I’m sure most of us have come across a site at one time or another where you’ve clicked on a link that takes you to a 404 error page. The Web savvy people out there know what it means and aren’t put off by it, we simply click “back” and find another way to get to the information we were looking for. Now, think about this same situation from the perspective of someone who uses the Internet maybe once a month.

After ten minutes of searching for information they find what they need, but when they click the link in the search results it takes them to a scary looking “404 Not Found” page with big dark letters. The knee jerk reaction would be to click on the “back” button and find another website because, to an unskilled web user, they’ve reached a dead end…and that’s what you want to avoid.

When a visitor has reached a dead end that’s not good, so consider doing something that’s rising in popularity. Customize your 404 page if at all possible by setting up a new rule in your “.htaccess” file.

This is a great way to improve a sites usability. When you’re trying to come up with some design ideas for a 404 page check out some examples that Sitepoint has gathered. Most of them are entertaining but helpful at the same time.

Don’t be afraid to give your custom 404 pages some personality, we are human after all and having a page like this can improve the users experience and keep them on your site for a longer period of time.

i think it’s important to step back at this point and let you know that your website’s structure and layout can and will effect your organic rankings on search engines (especially google).

so many business owners come to me after their website is built and want to know how they can get ranked on google and yahoo now that they have a website.  i take a big breath, pull up their website and sometimes have to deliver some very bad news…

if your website was built by a developer (as opposed to a designer) who is not current in their coding capabilities, then you might be in trouble.

here’s an example, we just recently landed a client who came to us and said “our new website was built 6 months ago and we cannot get indexed and ranked highly by google for any of our keyword phrases”.  first thing we look at is the website code, it was built in very outdated (HTML 4.0) standards, with tables being used, very sloppy, hundreds of lines of code, and validated with over 300 errors per page.  the problem here is that google and others don’t like to crawl this mess.  it is just one of many issues evaluated by google, but if you want to compete in a competitive landscape you have to look at all the angles, just like google does.

if you are thinking, “oh tricia, that is just a petty reason to recode a website, that alone isn’t going to keep them from being ranked on google’s network”, i might agree, however, all things being equal and this alone the difference, it certainly will play a role.  here is what google has to say about it if you don’t buy my bull…

so let’s take the flip approach, you had a website built by a “designer” (all-be-it, a good one) with some coding skillz…

like my girlfriend, you probably have a great looking website that is one big picture, so guess what google see’s…

that’s right, one big image, no navigation, no text because google can’t see past the details of an image, it is only a computer after all…

here’s my favorite, your website is built in all flash, this just doesn’t work for seo, unless you have an xHTML site built with text based navigation so that google and others can see more than flash files…  but that takes more money than most small business owners are willing or able to spend.

so how your site is built can and will effect your rankings.  what you want is a custom built website using xHTML/CSS coding standards that is validated error free by these guys.

How many times have you had conference calls or face-to-face meetings with a client and spent most of your time trying to nail down a small detail like the placement of an ad on the home page? After 40 minutes of going back and forth with the client someone usually gives up and it’s most likely you. Project Managers tend to relinquish the reigns to the client in order to move things along. When going back and forth with clients it’s important to stick with your ideas because the more you restate your idea the more likely it is that you’ll get on the same page with the client.

Here are some do’s and dont’s to think about when you get in these kinds of situations.

DO’s

1. Fully listen to the ideas your client is bringing to the table.
2. Use their ideas and your ideas to come up with a plan you can both agree on.
3. Depending on your client, change the kinds of words you’re using to describe your idea. Some clients are more technical than others.
4. Explain your ideas so that the client understands that you’re just trying to point them in the right direction.
5. Be respectful of their opinions.
6. Give reasons why you think you’re idea would be an effective option for your client.
7. Be persistent, but not forceful. The more you explain your idea the more your client will understand.

DONT’s

1. Never flat out give up on the client and your own ideas.
2. Don’t cut the client off while they’re talking about their idea’s.
3. Don’t tell your client that their ideas are bad. That’s a quick way to lose a client and hurt your reputation.
4. Don’t get frustrated when you’re having to repeat the same information over and over. Clients don’t know as much as you; be patient.
5. Never shut them out of a discussion. Keep them involved and active in making decisions.

I hope this helps you manage client meetings better in the future. Remember that clients will always think they know more about something than you do. In some cases that’s true, but hang in there!

If you’ve experienced this before and have some thoughts feel free to share them below by adding a comment.