DESIGN
The successful website starts with a home page that is attractive, easy to understand, and fast loading.
Think of your home page as the cover of a good book — it should entice the customer to look deeper into the site (book) and return to it often as a resource.
Another way to put it is that your home page, the first page the online consumer will see, is like the window of a store.
It is your showcase, storefront, and calling card — all rolled into one. Online, your competition is just a click away — careful design and targeted content are important guardians against customer defection.
Your website’s design and content will greatly influence your customers’ perception of your business, which will, in turn, affect their purchasing decisions.
Your pages should be laid out in such a manner that navigation through your site is intuitive and stress-free — so much so that your customers develop a comfort level in doing business on your site. How do you manage that? Read on!
When designing your site, there are certain categories of rules or guidelines that you should follow.
The acronym SPEC can be used to help you to remember the key categories:
• Stickiness and traffic generation
o Content
o Search engines
• Performance
o Speedy downloads
o Tables
• Ease of use
o Site Navigation
• Content visibility
o Viewable Site
o Frames
o Java
o Plug-ins
The successful website starts with a home page that is attractive, easy to understand, and fast loading.
Think of your home page as the cover of a good book — it should entice the customer to look deeper into the site (book) and return to it often as a resource.
Another way to put it is that your home page, the first page the online consumer will see, is like the window of a store.
It is your showcase, storefront, and calling card — all rolled into one. Online, your competition is just a click away — careful design and targeted content are important guardians against customer defection.
Your website’s design and content will greatly influence your customers’ perception of your business, which will, in turn, affect their purchasing decisions.
Your pages should be laid out in such a manner that navigation through your site is intuitive and stress-free — so much so that your customers develop a comfort level in doing business on your site. How do you manage that? Read on!
When designing your site, there are certain categories of rules or guidelines that you should follow.
The acronym SPEC can be used to help you to remember the key categories:
• Stickiness and traffic generation
o Content
o Search engines
• Performance
o Speedy downloads
o Tables
• Ease of use
o Site Navigation
• Content visibility
o Viewable Site
o Frames
o Java
o Plug-ins