Brad Roark

Graphics mistakes that will lose you business

So you’ve finally taken the plunge and put a website up. Congratulations, it’s a wise move!

“What? You did it yourself?

“Let me take a look… oh… ummm…”

Does your website scream amateur? It might be that you did put your site together yourself or you got your cousin, Charlie, who knows a little more than you do, to put it up for you.

Now cast a critical eye over it, as if you were your customer. While you may be proud of your new-found graphic skills, you may actually be scaring potential customers away.

Simply put, a professional website header and other graphics make your online business face professional by association.

If your graphics look, well… lame, then everything else is suspect too, even if you do have valuable information on your site.

A site’s graphics are so important, but often overlooked. If you’ve gone to all the work to bring new people to your website, don’t you want to leave a good first impression?

Take a look at some of the websites you like to visit and check out their website header, their “buy now” buttons, and the other graphical elements.

• Are they in keeping with the overall theme of the business?
• Are they pleasing to look at?
• Do the graphics in the content make the site easier to read?

The good news is you don’t have to be a graphics artist to have a professional-looking website! I can reveal my resources or arrange to have it done for you to save you time and hassles.

You can email or call me anytime to discuss this.

Online shopping carts – boost or bane?

Here’s a bold statement – All small businesses should have a website, even if they do most of their business offline. A website may be where your next customer finds you, and with people buying more and more often online, it makes perfect sense for you to sell online too.

If you do want to offer products for sale on the Internet, then you’re going to need an online shopping cart. Choosing the right one is important because the wrong one could mean more work for you fixing problems.

It’s true, the right shopping cart can be a huge asset to your business and even increase the number of products sold to each customer when they buy. (Think Amazon and how they suggest other products you might like.)

The wrong cart can cause lost sales and mean huge headaches for you!

Here are some things to look for in a shopping cart:

1. The cart is secure and hacker-proof.
2. It can calculate shipping charges and tax.
3. The shopping cart can charge clients monthly for membership-type products.
4. It integrates with major credit card processing companies.
5. The cart can also offer customer upsells.
6. It will create a client database, which is very important.
7. The price for the shopping cart service is reasonable for what you get.

I realize how picking the right shopping cart can make a big difference to you. Give me a call and I can help you set up just the right one for your business.

Can your business pass this online reality check?

Here’s a reality check, or checklist, regarding your business. You can mentally tick a Yes or No to each of these…

__ I have a website that perfectly showcases what my business is.
The face of your website is the face of your business. It should reflect what your business is and does, and what your values are. This is important to remember as more and more people search via the Internet.

__ My website has professional graphics and design and looks beautiful.
Image is important. It doesn’t have to be all slick and over-the-top but it should be professional enough to be engaging and evoke trust.

__ New people are visiting my site every day.
People, aka traffic, are important to your business. Get that traffic through various marketing methods.

__ I sell products from my website.
You’re not just selling products but also your services and your brand.

__ I look at my site’s stats and know where my customers are coming from.
Knowing how people are finding your site means you can beef up the weak areas or put extra time and resources in the strong areas.

__ I use social media and there are links on my site.
At the very least you’ll want to consider getting on Twitter and putting up a Facebook fan page.

__ I collect names and email addresses of my site visitors so I can market to them down the line.
This is huge! Offer something people want in exchange for their email address and you’ll have a targeted list of people who are interested in what you have to offer.

__ Other websites have links to my site.
This is called backlinking and it helps your site get higher up in the search rankings. The better your site sits in Google, the more traffic you get.

Don’t feel bad if you marked many of these No. You’re not alone. But you can turn that around and make these all Yeses and get ahead of your competitors. I’m here to answer your questions.

Many businesses have figured out that placing videos on their website is a good move.

Why? Because it builds the brand name, showcases them as an expert, puts real people behind the name, speaks to new customers, gives important information, offers real live customer testimonials, brings in new traffic, and increases sales.

Here are some types of videos YOU could use to grow your business:

• Customer testimonial videos with real people giving their honest feedback. This is the social proof that will help you sell more products or services.

• A brief video introduction into what you do. This is like a video version of your elevator speech.

• A brief walk through of your website video. Show them the page tabs and the search function so they can find what they are looking for on your site. Also show them the contact page so they can ask questions or leave feedback.

• How To videos. Perhaps you can show potential customers how to use the product or you can explain how to purchase the best product based on their needs.

• Question and Answer videos. Take the typical questions you get and make a video answering them. This shows the customer you care, and also cuts down on your time having to repeatedly answer the same questions via email.

Video on your website can have a tremendous influence on your business, but there are some details you should know regarding how to get the maximum impact from your media efforts.

Please give me a call if you realize the potential of using video and would like to discuss it further.

When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally to serve its purpose. Here are seven important rules of thumb to observe to make sure your website performs well. Additional information can be found on keys to a great website.

1) Do not use splash pages

Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a website. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like “welcome” or “click here to enter”. In fact, they are just that — pretty vases with no real purpose. Do not let your visitors have a reason to click on the “back” button! Give them the value of your site up front without the splash page.

2) Do not use excessive banner advertisements

Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to ignore banner advertisements so you will be wasting valuable website real estate. Instead, provide more valuable content and weave relevant affiliate links into your content, and let your visitors feel that they want to buy instead of being pushed to buy.

3) Have a simple and clear navigation

You have to provide a simple and very straightforward navigation menu so that even a young child will know how to use it. Stay away from complicated Flash based menus or multi-tiered dropdown menus. If your visitors don’t know how to navigate, they will leave your site.

4) Have a clear indication of where the user is

When visitors are deeply engrossed in browsing your site, you will want to make sure they know which part of the site they are in at that moment. That way, they will be able to browse relevant information or navigate to any section of the site easily. Don’t confuse your visitors because confusion means “abandon ship”!

5) Avoid using audio on your site

If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your site, reading your content, you will want to make sure they’re not annoyed by some audio looping on and on on your website. If you insist on adding audio, make sure they have some control over it — volume or muting controls would work fine.