8 Website Tips for Today’s Internet

Contrast & Visibility
As mentioned above, a lot of us are guilty of downloading those pixilated animated gifs and placing them on our own pages. We thought it looked great! Today, not so much. You will lose traffic over that. Users want to see clear photos and legible text. Rule of thumb: If you can’t see it, it does not belong. Make sure your photos aren’t blurry and the text is large enough to read. Depending on the website, you will have all age groups viewing. Make sure they all can read it.

The Search Engine
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) plays a MAJOR role with the website. You can create and launch a website today with high hopes of achieving the 1^st or 2^nd page in search results but reality will quickly hit when you find that you can’t even find your website. Due to the demand of placement by other companies and individuals, SEO is a requirement in today’s internet. SEO needs to be part of the process from day 1.

Hacker-Proof
I cannot stress enough how important security is to a website. Don’t think that being a little company or individual will reduce your chances… it won’t! The internet is like driving the 405 in LA during rush hour with no painted lanes and no laws. Keep passwords fresh and difficult. We always suggest that clients use a password that they will not remember. If you can easily remember it, so can they. Keep login pages hidden from prying eyes and use captcha keys. They are annoying, but they can keep the bots at bay.

Responsive & Mobile
When was the last time you went to a website and had to pinch and enlarge to find the navigation? Most of the time, visitors will leave the website immediately when they realize your website is not responsive. The loss of traffic will reduce your rankings in search engines and even trustworthiness among B2B opportunities. Make sure your website is one that people want to see on the desktop and on their tablet/phone.

Fresh Content
Keep it fresh! Despite what many people think, “keeping it fresh” doesn’t mean the content needs to be updated daily. A blog, for example is a perfect example of fresh content. If you add a new blog post with unique content once a week, you are doing well. Keep in mind, the crawler bots don’t crawl your site every day. You can usually expect it weekly, so you will want to be sure to have a little something new each week to not only keep the search engines happy but your users as well.

Social Media
Make use of all social media outlets. Social Media can play a large part in your marketing. Place links in easy to find spots on your website. Every time a new service or product is added, notify all your followers on your chosen social media platforms. Did you add a new post to the blog? Add it to social media. It’s a great way to easily and quickly bring in traffic and potential customers. Not to mention a fan base!

Use of Colors
Colors play a rather important role in the design and layout of a website. Depending on the business type and market you are trying to reach, the colors of a website can, a lot of times, make or break the visitor’s first impression. Keep this in mind, the logo itself will play a large part of the overall style, look & feel of the website. Try to keep logo and website colors to a total of 3 with use of different shades of those 3 colors. A lot of websites, today, go for the black and white with use of color blocks here and there for attention. Again, it all depends on what you are using color for.

Videos
The addition of embedded videos on a website can be extremely useful. Videos can add a touch of personalization to a website that may not have been there with simple photos and text. Use a video to show how to use a product that you are selling or show a user how to use a service or feature on your website. Testimonials are also a great way to provide information to users directly from the source.