Now, I have a super fast HP computer, a Google Android phone, an iPod Touch, a laptop and sooner or later, an iPad. We’re a much faster paced society these days. I can sit at Starbucks flip open my Droid and read the latest news, check the weather, etc. Recently, Google announced their endeavor into the entertainment market by releasing Google TV.

In a matter of a few years the Web has changed dramatically. With Google still dominating the global search market you can guarantee that the shifts will continue. This on-the-go society has really complicated the lives of Web developers because we now have to consider the following:

• Standard phones
• Smart phones
• iPad/tablet devices
• Various screen resolutions
• A multitude of operating systems
• And now websites as seen on a televisions

Right now, it’s tough to say where things are going. If I had to guess though, smart phones will eventually dominate the market and the current “standard” phones will be no more. With Apple, Google and others combating against Adobe, it’s safe to say that Flash compatibility will be a non-issue down the road. This means that most W3C compliant websites will load and display correctly on mobile/tablet devices.

Nothing is for certain, but keep a close watch on this in the future. Open source applications and juggernauts like Google will be leading the way for change.

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1. Color - Whether you’re designing a button, a banner or an entire header graphic the colors you choose really need to pop out on the page. For instance, using the color red on a dark website will draw attention straight to the red object.
2. Placement - The position of the object on the page is very important. Typically the object should be located in the top right corner or along the right side of your website.
3. Size Matters - This is especially true when you’re creating buttons. If your call-to-action button is the same size and blends with the rest of the site it won’t stand out as well if you changed some of the coloring or scaled it to be the biggest button on the page.
4. Verbiage - You could have a great graphic, but if the language isn’t effective you probably won’t draw people in. Using something like “Free Info” is dull, but “7 Ways To Boost Low Conversions” is sure to capture the attention of visitors.
5. Make It Visible - Don’t bury your call-to-action inside of text, banner ads or other graphics. What’s the point of a call-to-action if you can’t find it?

These are some of the core elements that go into creating a great call-to-action. If you have a website, bring it up in your browser and asking yourself, “What am I trying to accomplish?”

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All of these pieces are important to your websites success and should be carefully planned while wireframing out the sites design. Pay particular attention to how the information flows and where your eyes go on the page. It will most certainly change when you start adding graphics and color, but at least you can begin visualizing how the website will appear to a user.

Call-to-actions should be clear and positioned strategically on the page. It’s also important that you select the right color scheme that’s going to attract an audience.

There is a science behind building websites and careful planning can result in much greater conversion rates.

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Facebook allows you to sort your streams by news, pages, status updates, photos and links. Twitter, is one massive activity stream, that’s all there is, but that’s why it’s so effective. A simple design in a “fast forward” world allows people to communicate to one another easier and faster than ever before. You can download plugins for your Firefox to pop-up Twitter messages just like when you receive a new email through Outlook.

Activity streams are making their way into the workplace. Businesses are using them to communicate internally and there’s a chance that in the future company executives will be more accessible than ever as customers may be able to communicate with higher-ups directly through the companies website.

Social media continues to grow and expand like never before. Google has taken a shot at the market by developing Google Wave which essentially is a way for people to interact with one another on the fly. If you and a friend are typing message to each other you’ll be able to see what they’re typing as their doing it.

Internet technology is getting more advanced and expect these systems and features to play a major role in your marketing efforts down the road.

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To answer that question, your visitors will turn to the About Us page.  You need to convey information about your company, demonstrate why you are trustworthy, and develop a personal connection with your visitor, all in 400-600 words.  This information is expected and delivering the goods boosts your online image.

Elements to consider when crafting an About Us page:

• A physical address – An 800 number and contact form are easy, convenient ways for customers to reach you, but a physical address shows a prospective customer that you are a real business.

• What you do – Most of your site will focus on solutions for your customers.  The About Us page is the corner of your site to talk to visitors about your company.

• Why you do what you do – How did the company begin and what is the driving passion behind it?  This is a great way to demonstrate dedication to your customers.

• Your successes – This page is not for the modest!  If you have received any awards or recognition, tapped into a competitive market, or experienced impressive growth mention them.  These are signals to your potential customers that you will do a good job for them.

• What makes you different– Chances are you are not the only business doing what you do.  A look at what sets you apart gives visitors a reason to choose you.

• Personality – If your company is fun to work with or singularly dedicated to helping customers, make sure visitors know that.  Your company’s culture should shine through in the writing.

• Staff bios – Give your visitors a connection with the people behind the business.  The web is cold and impersonal, but humanizing elements add a friendly face and make the experience more personal.

As much as the web has changed the way businesses relate to their customers, the importance of trust has not diminished.  Potential customers want to know they are dealing with a reputable company in addition to getting a great product.  Build credibility on your site and convert visitors into customers.

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Landing pages is a hot marketing strategy where you create a single page with a very clear call-to-action and direct traffic to it. This could be done in one of two ways. Firstly, you can go with the standard SEO approach where you optimize each landing page using a specific set of keyword phrases. You would then work those phrases into the content of the page and the code as needed. When someone finds the page in a search engine they’re taken directly to a page that’s specifically targeted towards the keyword phrase they were using.

A landing page get’s right to the point and limits the options of the user down to taking action or just plain leaving. Another landing page strategy is to implement standard SEO on to a page and then link that page with a Pay-Per-Click campaign (PPC). This is proven to be highly effective, but to really get the results you need you should consider creating upwards of 50 landing pages each one unique from the other in some way and hooked to a PPC account.

A websites standard conversion rate is somewhere between 0.5%-2% (source). Conversion rates are obviously higher for e-commerce sites like Amazon and E-Bay, but for now, PPC linked with landing pages seems to be the key to increase conversion rates and while will Google’s PPC remains the dominant force, Bing’s advertising methods are on the rise because it’s cheaper and tends to bring in more conversions than Google.

The design of a landing page is complicated and requires you to think outside the box which I’ll save for another post.

For now, ponder the strategy behind landing pages. If used correctly, they can be a very powerful asset.

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Here are some things to watch out for when you’re putting a site together:

• If you have a search box, make sure it’s placed in a position that makes sense. Search boxes are very useful to have on a large scale website because it allows people to find the information they need quicker.
• You should absolutely have a phone number somewhere obvious on the website. Don’t bury your number deep within contact areas. Always consider placing the phone number somewhere near the top right of the website.
• Break up your content so that it’s readable. You have to realize that when people come to your website they are looking for particular pieces of information. They’re not coming to your website to read everything you have up there. They’re coming to you to find an answer to a very specific question. So, breaking up the content into different blocks or adding sub-headings helps people navigate your website easier.
• Widen your color palette beyond 2 colors. Look, some of us out there like to have things as uniform as possible, but in the marketing world you need buttons and other elements of your website to jump out at people. Now, I’m not suggesting that you use bright neon colors (please don’t do that). Just think about your marketing goals and understand how people browse a website.

Keeping your site in line with the companies goals is an important part of the overall process.

Websites are meant to bring in traffic and revenue. Don’t spend your money developing one if you’re not willing to think outside of the box.

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Well, why did you do that? Without even thinking you already knew where to go because this has become a standard on all products throughout the world. Let’s say we change the standard and now the power button is located in the bottom right.

Does that make sense? Of course not! Why is that? Because developers thought about this a long time ago. It doesn’t make any sense at all to have to make people use to hands to turn the power on our off. Some people like holding the remote while they’re watching TV. With a power button in the bottom right position, it’s a guarantee that someone out there would be getting rather upset that they keep turning off their television on accident.

Look, we’ve standardized things for a reason. When you’re building a website, don’t reinvent the wheel. People are already attached to standards and expect various pieces of information, like a phone number, to be located somewhere near the top right of the website. Make smart decisions and the customers will keep coming back to your website.

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It’s simple enough to request a store be added as a part of your projects scope, but the real tricky part is setting it up in a way that will convert users and increase your sales. Some will argue that on-site stores aren’t the answer, and in 3 years they might not be, but for now this is where the industry is headed and you have to be hip to the trends.

So, how can it be the “ultimate e-commerce tool”? Well, it’s going to take a great deal of time to organize the thoughts of the designer and the rest of the development team. If you’re utilizing this kind of tool then it’s important that you have a few spots on your home page to entice users to visit the products area of your website. This could be in the form of an elegant button located in the top right area of your site or a featured product box in a sidebar or somewhere else so long as its above the fold.

You can use all kinds of other marketing tactics such as offering freebies if they purchase a product now. This is a great way to pull people in. If they can get something for free without having to do a whole lot of work than that can be big, especially if they like what they’re receiving. They’ll say good things about the company and direct other people to the site who might be interested. Word of mouth, in my opinion, is the most important piece of the small business puzzle. If you have a great website that has some interesting offers and you’re visitors are pleased, then wouldn’t you agree that Web usability could very well be the ultimate e-commerce tool?

Use Web usability to direct traffic towards the areas of your website that you want them to go. This is how you get customers to convert.

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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.

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