Web Design

Online Selling to the Subconscious

April 2, 2012 By Brian Kane 1 Comment

Web designers creatively design, developers build great functionality and online marketers promote sites in more ways than ever, however the companies who are really selling online are creating unconscious connections with their site visitors by applying some serious psychology to the online experience.

This infographic from KISSmetrics explores some of the underlying emotional factors that influence purchase decisions and discusses ways to build these into your visitors’ online experience. These range from:

keeping it simple and reducing users options by narrowing choices through the shopping and buying process
positioning your products as being the ‘safe’ tried and tested option rather than a new choice
creating a fantastic first impression
providing social proof that other people like and buy your product.

Filed Under: Infographics, Web Design

Website – Recommended Legal Requirements

October 24, 2011 By Irene Bodle 2 Comments

Following on from my previous article on the mandatory legal requirements for UK websites, I recommend adding the following non-mandatory information to your website.

Terms of Use/Disclaimer

Set out the rules applicable to persons using and accessing the goods and services on your website. For example state who may access the website e.g. consumers, businesses, over 18s.

You should also aim to limit your liability for information on the website. For example state which law applies, your limits on liability etc. However, please note that you cannot exclude or limit certain liabilities in particular circumstances – particularly in relation to consumers, injuries caused by or defects in your goods and services.

Copyright Notice

Protect the information on your website by inserting a copyright notice “© company name 2010. All rights reserved.” Without this notice, it may be difficult in some countries to take any action against a copyright infringement.

Mandatory Legal Requirements - a shortened list is shown below, click to see the full mandatory requirements

About Us/Contact Information
Registration under the Data Protection Act
Privacy Policy
Disabled Access to your Website
Trade Marks and Logos
Copyright
Online Payment

Filed Under: Internet Law, Web Design

Website – Mandatory Legal Requirements

October 13, 2011 By Irene Bodle 2 Comments

Does your website comply with the various legal requirements in the UK? Below, I have set out the main UK legal requirements that you should currently be complying with.

About Us/Contact Information

You must provide the following information in an easily accessible position on your website:

your legal name e.g. XYZ Ltd
your geographical address
contact details e.g. telephone number, fax number and email address
which country your business is registered in and the registration number
details of any supervisory body which regulates your business e.g. the FSA. For regulated bodies more detailed information is required.
where you are registered for VAT and your VAT number
clear details of prices and whether or not delivery and/or tax is included

Registration under the Data Protection Act

If you collect any personal data on your website – e.g. email address, name or address of a living individual, you will be processing personal data and must register as a data controller under the Data Protection Act. It is a criminal offence not to register.

Privacy Policy

If you are collecting, storing or processing personal data you need to set out how and why you are doing this to comply with the 8 principles of the Data Protection Act. In particular if you are sending marketing emails to potential customers you need to ensure that you have obtained specific consent, BEFORE such emails are sent. Consent should be covered in your privacy policy and the registration process on your website.

Disabled Access to your Website

If you offer goods or services on your website you need to make your website accessible to disabled users. Level 1 compliance with the WC3 standard will usually suffice.

Trade Marks and Logos

Do not use other people’s trademarks or logos without their consent on your website or you could be liable to pay damages for trademark infringements.

Copyright

Do not use other people’s content without their consent on your website, or you could be liable to pay damages for copyright infringements. If you have links to other people’s content, make sure that this is permitted in their terms of use and ensure that the information opens in a new frame.

Online Payment

If you accept online payment for goods or services you must provide customers with specific information about their right to cancel, VAT and prices, refunds and defective goods PRIOR to the sale being concluded.

Summary

The above are examples of the main legal requirements for websites in the UK. This is a very complicated area of law and the specific rules that apply to you will depend on what goods and services you are offering, whether you are acting BTB (business to business) or BTC (business to customer), where you are based, where your customers are located and many other factors.

Filed Under: Internet Law, Web Design

Are these your top 10 biggest website mistakes?

September 22, 2011 By Chris Elvery 2 Comments

Following on from my last post about building websites to take account of Social Media, I thought, seeing as I spend most of my life reviewing sites that I’d share some of the most common errors I see – these are not in any order and the list is not definitive, but hopefully they may strike a chord!

1) What’s it all about then?

If I see another website where I struggle to understand why on earth it was built in the first place, who it’s for, what it’s supposed to do or what I’m supposed to do on it, then, I will …… have seen an awful lot that fall in to this category. Websites need a purpose!

2) Build it and they will come?!

The key to a successful website is understanding your audience and building a site that offers value to them. Without knowing that, you’re on a hiding to nothing!

3) Accessibility isn’t for me

There are laws and there are standards – make sure you follow them. Visually impaired and people with other disabilities use the web too you know!

4) Well I know where everything is!

Any usability study will tell you that when people are lost, they leave. Clear, logical navigation and tools to improve (such as breadcrumbs) are key.

5) Looks good in my designer’s office!

It looked great when you saw it on a 25″ widescreen monitor, on a safari browser. Now that you’re looking at it on a 17″ monitor using Internet Explorer 6 – it’s not so great! Ensure that you build for the widest possible audience.

6) They’ll get in touch if they really want to

You build a site, you attract traffic through Search Engines and other mechanisms and then you leave site visitors to their own devices when it comes to what you want them to do – be clear, be bold. Make specific to the page the visitor is on.

7) Website – done. Now back to the day job.

You have a site which is invisible to the outside world – don’t get me wrong, there are occasions when you don’t want any profile, but most clients build a site to attract business, yet the site has either been built so the Search Engines avoid it like the plague, or there are no links in to it……

8) Build for now, we’ll think about tomorrow, tomorrow!

Think of your site as an apartment block. If you can consider what you’d like the block to look like over a 3-5 year period and then build the site – even if it’s the first storey, then at least you’ve got the architecture to allow you to continue to built. The amount of multi-storey bungalows I see!

9) My developer knows what I want

“I thought the guy knew what he was doing and gave him £1500 and my logo and he built me a site – now I find it has no search engine profile and I can’t update it myself”. True story and oh, so common. Always specify your requirements before starting.

10) We’ll get an enquiry one of these days……

Everyone says that Google Analytics is wonderful – question whether they use it and that’s a different matter. It’s as if by the very fact that Analytics is plugged in that the site will heal itself! Analytics are great, learn how to read them (Google’s Conversion University is great) and make decisions based on the information . Two words of warning – make sure that you filter yourself/ your developer out from the data and make sure that you treat the data with a certain amount of common sense – after all they only tell you what people did – not what they wanted to do!

Filed Under: analytics, Conversion Rate Optimization, Engage, Google Analytics, Tips, Web Analytics, Web Design, Web metrics

Twitter ROI: Show Your Clients the Effectiveness of Twitter Campaigns

March 5, 2010 By Chuckie Oliver 1 Comment

We’ve arrived at the year social media takes off. Clearly, social media is already booming, but in 2010, businesses are embracing this new marketing tactic like never before. Twitter and Facebook aren’t just for mindless procrastination anymore. Fortune 500’s are signing up for Twitter handles, budgeting thousands of dollars around year-long social media campaigns. But there is still one very important question to answer: What’s it all worth?

Mainstream Embrace of Twitter

In year’s past, marketing gurus and branding experts touted Twitter as a revolutionary force in communications. The only problem was a lack of measuring sticks. Social media campaigns of yesteryear lacked the means to measure the all important Return on Investment that CEO’s and accountants like to see before they give the green light. In 2010, web-developers have caught up to the industry and have produced a wealth of resources for measuring your social media campaigns.

If you are a marketer and you can use these tools to prove the value of your Twitter presence to clients.

Twitter Analyzer

This tool is offers one of the most comprehensive snapshots of your Twitter account. In one clearly-labeled window, you can gather a bounty of client-impressing information. Some key attributes include:

A graph displaying the amount of users that clicked on each Tweet sent
A “Unique Readers” reach total
Percentage of your Tweats that are retweeted
Which links were read the most
How popular your Tweets were on any given day

This data can be assessed and presented to any client wishing to see the results of a social media campaign. In this sense, you have more access to audience information than with a TV commercial or Radio advertisement.

Klout

Klout is a valuable resource when it comes to evaluating the essence of your Twitter presence. It is also one of the most respected measurement applications and was recently integrated into CoTweet – one of the internet’s most heavily used Twitter assistants.

Klout’s rating system defines a Twitter user by a number of factors, identifying who the major influencers are on the Twitter-sphere. A score in the 70’s or 80’s indicate that your campaign is a success and people are listening to your message.

TweetBeep

For the ultra-obsessed client, set them up with a TweetBeep account. This (free) service allows you to keep tabs on your Twitter progress by monitoring each Retweet, product mention, direct message, website link, etc. with hourly updates sent to your email account. The more updates they get, the more respect your campaign receives.

Tweet Stats

I prefer Tweet Stats for long-term evaluations of my Twitter progress. I usually use this site for personal analysis of my various campaigns, but clients occasionally like to see these colorful graphs as well. This program graphical displays data on the amount of Tweets you send per month along with which of your Tweets receive the most traction on the web.

Tweet Effect

This tool is incredibly valuable if you are focused on reaching the most followers possible. Simply enter your Twitter handle and the application determines which of your recent tweets affected your following; that is, which tweets resulted in an increase or decrease in the number of followers to your account.

This insight can prove invaluable if your client lists “a huge number of followers” amongst campaign priorities. You’ll be able to Tweet more effectively in the long run.

Your Tweets Matter

There are many other Twitter tools on the web for Twitter analysis and evaluation, and more coming out each day, but these resources will answer many of the questions your client has in regards to ROI. Like and TV commercial or billboard, you and your client need to know the reach and frequency of each campaign. In the past, these numbers were merely estimates based loosely on polls and meter systems. But now we have exact measuring sticks and tools to see precisely the effectiveness of your campaigns.

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Case Ernsting is a guest blogger for Web Analytics World. He is a Marketing Representative and lead blogger for MetaSpring, LLC, a leading Michigan web design firm in Ann Arbor. MetaSpring works with clients both big and small around the country, specializing in web design, development and web marketing.