Tag: websites

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5 Tips for Web Design

You can find a lot over the internet about how to design a great website but there are 5 main tips that you need to keep in mind:

    Keep it simple
    Clear language
  1. Use the right pictures
  1. Important items above the fold
  1. All about the customer

Keep it simple

Have you ever visited a website that was so cluttered and confusing that you could not find what you were looking for and left without buying?

By making your site easy to navigate and clear to read visitors can find what they are looking for easier and increase your conversion rate.

Clear language

Does your ideal client know the technical terms? If not then make sure to either explain them or do not use them. You want language that your clients and potential clients will understand.

Use the right pictures

Pictures can make a website look great, but if you use a picture that is random and is not clear on what it has to do with your site or the text it is with then it is the wrong picture. You probably think that that never happens, I have seen it happen online several times this week. I was attracted by a picture then read the text or clicked on the more info and found that the picture had nothing to do with the website or topic. What a disappointment and I am not visiting that site again.

Important items above the fold

What does this mean? It is an old newspaper term, when papers were folded editors would put the most eye catching and sensational information on the top part where it could be seen when stacked. More people would buy.

The fold on a website is the part of the page that is seen when the site is first loaded without the person having scroll down. Since you only have seconds to grab attending having valuable information show up right away that the visitor likes will mean they will scroll down for more.

All about the customer

Who is the site for? You want the site to contain information the your target will find interesting and answers their questions. This means less can be more. You might want to tell them the history of you, your product or services but do they want to know? Customers are more interested in how you can help them.

What tips for web design do you have?

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Consistency is Key

If you have a blog on your website it can be difficult to come up with ideas or make time to write on a regular basis. You may write every day for a few weeks, or days, then it gets less frequent. The search engines like sites that are updated frequently, and that includes adding blog posts, but customers also need to hear from you on a regular basis.

Whether it is your social media or blog they all need to be consistent. Start with a social media plan, you need to know where you want to post to, Social Media, website blog, online articles etc. I have a yearly general plan which I sit down and plan out for a whole month, all my social media topics and even the text or general info I want within, then I see what I could go into more detail and mark them to be blogs.

You do not have to blog every day, once a week is fine, more if you like. By planning either monthly, quarterly or yearly you can schedule in a whole day to write all the blogs for a period like a month, if you are blogging once a week, that is only 4 or 5 you have to do at one time.

WordPress allows you to schedule a post to be published on a specific date, so once you have written the post you can add it to your WordPress site, add some pictures and schedule to publish on a specific date.

Writing can be difficult to start but once you do it a few times it gets easier. You do not have to write a book a couple of paragraphs can be enough, think about what information your customer would find useful. If it is too long people may not read, try splitting a longer post into smaller parts, more weeks to schedule in!

What is your tip for finding topics to blog?

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How to use text styles in WordPress

Styles are such a timesaver and a lot of people don’t even know they are there. When you are writing pages and posts there is a dropdown that usually says paragraph.

Select some text and click on that dropdown, there is a list of predefines formats called styles. In the page or post edit screen they usually do not look like they will on the finished site but you can use the preview button to see how it will look.

Styles are set by the theme and when you apply a new theme as long as it has the same style the new theme will apply its format to the text. For example the style of Heading 1 can look different in different themes, so you do not have to go into each page to manually change the font or colour. This saves you a lot of time when you want to change the look of your site.