So I saw this website, and it was Awesome!
It is said, beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder. What bothers me is how is beauty defined? I mean I know beauty can vary from anybody to everybody, but I am trying to pin point the thin line of commonality in opinions.
This botheration starts making rounds when I am talking about the beauty of a website.
When in doubt, I ask. So I did ask. What matters is whom did I ask?
I asked the actual visitors and this is what they told me about the factors which influence a visitor to come again, share it, bookmark it. In short consider it beautiful.
Here I am talking about top 8 points which I think should be considered when developing a website.
1. The web seeketh purpose of your existence
The purpose milestone is the one which needs to be travelled to until found. Without it you would do any amount of graphics, any amount of videos will result into nothing. But how should I choose the purpose of my website?
To decipher the purpose of your website, you should get answers to the following questions:
a) What is that you wish to convey through your website?
b) What do you want your visitor to do on the website?
c) What are the goals for your website?
2. Choosing the name and hosting
When choosing the domain name, keep in mind that the name should be able to convey the purpose of the website or if you are going for a brand recall, you should make sure that visitors can actually make out your brand name. It should be short, easy to remember, and easy to type.
I suggest that the domain name should include your primary keyword (your targeted search term). Two obvious reasons are:
a) the domain name is a ranking factor itself that search engines considers while deciding the ranking index
b) having targeted keywords in the domain name is good as the domain name will be used as anchor text when referred by someone else over internet
PS: Using a keyword in your domain name can be helpful however, it might also lead to critical observations by search engines which might result into negative ranking effect — so step carefully 🙂
You could also go for a custom tlds like .biz, .guru, .global, or .news, but please make sure that they would serve the purpose since they are not cheap and can actually cost a ton to buy and then retain.
Hosting is a technical issue and should be taken into consideration very carefully, I would recommend you going with known and well established options since believe hosting problems are the last thing you would want for your website.
3. Intuitive Design
Intuitive designs are always looked forward to, for the simple reason of engagement. Yes! Intuitive designs attract visitors to engage with a website. Not only that intuitive designs cause people to come back also, explore more and further share more.
The idea of lead generation through website will make the web design more intuitive in order to engage their visitors.
Always remember, if you succeed in engaging visitors, your chances of getting their details get hiked.
4. Copy Writing
I wanted to focus on targeted writing. You see there is nothing inadvertent on your website and neither should you leave scope for any.
With that said, I simply wish to highlight the simplistic yet targeted copy writing manner. I have been seeing a lot of posts talking about content marketing under the garb of website copy writing.
They are not the same. However the common thread of commonality does exist yet they differ a lot. An ideal website copy should feature the following
a) Simplicity
b) Target messaging
c) Highly charged call to actions
Effective content should be accompanied by the effective placement of text. Make sure you have given deep thought on user point of view before you actually start placing content.
5. Colors & Graphics
The choice of colors & graphics can sometimes, fail you very badly. Colors have a sense which when conveyed properly can actually first intrigue the person and then can actually excite the person to take a decision.
How do you decide which color scheme to choose? There are many color scheme source on the web such as the one in exhibit below
6. Ease with which we distribute
Every Website requires good distribution channels. Social media has made more than just ripples in terms of distribution. The power to spread which a few years ago lied solely on the content being discovered, has drastically changed.
Every website needs not good, but awesome social media plug-ins for it to be shared effectively. Factors to be taken care while choosing social media plug-ins should be,
a) Ease & Comfort with which the plug-in works
b) It has the ability to remember, yes! Now suppose you had to transfer your website to a different host. Now if your plug-in relied on the data base of your website, it may or may not sometimes pick the same social statistics existing for your website. If it doesn’t , well God forbid!
Some social media plug-ins get you to register with their own website and record all your social data within their own network, which can be easily called whenever required.
c) Many networks required but not all, not all networks are required for your website. Choose wisely
d) The plug-in should also support features like e-mails so that instant sharing at various levels can be achieved
7. Navigation
When I think about navigation, the first aspect that comes to my mind is the ‘ease’. Ease with which the visitors on my website can explore my website and clearly understand what I have to convey & offer. I am listing a few points to make an awesome navigation for your website.
A. Placement for Navigation
Ideal places for navigation are either top horizontal & bottom horizontal or vertical down the left side. Any other place for the navigation can actually miss the person’s eye or maybe even disinterest your visitor.
B. Drop Down Menus
Drop Downs are a pain primarily because as human’s we tend to see quicker than we move our hands to click a particular link.
If we have chosen to click a link, we have made up our mind to explore it. However with a drop down there are further a lot of choices, which to an extent can confuse and further make you indecisive.
C. Overcrowded Navigation
Realize the importance of Navigation which is essentially the ease with which you can explore a website. If however you over crowd the navigation, you take the risk of putting off your visitor’s interest in your website.
D. Footer Navigation
Footer Navigation should be handled very carefully, primarily because the footer is common to your entire website.
i) Links in the Footer section should be wisely chosen and should be prioritized prior to be sent to the footer, since with many links, you risk losing valuable Page Rank (Read Link Sculpting)
ii) Social Icons should be used in the footer to let people explore your social media profiles. Make sure you are not adding too much to it.
iii) Stress on the downloads section. However do not put all downloads, make a page and entice the user to actually go to the download page through your footer section.
8. Responsive Design
Needless to highlight the importance of making your website responsive. I am giving you some of the best practices of mobile responsive websites
- Get rid of non essential content. Imagine and get in line with the person who is viewing your website on his or her mobile. What do you think? would you like to see when viewing the website on the mobile?
- Compression of site elements and content can be done, this will ease it’s transmission across networks.
- Make your images flexible.
- Do not assume, and try to make things better catering to all platforms. Especially if you have an e-commerce website.
- Make your contact form flexible and keep in mind the submit button is very easy to click whether working on a touchpad, scroll pad or touch screen.
Conclusion,
I met a talkative kid while I was flying once, in a not so careless manner he mentioned he liked the internet because it made his eyes go big and round and his head wobble. I wonder whether it was an awesome website which made him say that, nevertheless I remember that every time I see an awesome website.
