Is your website working hard?
In this digital age, be it the ubiquitous coffee shop or a large business house, virtually every business in Oman has a presence on the internet, usually in the form of a website. Done right, a good website can be a very powerful marketing tool.
So, what do you need to keep in mind to exploit the full potential of this medium? What are the pitfalls that need to be avoided? Are there any research findings that support some of the oft quoted hypotheses?
It has been found that the design of a website directly affects its perceived trustworthiness and hence it is extremely important to give this adequate attention. It is vital to view the site from a customers’ perspective and give priority to the key information that he would be looking for. For example, a retail showroom should ensure that its business hours, address as well as contact numbers are given due prominence. To provide a design guideline, a law relating to human-computer interaction formulated by Fitts in 1956 is still very useful. Put simply, it states “…the time to acquire a target is a function of the distance and the size of the target.” So, to improve the effectiveness of your website, make the most commonly used buttons larger than the others and make the most important element the easiest to access. Common sense, really!
Eyetrack 3, an exploratory research conducted in California by The Poynter Institute, The Estlow Centre for Journalism & New Media and Eyetools, threw up some interesting findings. Dominant headlines most often draw the eye first upon entering the page, even more than the photograph on the page. It was also observed that lower parts of the page, especially areas where you have to scroll to view, receive less attention. In terms of placement of navigation buttons it was found that buttons placed at the top of the page tend to get the best response.
It was also concluded that use of white space is critically important for attention grabbing as well as comprehension of the message. In a separate research conducted by Sheena Iyengar of Columbia University, it was observed that presenting the customer with too many choices at the same location tends to confuse him. In her “experiment,” it resulted in lowering of conversion rates by 27 per cent! So, be careful, especially if you are an online store. Do not give too many options on a single page.
All of us, at some time or the other, have experienced the frustration of a page that takes interminably long to open. More often than not, you just skip the site and move on. To the business you could well be a ‘lost sale.’ In fact, the search engine, Bing, found in their study that a 2 second delay in page responsiveness resulted in a 4.3 per cent loss in revenue. How can you avoid this? You need to speed up the responsiveness of your site by including only the essential elements, avoiding unnecessary gimmicks and by choosing the right server-even if you have to pay a premium for it.
Today, the advent of fast 4G networks has made data consumption extremely easy, even on the go. Customers access the net on a variety of devices ranging from desktop computers to tablets to mobile phones. To ensure that the user experience is equally pleasant across devices, a responsive website is a must.
Are there any pitfalls that you need to watch out for? Yes, several of them. Make sure that your website does not carry outdated or inaccurate information. Keep it updated on a daily basis. Also ensure that you do not have too many fonts and colours on your pages…this can be very distracting. Aim for a unified and consistent look across the site. Another point worth keeping in mind is that if the visitors to your website can’t figure out where to go next, then they are likely to move on…perhaps to your competitors’ site. So make sure you plan for easy and intuitive navigation.
Plan out your website keeping these basic points in mind and get set to reap rich rewards.
*John Smith is a seasoned marketing professional who has spent almost two decades in the Middle East. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy of Times of Oman.