Archive for the ‘Usability’ Category

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A few weeks back I was on a flight across the country and I had the pleasure of sitting all the way in the back row… you know… where they used to put the smokers. Ahhh, remember those days? One of the luxuries of sitting in the back is watching people enter and leave the restroom. Oh, and that lovely toilet smell.

But on this particular flight the bathroom was out of commission. The airline helpfully placed the following sign on the bathroom door:

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If you missed my blog series titled Destination Search Engine Marketing or want to have an easy-to-read and print version, you’re in luck. We have created a 34-page downloadable PDF from the series of posts. Not only is the PDF fully illustrated, but it is has also been edited and updated.

The download is free and we don’t ask for any information or try to call you to sell you something else. Just click on the link above and save the PDF to your computer. That’s it. Enjoy.

If your website was presented before a jury of your peers, would you be found guilty of gross marketing misconduct or absolved of all charges of crimes against usability?

The fact is, your website is being judged. Each and every visitor that comes to your site is actively weighing, measuring and perhaps even finding you wanting in how you present your information to them. Every person will judge you on how quickly they can find the information they want, how complete that information is, and whether or not all their questions get answered.

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Web searchers looking to research or purchase items to buy on the web are inherently skeptical. This is especially true when they end up on a site which is new to them. Regardless of how they got there–web search, referral, advertisement, etc.–this skepticism interferes with the buying and selling process.

There are numerous issues that make their way into the visitor’s conscious and sub-conscious, most of which must be overcome before they are willing to seal the deal and complete the sale. Here are just a few:

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One of the most fascinating things to watch, when you’re running an online business–or likely any business, for that matter–is the increase in traffic coming through your virtual (or physical) doors. Watching that traffic count tick up due to a successful optimization, PPC or social media campaign can be thrilling.

Yesterday I talked about how to turn your top search engine rankings into traffic. In reality, rankings are just one way to generate traffic. There are literally countless ways in which you can drive traffic to your website, via both on- and off-line marketing efforts. Unless you sell advertising by the impression, traffic isn’t the end-all, be-all of website performance. For many sites there has to be a conversion.

What that conversion is varies from site to site. For one it can be finalizing the sale of a product, for another it can be a lead, and for others it can be a download or signing up for a newsletter subscription. Whatever a conversion means to you, you know that getting it is the most important thing. Rankings only lead to traffic. Traffic puts eyeballs on the site, but beyond that, we need to know how to get that traffic to convert.

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Back in August of this year, while at Search Engine Strategies in San Jose, I sat in a session where one of the speakers talked about site search. He said something that I fundamentally disagree with but it got me thinking about why you should or should not implement a search feature on your own site.

I believe that implementing site search is smart for large sites, but only if you can be sure it works nearly perfectly. On the other hand, the speaker in this session (and I completely forget who it is) said that, for analytical purposes, every site should implement site search, even if it doesn’t do a good job. This is what I fundamentally disagree with.

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This is a continuation of a series of website marketing checklists. Check out all Web Marketing Checklists in this series.

What this is about: This list covers issues regarding site pages that outline your privacy and security policies as they relevant to the site visitor’s needs.

Why this is important: While most visitors won’t read Privacy and Security pages, they do provide necessary assurances that visitors look for in terms of being able to trust you. However, when visitors do click into these pages need certain information needs to be presented to them to ensure their needs are met.

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What this is about: This list covers in-site search, what features should be included, what is expected by visitors and how the results should be laid out.

Why this is important: Site search is an important element of on-site usability. Both in its ability to help visitors find the information they are looking for, or by being absent if it doesn’t produce accurate results. Site search must be able to improve the visitor’s experience in your site, otherwise it does more harm than good.

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This is a continuation of a series of website marketing checklists. Check out all Web Marketing Checklists in this series.

What this is about: This list covers how web forms should be created as well as basic functionality, including how errors are handled when something goes awry.

Why this is important: Forms are a standard method of allowing visitors to communicate with you, including the placing orders. If forms don’t work properly, frustrate your visitors or create additional roadblocks that the visitor must hurdle over, the contact/conversion rate on your site will drop drastically.

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This is a continuation of a series of website marketing checklists. Check out all Web Marketing Checklists in this series.

What this is about: This list covers a range of items dealing with pages dedicated to helping your customers with various needs and answering important questions they have regarding your site, products and services.

Why this is important: If your customers are digging through your help and FAQ pages, chances are they are close to making a decision to purchase, they just need a little extra bump. These pages are essential to these visitors seek by providing answers to questions and other helps that will push them through the conversion process.

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