WEBSITE ETIQUETTE THE BASIC BAIT

20 seconds is all you have to capture your reader or potential customer putting pressure on you to ensure that your first impression counts.

 

Your website should be welcoming and inviting for your visitors, no cold link, dead ends and images that don't display properly. You need to feed your visitor a little bit of information and entice them to click for more.

 

Just like getting a mouse to track the bait!

 

Setting the bait

 

The bait (your home page) needs to be approachable without obstacles. This is done effectively with a simple and user friendly environment. We achieve this by using familiar headings that your users will understand such as | about us | contact us and home page. Layout is also important ensure that your page flows freely and makes sense to the customer.

 

Be direct to your visitors, tell them what you are and what you do. Tell them where they need to click for information. Don't assume they will no that the products link has a contact option inside it.

 

Ensure that it complies for disability users with colour effective fonts to ensure it can be read by all. Don't assume everyone can read red text on a black background.

 

Creating options to enlarge website font is a good choice if your audience is targeted to an audience of poorly sighted people. Again simple tools and steps will eliminate a particular group from leaving your site without checking first.

 

Trusting the bait

 

Ensure your website is creditable, do you have testimonials or accreditation logos you can add? Have you made the right impression? Do you have the right language? A society with a population of 30% mandarin speaking means your English written only website probably won't be viewed by 30% of the population.

 

Checking the baits use by date

 

Make sure you have some dynamic and up to date content. A simple news page showing recent news and activity is a good way to show customers you are current. There is nothing worse when you're tempted to buy something then realise that the website has not been updated in two years. Then you wonder "Are they still running?"

 

Last but not least avoid intro pages that are so 1999. Flash and animated intros don't get to the point; most people look how they can skip it. They take longer to load up and with mobile phones being a common source of internet access, flash intro websites can't be viewed.

 

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