You've put all the love and energy into your own website. Its a winner! You're sure of this. Its got all those u-beaut whizz bang graphics. Heck you may even have that terrific FLASH intro. It cost you an arm and a leg but now you have a site that looks like Times Square, Las Vegas and Piccadilly combined.... Right? Wrong!
OK hope I haven't offended too many web builders and I probably haven't won too many friends amongst the Flash Builders Association.
Here are my tips on building a good site.
1. Forget all the whizz bangs.
A. Download time is essential. The faster the download the more people you will retain.
Unless you're building a web site for people interested in graphic design keep these to a bare minimum.
B. Often irrelevant graphics particularly the flashing, strobing types are very annoying.
2. Keep It Simple Keep It Sweet!
A. No matter how clever your think you are or actually might be keep your wording to a level that most people can understand. The more people that can understand what message you are trying to convey, the more successful your site will be.
3. Make your site easy to navigate.
A. Nothing is more frustrating than trying to find something you have seen on a site and then comeback, either to find it missing or having to go through 250 pages.
B. Place either a Navigation search engine on your site or easy quick links in an index on an easy to locate page. Keep your visitors happy.
4. Keep your page Clean.
A. Allow plenty of white or clear space.
B. Align paragraphs to keep it all neat.
C. Avoid way out colouring. Remember Black in some countries is an immediate turn off because of its association with death. Red also due to its psychological association with blood, should also be used sparingly. Lime green iridescent fluoro backgrounds are definitely a turnoff.
D. Keep any background pattern to the minimal and check it out to see if it effects the print on the webpage.
5. Spelling.
Even humble people like myself make typo's or boo boos. Try and spell check your copy before putting it on your web page. Also common mistakes include their and their, were and we're, two, to and too. Just a tip and certainly not trying to be your English Teacher.
6. Avoid using underlines.
A. These look too much like links. Ever clicked and clicked that nowhere link.
B. Use Bold or Coloured or CAPITALS as Emphasis instead.
7. FREE Web Sites.
A. Now these are getting as scarce as left over hotdogs at a kids picnic. Most of the FREE sites these days are very basic. Their Site builders/Web wizards for the 95% of
us that don't eat sleep, breath and talk html., are pretty dull and unimaginative.
B. POP Ups or Banner Ads are also another annoying thing that some people live with on the basis of it being FREE! Immediately visitors hit on these sites the first impression is... hello a FREE website. Often this is unavoidable as the popup up or banner reads... "Get Your FREE Website Here!" If you are using this for your business site it may as well read,
"Would You Spend Your Money At A FREEBIE Site?"
Now if you have a hobby or a family site yes FREE webs are great. But don't confuse them with Business sites.
First timers I know you probably won't listen, so here are a few FREE Web Sites that you may like.
1AFM.com Free Websites, 100 MB of free WebSpace, Subdomains: Free web hosting - free web sites with true subdomains, short URL, 100 megs of web space, plus tools, and instant set-up. Full FTP and online editor.
Free disk space - 15 megabytes PageWizards PageBuilder - flexible and powerful drag & drop editor - no HTML coding Site Statistics - get comprehensive reports to track your visitors - automatically! Pre-built templates - layouts to customize with your own personal touch. Short URL - easy-to-remember web page address
50MB Web Space Unlimited hits Unlimited bandwidth Fast servers Free Guestbook
Free Chat Board Free Form Email Web Page Builder Web Page Templates
Unlimited Hits No Pop-Up Banners
Banners & Pop-Up Advertising Most common file types allowed FTP access
Web site build tool Lots of free add ons 25 Meg Storeage.
8. BRAND YOUR SITE!
It is vitally important to Brand your site. This is to give your site market recognition.
Now this is not likely to happen overnight. But if you stick with it it will happen.
For example think of an Atlanta Firm that makes a sticky black carbonated drink and you ge the picture. How many people in the world have not heard of Coke(tm).? Ok they have been around since 1901 but their logo or trademark hasn't changed all that much in all that time. And boy do they jealously guard no only the contents but their trade mark.
Why because its worth BILLIONS to them!
On the internet think of the other IT Companies with Successful branding. Yahoo, AOL, Apple, Microsoft, Bill Gates... well good or bad Bill's name is constantly put in our minds.
So what does Brandability achieve and how do you achieve Brandability.
Think of the good old days. Ranchers branded their cattle to stop horse and cattle thieves.
Overall this works for fear of being caught out. So in this sense, it stops your competitors from nicking your good name and using it for their purposes. Briefly I'll tell a true story. In the 1980's I started one of Australia's first video production companies. Mainly shooting weddings, sporting games and news stories. Some years later another company started after I'd quit my business. They called themselves Paradise Video and were selling pornograpic videos. Hmm could have been a bit embarrassing if I was still in business.
So how do you brand your site? The best way is to buy a domain name which will give you an internet address for your web page. The outlay is dirt cheap these days. Would you believe you can pick up an internet address from only $8.95 for a year. When I first started $70 was the going rate.
To discover more about this incredible dot com sales company that sells domain names from only $8.95 go to 1hotdotspot. This site lists a number of companies with various domain names including .com, .org, .net, .biz. .info, .bet, .tv and more.
9. Pop Ups. Talk about over kill. Everyone is getting more and more disgruntled with pages loaded with multi pop ups. Sure they are effective, if we believe what our gurus tell us... but... I tend to have a view if you cannot grab your visitors attention with witty, factual, copy... then you do not have a snow flakes chance in hades!
If a person builds a page and is really silly they will put at least 3 dozen of these annoying pop ups into them. That way oblivious to the pain of the user and not knowing they have probably crashed their visitors computer. In general I believe 1 pop under a website is
more than enough. But if the webmaster is greedy, stupid or both... go ahead.
People will not return.
10. INSTALL THESE TOOLS.
Now if you don't have much knowledge of site building here's a few products you may like.
SITEMOTOR.
Allows you to build your site with no html experience. Try their 30 Day FREE Trial.
Your website won't sell by itself. Well maybe if the copy is it may well do but you will improve your chances of sales by installing these low investment tools.
Automate your web submissions. Your Own Professional Daily Sub. Service.
Imagine submitting to 400,000 search engines and FFA's automatically each day. You can submit multi urls and there are packages starting at just $1 per day. This service does all this and more. Well worth a look! Click Here.
E-Commerce enable your site. (Make $$$).
Accept Credit Cards Online
Click Bank is a well known place to enable your site to sell. A very low on time fee then a small percentage of each sale puts it within the reach of all home business people selling online products. To discover more Click Here.
2CheckOut.
Accept Credit Cards within minutes for a low one-time fee and instant set up This may be just what you're looking for in accepting credit cards at your site. $49 Merchant Account Setup Fee $0.45 per Transaction 5.5% of Transaction Amount, 30 Day Money Back Guarantee, No Application Fees! No Monthly Fees!! No Statement Fees No Gateway Fees! No Leases!! No Maximums or Minimums FREE Secure Server! Click Here.
E-COMMERCE EXCHANGE
Established ten years ago, E-Commerce Exchange is one of the largest providers of merchant accounts for entrepreneurs on the internet with 12 offices nationwide USA. Thousands of merchant accounts are established each month. One study showed that the average cash sale amount is only $9.00 while the average credit card sale is $40 - an increase of 450% per transaction! To Discover more Click Here.
WebTranz
Studies have proven that accepting credit cards and checks can increase your sales anywhere from 30% to 100%. WebTranz is a powerful, Internet-based payment transaction processing system, which authorizes credit cards and checks instantly online. With our quick and easy merchant account set-up, you can get started in as little as 7 days!
Getting too big for your boots or How to Start Your Own Affiliate Program.
Build Your Own Affiliate Program.
The Rapid Replicator.
The Rapid Replicator is exclusive software, that allows anyone with access to the Internet, the ability to generate their own self-replicating web sites by cloning an existing or new web site. The Rapid Replicator allows you to give away free unlimited ready made web sites containing information about your products and/or services, which increases your exposure. It automates the process of generating copies of your web sites, leaving you free to do other important tasks. A very AFFORDABLE monthly fee get you this and a lot more. For further details just Click Here!
Pro-TRACK -
A great affiliate tracking software for the affiliate program owner that wants to keep track of sales and wants to know from which affiliates the sale originated. The Pro-TRACK 'Pro' version will not only track where your sales are originating from, but also provide you with the statistics you need to track how well your affiliate program is doing. Click Here!
FREE Auto Responder.
"UNLOCK THE MOST POWERFUL SECRET TO DOUBLING YOUR SALES!"
"With NEW intelligent software that's FREE and GUARANTEED!" That secret is "follow up" but the trick is to be fast, repetitive, personalized and consistent. New, sophisticated
autoresponder does all that for you ... And more! SAVE time and money. GRAB YOUR FREE VERSION NOW! Marketers grab a FREE report: "How to Double Your Sales With a Proper Email Strategy"! Don't wait, Click Here.:
Other wise if you can afford $9.95 per month I would strongly recommend an autoresponder from the clever people at Make Net Money. Too be honest if you were just to use their auto responders which by the way you get an unlimited quantity of you would be laughing. Combine this with a FREE E-Book of the month club and a very good affiliate program paying 50% plus an excellent forum for professional online home business people and you have top value. I recommend you at least take a look. Clcik Here.
FREE AD TRACKER.
The Ultimate Tracking solution from GetResponse. Instantly finds...Which ad is generating the most ~sales~ (not just unique visitors) Where to keep spending advertising
dollars to GUARANTEE a great ROI. How to keep profiting from your existing website traffic all the time. FREE sign-up! Click Here.
FREE. Save on 2nd. Line Installation
Stop Missing Calls While You're Online! Hear who's calling while you're online... Get the FREE the Internet Answering Machine. Click Here.
Retrieve Your Passwords & Fills in online Forms Fast
This will make your online life easier! FREE software that does the typing for you. cuts frustrating web chores like filling out forms and remembers passwords. Click Here.
