This month, Emma Garton, one of our fall Client Relations Interns, outlined tactics for improving website user experience and effectiveness. When each of these elements are optimized, they work together to create a mutually beneficial relationship that enhances a website’s presence. Here are 5 strategies to kickstart this relationship and keep it going strong.
- Your Website is Your Business Hub – Of all the spokes on the marketing wheel, your website needs to act as the axel. If it doesn’t, you’ll quickly be left behind in the competitive landscape of the World Wide Web. To prevent this, your goal online is two-fold: get visitors to your site and keep them there for as long as you can. Having your website as the core of all that you do will help keep you on track.
- Tackle User Experience First – User experience can be broadly summarized into three facets: usability, accessibility and aesthetic appeal. To discern if your website is meeting and excelling in these three criterion, consider these questions:
- Usability: How quickly and efficiently can a visitor complete the task they are looking to complete on your website?
- Accessibility: Can visitors of all abilities and skill levels reach, use and understand the website’s system?
- Aesthetic Appeal: Does the branding, content and graphical elements all work together to create consistency and continuity throughout the entire website?
- Security Should Come Standard – Another feature of the World Wide Web constantly in the back of visitors’ minds is security. Simply put, the quickest way to discredit yourself and your business is not ensuring the safety and security of your consumers information. Both the concept and application of security online is not hard to understand or implement, so do yourself a favor and make sure the proper security measures are in place to safeguard your visitors and, in turn, your reputation.
- Metrics Determine Effectiveness – A website’s effectiveness in retaining visitors starts to get into the more technical elements behind the scenes, such as search engine optimization and calls to action from a content management standpoint and bounce rates and user activity tracking from an analytical standpoint. Due to this, you’re going to need someone on your team that is willing and capable of digging into these metrics to search for patterns and recommend steps for improvements.
- Invest – In total, it’s going to take some money and time to get your website where is needs to be in terms of user experience and maintenance. And once you think you’re there, ongoing maintenance is required to adapt to new technologies, changing trends and web best practices. I know it can sound like a lot, but being methodical and strategic from the onset will always pay off in the long run.
Whether you’ve had a website for years or are looking to break into the online realm for the first time, our team of web developers, programmers and designers know what it takes to make your website presence stand out. Please give us a call at 701-478-1111 and ask to speak with a Marketing Advisor, or take some time to complete our website project inquiry to get started.