By Dee Power
When designing a website, especially an e-commerce website, it is very important to keep your visitors in mind. Since these visitors are potential customers, you need to do everything you can to hold their interest and make the sale.
Tip number one. Elements such as animation, flashy banners, scrolling text, pop-up windows and sound are not recommended for a business website. These things are very distracting and will make it hard for your visitors to concentrate on the product or service you are offering.
Individuals with slower connections will probably go elsewhere if they have to wait for these elements to load. Scrolling text will present a problem to those who read at a slower pace than the information is being delivered. All of these things can result in a loss of return visits or sales.
Tip number two. When designing a website it is also important remember to make your information easy to find. Put as few clicks between your potential customer or visitor and the information you provide as possible. This will go along way in increasing your profits and traffic.
Basic welcome pages that do not provide relevant information should not be included as part of your website. If all the page says is welcome with a short paragraph, don”t use it. In regard to text, it is recommended that each page of your site should contain at least 400 words. Shorter pages can easily be combined, in a logical manner, using sub-topics.
Tip number three. Include a simple menu and an easy way to navigate back to your home page, on every page. You need to remember that many of your visitors will not be computers savvy. Some will not be aware of the “back button”, located at the top of their browser.
Visitors expect the navigation bar to be at the top of the page under your header graphic and/or on the left hand side of the page. Some website masters suggest that links to the major pages of your site also be included at the bottom of every page so there is no scrolling all the way back up to the top.
You need to provide every visitor with the easiest way to “toggle” through your information. It is highly unlikely that they will choose to bookmark your website if it is difficult to navigate.
Use a design that is appropriate for your subject and keep special effects to a minimum. Load time should be short. Keep your design easy to navigate.
About The Author
Dee Power is the author of several nonfiction books. More website design information is available at http://www.businessplan-basics.com and http://www.capital-connection.com
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