortunately true more often than not.  Taking that a step further, having someone else design, build, and maintain your website doesn't assure it's value either.  Always keep in mind, this is your business, your online greeting card, so you must keep on top of any decisions made in the creation of it.

Most common website frustrations or mistakes are very easy to prevent or fix.  Here are five simple ones to keep in mind:

~ Compelling content
~ Clean navigation
~ Show the way home
~ Size does matter
~ Too much of a good thing is too much

Compelling content.  Yes, people may be coming to your website to learn about you and your products, but these visitors see them through their own point of view.  Websites exist to provide useful and interesting information to these visitors.  If you only present the value of the information from your point of view, why would the visitor want to stay, much less come back again.  Think about watching night time television, specifically a program that also airs commercials.  The whole point of those commercials is to get you to buy their products, but those advertisers purchase air time around specific television programming for a reason.  Would you tune in to just watch the commercials?  No, not likely.  You are there for the value the programming brings you -- even if just entertainment -- but you will often listen to the commercials because you are already there.  You received value from the programming.  Your website needs to be like this also, giving value to the visitor.

Clean navigation.  When a person visits your website, they shouldn't have to work hard to find the information they are looking for.  It should be easy, common sense simple, and no more than two (three at the very most) clicks to get there.  You do want this person to visit you again, correct?  Then you need to make it as easy as possible for your visitors to find what they are looking for.

Show the way home.  Tied closely to keeping navigation clean and easy to follow is always having a link back to the HOME page available.  It's a simple website visitor standard, "...if you're lost, return to home and start over."  You don't want your visitor to have problems getting back to the home page.  In fact, a better design includes a menu bar with links to all of the key pages of your website on each page.  The easier and more pleasant you make the visitor's experience, the higher the probability that the individual will visit again.

Size does matter.  Keep your pages to 2 or 3 screens full of information, or 6 to 8 screens for articles.  And don't make your pages so wide that the visitor has to keep scrolling from side to side to read it's content.  After just a short time of fighting with the scroll bar, most visitors will give up and simply skip reading that section of the website.

Too much of a good thing is too much.  Many website designers look for opportunities to "razzle dazzle" you with using all the sound, movement, flash, etc. available.  And while these items can be fun to view once or twice, they can get on a visitor's nerves quite quickly.  The easiest way to have these design features (if you really like them and they fit with your website message) is to make them visitor controlled.  If you're going to include a flash trailer, make sure the visitor has the option to "skip trailer."  Always keep in mind that depending on the expert you quote, 75% to 95% of all communication is non-verbal.  Make sure the design of your website -- the font, color, pictures, sound, movement, flash, whatever -- are in keeping with the message that you want to communicate.  Very few of us want to communicate the idea of chaos.

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copyrighted © 2006-2008 by Kellie Finley.
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Last website updates ~~~ October 2007

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