Web Design Tips and Tricks

Website Woes: Top Five Offenders

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I see a lot of mistakes, but here are the top five offenders you need to correct to give your site a boost.

Bad Title. Look at the title for each page. The title shows in the top bar of your browser. It is also what shows when you set a favorite or bookmark a site. Plus, the title is what shows in the search engine results. So you want your page title to be a "headline" - something that will make people want to click on it.

Give every page a different title according to its content. Include your keywords or key phrases in the title. Remember, people won't want to click on your company name, unless they're looking specifically for you. Instead, they are more likely to click on key words or phrases that reflect what they're looking for.

"Me" Language. Read each page of your site from your visitor's perspective. It's an eye-opener in most cases. If you want to "see" the impact of this, print the page and using a brightly colored highlighter, go over everything that is about them. You'll be amazed at how little of the page concentrates on the benefits to them.

Visitors don't care about your mission statement - they want to know what you can do for them. They don't care where you went to school or what degrees you have - they do care about why that matters to them. Speak "benefits" not features.

To be sure you are using benefit-driven language, keep asking the question "so what?" For example:
Our site is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
So what?
So that means even at 2am you can access the information and start using it immediately. It means that regardless of where you live around the world, the information is available when you are. 

Repeat this process until you get down to the benefit for the visitor. Then express that on the page.

No email capture process. Make sure you have a way to capture visitors' interest in the form of their name and email address. This means you want to "sell" the benefits of subscribing to your electronic newsletter or tips. You may want to offer a free report or ebook as a "bribe". However you do it, get them to sign up. This is the single most important asset you have online - a good list of people who look forward to hearing from you. And be sure to make it easy to sign up - put a form on every page of your site.

No contact information. Contact information online serves a dual purpose. First, it shows legitimacy. Sites without contact info are "suspect" - are they really a "real" company or a fly-by-night operation?

Second, we've all had the frustrating experience of trying to get in touch with a company and not being able to find their address, telephone or fax number. Be kind to your visitors - put your contact information on every page. If you're not comfortable with giving your street address or city, at least let them know what time zone you are in. If you have an unusual URL, include that. You never know which page your visitor will print and file. You want to be sure they can contact you later.

Slow to load. Finally, be considerate of all of your visitors by keeping your page download time to a minimum. If you're used to a fast connection you may not know the pain your visitors are experiencing. Go to an older computer with a slow telephone connection and visit your site. Try to keep your information on the cutting edge and your technology 2 years behind the curve.

If you take care of these five mistakes, your visitors will be happier, your conversion rates will improve and you'll be more successful online.

Lately I've taken to subscribing to many newsletters and the "free" programs being offered by internet marketers - think Frank Kern, Yanik Silver et al. - and people like Aaron Wall and Shoemoney and that Brian fellow over at Copyblogger.

If you, like me, receive some of these emails, you may have noticed how their sales methods have taken the typical long web page sales pitch and turned it on its side. They've spliced it into emails and videos and feed that info to us in a much more interactive and entertaining manner then the long winded sales pages of old.

So this morning while trying to convince my 21 month old son to go to the park (that's right, to convince him to go to the park) I found that the usual things were not working. That is when it hit me.

Parental persuasion ala Frank Kern

Please note that I have not met nor do I know Frank Kern, and I am only singling him out because his name stuck with me. I suppose this parody below could be recognizable to Jeff Walker's children as well. One last note, I have found the free info they give away as they get you to the offer/pitch/monthly service to be quite valuable.

• Dad: Hey son, want to go to the park with your favorite car and play on the swings?
• Son: No!
• Dad: Oh, did I mention that I found some extra strawberries, your favorite fruit? I figured you would want them and washed some for you. Want to go to the park with your favorite car and play on the swings and have some strawberries?
• Son: My car...? No!
• Dad: We can take the little soccer ball and some balloons. We know you like balloons so we bought some extras last night. Want to go to the park with your favorite car and play on the swings, with the ball and the balloons and have some strawberries? You don't have to do anything, just have fun!
• Son: Balloons...? Where's my car? No!
• Dad: Hey listen. Its 8:00, the street cleaner will pass soon. If we go now we can also see the street cleaner! You love the street cleaner and if we don't go now who knows when he will pass again.. Maybe never! Want to go downstairs and see the street cleaner, then go to the park with your favorite car and play on the swings, with the ball and the balloons and have some strawberries?
• Son: Street cleaner...? Balloons...? Where's my car? Hmm... (asks for shoes, walks over to the car...) No!

• Dad: Listen. If we go down now, we can stop at the bakery. I'll order an espresso (you love the noise from the espresso machine!) and get you some toast and jam (I'll pay; you get this fre.e!) and we can sit at a table outside and watch the street cleaner. Then we can go to the park with your favorite car and play on the swings, with the ball and the balloons and have some strawberries? And one last BONUS: we can stop at the fountain and throw in some rocks!!

  Look, if you don't have fun doing this, later I will take you to the pool.
  YOU CAN"T LOSE!!

• Son: (getting up on the car...) Yes! Lets do it! (makes some vroom vroom noises with the car).

Father and son head down the elevator out to the bakery. Son demands the water fountain in the park so we head straight there, where strawberries are eaten and some rocks thrown in. Then he says "casa" (hey, we live in Spain) and demands to go home. We stop to watch the street cleaner pass by and head home, not having visited the swings, played with the balloon or balls or had breakfast at the bakery.

(Okay, so in the end I also pick on we folks who buy these things - be they live the internet lifestyle products or self-help books - and don't implement them to the fullest :)

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