Website Design

When building a website we need to address a number of different factors in order to achieve the desired outcome, which should be to have:

A fantastic professional looking website.

We need to appreciate that our website represents our business to everyone in the world that finds us online. It is responsible for making that ‘first impression’ which is so critical, bearing in mind that it needs to look better than your competitors’ websites. Imagine someone going for a job interview in thongs, shorts and a singlet, what sort of result do you think they would get? Not great to say the least, then why would a business large or small ever be satisfied with their website appearing unprofessional? They would probably be better off with no site at all. These are only some of the reasons that your website needs to look fantastic and professional.

One that is functional

There are few things worse than a website which doesn’t do what it needs to do. We need to understand what our end users want and deliver it to them. If we are selling something online then we need to make it simple for them to buy. If we are generating leads then we need to make it simple for prospects to make enquiries. Your website needs to have a purpose, if it consists of unclear and scattered information with inappropriate links then our prospects will only be infuriated and we will lose their business. Therefore, we need to make our site functional

One that is quick to load

This is simple but as I am sure we all can attest to, rather frustrating for the end user when all we want is to get into the site and look around, and it can take forever. What do we do when this happens to us, leave the site and look for another one? Of course, this is why we need to ensure that our site loads quickly, as they say ‘time is money’.

One that is straight forward and not confusing

Our website is designed to be our business online, our shop front if you will. Therefore, we need to adopt the KISS philosophy of Keep It Short & Sweet. Nobody wants to go through unnecessary information; it not only takes up valuable time but confuses our potential and/or existing clients. Although this is the case, we do also need to ensure that all relevant information is in the website, if not we might be perceived as not knowing what we need to. Remember, if people want to read the information, it needs to be there! If they don’t want to read it and it’s still there they simply wont, but we must give them the choice.

One that can be found when potential clients are looking for your services in the Search Engines

All websites must be treated as a marketing tool not just a point of reference. With more and more people going online to research or purchase what it is they want, it is critical that you have your website working for you. Your website should be making you money instead of costing you money, even while you are sleeping.

The ultimate form of advertising is online marketing! How else can you target such a wide range of clients with such a relatively minimal investment? You simply can’t. if somebody types in ‘Melbourne Removals’ or ‘Richmond Dentist’, do you think they are researching a hobby topic or a removals company in Melbourne and a dentist in Richmond? It is for this reason that in the US last year the combined advertising earnings of Google, Yahoo and MSN, was greater than that of CBS, NBC and CNN. This meant that for the first time ever, another form of advertising was perceived as more powerful and far reaching than television advertising.

In Australia businesses are just catching on, 5 years ago in the US online marketing or e marketing was readily accessible and affordable, now it is that competitive that companies are charging in to the millions to advertise effectively online and it is only getting more competitive, as is always the case Australia will follow suit. Maybe not to the same extent but it will become far more important to be ranked highly in the search engines than ever before, so don’t miss the boat!