If you’ve been involved in the design of your company’s web site, you probably already know how difficult it can be to convey the type of website design you want.Website design is a matter of personal taste. What one person finds attractive and professional, you may not and vice versa. Oftentimes, what you want is a matter of “I’ll know it when I see it,” but unless your graphic designer is a mind reader, that’s not enough information to assure you’ll get what you visualized in your own head.

Below is a list of questions to help you solidify in your own mind and communicate to your website designer the look and feel you believe would best represent your company.

Website Design Questions

• Do you prefer website designs that contain many different colors

(<http://www.reductionengineering.com/> as an example) or designs that use

fewer colors (<http://www.reissbuilt.com/>, for instance)?

• Do you prefer bright colors (as on http://www.hmroyal.com/>) or muted

colors (as on <http://www.reissbuilt.com/>)?

• Do you prefer website designs that have white backgrounds behind

the text (like <http://www.isternplastics.com/>) or colored backgrounds

behind the text (such as <http://www.purgeusa.com>)?

• Do you prefer sites with black type for the main text (such as

<http://www.reliable-resins.com/>) or those with colored type for the main

text (like http://www.naturalgas-electric.com/)?

• Do you prefer website designs with a horizontal layout (such as

<http://www.rotomachines.com/>) or a vertical layout (like

http://www.elmonteplastics.com/)?

• Regarding navigation, which button locations do you prefer - horizontal across the top, down the left (as on <http://www.dbi-global.com/>) or the right side

(http://www.elkayplastics.com), in blocks (as on <http://www.be-ca.com/>),

or a combination of some horizontal and some vertical (as on

<http://www.jomarcorp.com/>)?

• Do you want a straightforward, rendering of the logo,

or would prefer something with more color gradation or artistic treatment

(<http://www.utility-savings.net/> as an example)?

• Does your company have a motto or tagline that should be incorporated into the design?

• If yes, do you prefer the site tagline in a straightforward, headline-style format or do you prefer a more stylized format (as on

<http://www.evidencebags.com/> or <http://www.tecpapersdigital.com/>)?

• Some sites have faded terms related to their businesses embedded in

images (<http://www.unitedpolychem.com/> and <http://www.pilotfishseo.com/>,

as two examples) -Do you like this technique?

• Do you prefer sites with actual product images (as on

<http://www.elmonteplastics.com/>), or those with stock photographs that

evoke specific responses, such as a sense of dependability or

professionalism (<http://www.hmroyal.com/>, for example)?

• Do you prefer website designs with straightforward, realistic photographs of

products or those that contain artistically altered images of products

(<http://www.airpowerusainc.com/>, <http://www.rotomachines.com/> and

<http://www.evidencebags.com> are examples)?

• Do you prefer to have your product images on the left side (as with

<http://www.firestonepolymers.com/>), along the top (as with

http://www.polysort.com/ntm/index2.html) or down the right side (as with

<http://www.airpowerusainc.com>)?

• Are there any logos for industry quality, certification programs or

association memberships that should be part of the site’s design? (See

<http://www.hmroyal.com> for example)

Of the sites you viewed above, please provide feedback on the following questions:

• Which sites from the list of examples do you like best? And why?

• Which do you dislike the most? Why?

• As you review the sites, which company logo placements do you feel are the most appropriate for your company?

• Which color schemes do you prefer, as you look at these sites? And why?

• Which color schemes do you absolutely hate? Why?

• Are there any other web sites that you have seen that you like or feel demonstrate the style of design you prefer?

Answering each of these questions will go a long way in helping your graphic designer to create a website design that satisfies your graphic sensibilities.

By Angela Charles
Angela Charles is president of Pilot Fish, a website design and SEO firm based.

Whether your advertising streams concentrate on PPC, SEO, newsletter advertising, or a combination of these and any other advertising models, the landing page is one of the most important factors to consider. Primarily, the landing page needs to closely match your visitors’ requirements but it also needs to be set up to convert and persuade those visitors to take the desired action. A desired action can be anything from signing up for a free newsletter or offer to making a purchase - a landing page should lead visitors towards this conclusion.

Meeting Visitors’ Needs Through Page Relevancy

The landing page needs to be relevant to those that visit it. This means researching your visitors and, specifically, what they are looking for. Search engine visitors can be more difficult to read, especially if they have arrived via a long-tail or non targeted keyword. However, the inclusion of SEO and PPC keywords identifies to the visitor that they are on the right page and that the page offers the information they want.

Page relevance has been mentioned within various Internet marketing discussions, and it’s important in landing optimization too. The landing page has to be as relevant as possible to the ad or link that directed a user to that page. When setting up PPC ads, banner ads, and article ads, this should be a simple concept. You know the keywords and you know the content of the ad that led your visitors to that page.

Page relevancy only becomes more of an issue for SEO campaigns. While you undoubtedly target certain pages to specific keywords, visitors have a nasty habit of using completely different keywords and still finding your page. The positive about this is that the keyword they use is more than likely found somewhere on that page, even if it is buried deep in the text.
The underlying moral is that the more relevant the page, the more targeted the visitor and the more targeted a visitor, the more responsive they will prove to be.
Stand Out From The Opposition With Your USP

Identify your USP, or Unique Selling Proposition, and package it so that your visitors can’t live without it. A Unique Selling Proposition is the one thing that makes your service stand out from the service of your competitors. It can be anything from cheaper prices to a personable service to a bunch of free giveaways.
The USP has to offer an advantage to your user. Better profit margins is not something that will attract people to purchase your products. Competitor analysis and market research are vital components to identifying your USP. You need to have intimate knowledge of your own product and service, as well as a similar level of knowledge of your competitors. Identify the stand out reason, or reasons, that make your website the best choice.

Once identified, the USP should become one of your biggest selling points. It should be identified and clearly defined early in the landing page copy and reiterated at an appropriate time later in the page. If you can include it as part of the tag line to your company or advertising campaign then that’s all the better.
Keep Your Visitor’s Attention By Beating The Fold

Beat the fold. In website terms, the fold is the bottom of your web page that is viewable without having to scroll. You should attempt to get all of the most important information across before the fold gets in the way. Another particularly nasty habit that modern surfers tend to adhere to is laziness. In many respects it’s our fault, as Webmasters, too.

We’ve created a virtual world where information is available at the click of the button. We’ve introduced and helped popularize features like video streaming that make information even easier and quicker to access. The result is that visitors take this speed and ease for granted. Clicking the scroll button may not seem a particularly testing action, but it is one that many of your visitors will avoid.

Fortunately, help is at hand in the shape of best practice web content writing. It is considered honest, reliable, and decent (as well as more effective) that you should summarize the contents of a page within the first paragraph. In fact, within the first short paragraph. Legitimately, and without going into finer details, we read and digest information on a computer screen much slower than from paper and to make allowances, landing page copy needs to be direct and use shorter sentence and paragraph structures.
Record Results And Test Changes
A good landing page is an effective one that converts visitors to customers or persuades them to complete your desired action. So, test your page. Get a good analytic package that includes masses of information and keep an eye on results. Make slight alterations rather than huge changes or blocks of changes - test the new page and then repeat the change and test process again until you get the best possible conversion rate.

Reduce Outgoing Links To An Essential Minimum

Don’t link out to too many pages and even try to minimize the number of navigation links you have above the fold. Links and navigational links are designed to stand out from the rest of your content and, you guessed it, surfers are easily distracted. Don’t go out of your way to move the navigation menu on landing pages, but if you’re designing a site from scratch try to keep those pesky and distracting elements down to a minimum (and that includes Flash pages).

Offering Incentives To Buy
If all else fails, offer an incentive. Give something away that offers true value. Offer a discount on larger orders or free shipping on all orders. Yet again, we go back to the irritating habits of surfers and consumers and one of the strongest of all those habits is looking for something for nothing, or something extra for no extra. Write an ebook, source re-brandable software, offer free shipping or three items for the price of two. Do something to grab your reader’s attention.

By Matt Jackson
Aside from berating surfers for being inconsiderate, lazy, freeloaders with no attention span Matt Jackson also partakes in web content writing and SEO copywriting with WebWiseWords.

I’m going to ask you to use your imagination for a moment.

Think of a topic that interests you. Maybe it’s your favorite sport or hobby, for example. Now imagine that you’re searching the Internet for information on that topic.

The first article you come across is related to the topic you’re researching, but it doesn’t offer much in the way of value. It’s too general and full of pointless “fluff.” It makes obvious points that a third-grader could grasp. And it fails to offer any related information or resources.

The second article you come across is much more in-depth. It explains several aspects of your topic with refreshing insight. It is helpful and useful, and it links out to many related articles and resources on the subject.

If you could only bookmark one of these pages for future reference, which one would it be? It would be the second page, right?

You, like most people, would probably prefer the second page to the first. It’s an easy choice, and that’s because the author of the second article understood (and delivered) the most important concept of website content development — the value factor.

5 Benefits of High-Value Web Content
This kind of content has value for the reader, obviously. But it also benefits the author / publisher. Here are the top five benefits of creating high-value website content for your small business website:

1. It keeps people on your website longer.

2. It makes people more inclined to trust you.

3. It encourages readers to recommend the site to others.

4. It encourages other webmasters to link to your content.

5. It helps you improve your search engine ranking and visibility.

All of this sounds great, you say. But how do I create that kind of small business website content? Here are the top five guidelines for creating high-value website content.

5 Steps to High-Value Web Content

1. Choose the right author.

2. Choose the right topic.

3. Address all sides of the topic.

4. Add supporting graphics, pictures, etc.

5. Link to related resources, both on your site and elsewhere.

Let’s look at each of these steps in greater detail.

1. Choose the Right Author
I once worked for a company who let their web programmers write the instructions for their online ordering process. Big mistake. If their audience were programmers as well, this might be okay. But most of their customers had limited technical skills. So when these people encountered online instructions such as “Validate parameters before advancing” … the customers would often become dead in the water.

This is a prime example of choosing the wrong author for web writing. Sure, the programmers’ input is important. After all, they built the thing. But they should not be the voice of customer guidance. A skilled web writer (someone with usability experience) would have “translated” these instructions to say something like “Please fill in all required information before moving to the next screen.”

Here’s the key to this. The best author for your small business website content is not always the person who knows the most about the product or service from a technical standpoint. Often, it’s best to have an in-house writer who plays the go-between role of “consumer advocate,” getting the information from one group and translating it for another group.

2. Choose the Right Topic
If your small business only offers one product or service, then that will likely be the topic of your web content. In this case, I would focus on choosing the right angle as well. Don’t tell people what you want them to know — this is an outdated way of thinking about public information, especially when it comes to small business website content. Instead, find out what people want to know about the types of products you offer, and use your web content to address those questions or concerns.

If you are writing web content for a company that has many products or services, you will have to spend more time choosing topics first and choosing your angle second. In this case, it becomes more about topic organization than anything. Large websites with many topics are ideally suited for a category and sub-category system: These are our products >> And this is product ‘A’ >> And this is a web page that explains product ‘A’ in detail.

3. Address All Sides of the Topic
Whether you’re writing about one of your products, or you’re creating a tutorial of some kind, you need to cover all the angles. There’s nothing worse than website content that leaves the job only half-done, telling you why a certain thing is important but not pursuing that lead.

When you are close to a certain topic — as is the case with people who create a product or service — it’s easy to assume everyone else understands it as well as you do. But the opposite is usually true, so you need to explain all sides of a topic when you write content for your small business website.

Want to keep your pages relatively short for easy reading? You can do that while still offering complete information. That’s what hyperlinks are for!

4. Link to Related Resources
Here’s the key to developing great content for your small business website. Try to create authority documents that others in your field would link to and recommend to others. One of the key criteria for a resource document is that it links to plenty of supporting information, both on the same website and elsewhere on the web.

In addition to being good for your readers, this kind of useful content will make other webmasters more inclined to link to your website. This adds to your link “popularity” and can further improve the search engine ranking of your small business website.

When writing a particular web page, try to think of it as “the ultimate guide to [blank].” This is the first step to creating the kind of authority documents that eventually dominate the search engines and drive endless web traffic for the authors. But it’s rarely possible to create an “ultimate guide” to anything in just one page, so be liberal about linking to other sources on your own website and elsewhere (as long as they are not direct competitors).

5. Add Supporting Graphics, Pictures, Etc.
Reading online can be hard on the eyeballs. You can make the reader’s job easier in two ways. First, you can format your content appropriately for web reading (short paragraphs, narrow text columns, lots of bullet points, headers, sub-headers, etc.). Secondly, you can add supporting images and helpful graphics.

Well-placed graphics can improve website content in a number of ways. Images are more enticing than text upon first glance, so they can help attract and retain readers. They also help you clarify your message with visual reinforcement.

Conclusion
I have a motto I use regarding website content. “If it’s not worth putting online, don’t put it online.” This is my reminder to myself that I need to use the techniques outlined above to create superior website content. Because that’s the kind of content that leads to online success. Apply these lessons to your small business website and watch your own success increase!

By Brandon Cornett
Brandon Cornett operates a web marketing firm in Austin, Texas and is a web writer at large for dozens of websites and blogs. Learn more by visiting http://www.austinseoguy.com.