Nov

How to Build ‘Singing Web Sites’ aka the Rockin’ Cool Kind

The New York Times has an outstanding article this week titled How to Make Your Web Site Sing.

It’s very appropriate for the Building Rockin’ Church Web Sites series, so I thought I’d bullet point some of the great insights shared in the story:

“Your Web site is like a digital business card.”
Create sites with “addictive content,” according to Vincent Flanders of Webpagesthatsuck.com
Get your message across quickly, according to Jakob Nielsen. Nielsen’s got a fantastic site called UseIt, drawing from his research into web viewing. I’ve been reading it for a long time. Although his reports are incredibly expensive, he offers a lot of advice through his column. He’s also got a great book out called Prioritizing Web Usability.
“Only 50 percent of Web visitors scroll down the screen to see what lies below the visible part on their PC monitor.”
“Users spend 30 seconds reviewing a home page,” Mr. Nielsen said. “A business must encapsulate what they do in very few words.”
Answers questions with your site. “The first thing customers visiting any restaurant’s Web site want to know is when it is open.”
Visitors must immediately find out “who you are, what you do and how people can reach you,” said Baris Cetinok, Microsoft’s director of product management for Office Live.
Neil Hettinger, co-owner of Lead Pencil Ad Design, “suggests mixing text and graphics on a Web site, with dark type set against a light background for easy reading.”
“The most important rule in Web page design is to eliminate unnecessary design,” according to Flanders.
He also advises business owners not to add introductory splash pages that force a viewer to watch a video or animation.
“The first time a word is used on a site, it’s significant,” said Matt Cutts, a Google software engineer. “If that word is used 50 times, there is a diminishing return.”
If your business is local, make sure that the entire geographic area you serve is mentioned in text on the site. To increase the number of sites that link to yours, list your business in online trade directories, and mention it on various blogs. [Excellent advice! One I'm going to implement immediately.]