One partnership our search engine marketing firm engaged in last year with gold bullion dealer Provident Metals has seen tremendous success.

When we start working with a firm to grow their online presence and by extension, traffic and revenues, we set realistic goals to accomplish the desired end. In the case of Provident Metals, traffic and search rankings for the bullion dealer’s site increased well beyond anyone’s expectations.

Since formation of the partnership in mid-2010, Provident Metals’ website has seen over a 600% increase in web traffic. Much of this traffic has been driven by the exponential increase in the company’s page 1 Google rankings. Coupled with social media engagement and a re-designed online store, the bullion dealer has experienced much success since teaming up with our firm.

Now that the new site design is complete and a large catalog of informative content is established, we’re now working to target some super-competitive phrases related to PM’s industry – think ‘gold bullion’, ‘silver bullion’ and others.

Dominating these keyword phrases will vault Provident Metals into the elite circles of the bullion industry.

We’ll continue to work with Provident Metals to build informative web content that builds search rankings and engages the reader to act. Providing timely and informative content is key to building thought leadership and trust with customers.

We’re excited to be working with such a reputable company that prides itself on superior customer service. Stay tuned for more important updates on our exciting work. In the meantime, read more about the partnership in our latest press release.

And if you’re searching for an online partner dedicated to helping businesses grow, contact search marketing consultants at SEO Advantage today to find out how you can effectively harness online channels to build website traffic and revenues.

But once you’ve grabbed their attention, you’ve got to keep them there.

Bad site design from a usability perspective will certainly kill your site’s good will. How many websites didn’t have easy to follow navigation or otherwise made it difficult to find what you needed?

Sadly, this is more common than anyone wants to admit.

Below is a list of the 10 most common web design mistakes compiled by usability expert Jakob Nielsen. Of course, there are other design issues from an SEO perspective you need to consider. But these following 10 mistakes will kill the experience for your visitors, which will depress the number of visits and conversions you ultimately receive.

#1 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Bad Search

When site visitors can’t find what they’re looking for through the site’s navigation, they turn to search. Some just jump right to the search bar and type in their query. However, many online users don’t have a keen sense of grammar and spelling. If your site’s search functions are overly literal, this could hurt you.

Be sure your search functions are able to handle typos, plurals, hyphens and other variations of important terms on your site’s materials.

#2 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Over-use of PDF Files

Adobe PDF files are generally reserved for extensive e-books and other information that’s better off being printed. If a user encounters a PDF while browsing, it breaks their flow and leads to a bit of frustration. Also, layouts for these documents aren’t meant for the web and usually display in very small fonts that are difficult for users to handle on-screen.

Therefore, only use PDF for manuals, e-books and other large chunks of content that need to be printed. Convert any information that should be browsed or read on-screen into a real webpage.

#3 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Not Changing the Color of Visited Links

Understanding where you’ve been helps you better understand where you’re going, both in life and on websites. For the web, links are the key component in this navigation process. Knowing which links you’ve already visited keeps you from unintentionally revisiting the same page again. Testing has shown if sites do not change the color of a link once it’s been clicked, much disorientation and frustration among users will result.

Therefore, be sure you setup your links to change color once the visitor has clicked on it. This will help your visitors avoid visiting the same page twice, or three times.

#4 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Non-Scannable Text

A big mistake among web copywriters and designers – not having copy that’s scannable makes it look intimidating to readers. Boring and painful are other metaphors that can describe one’s feeling when they run into non-scannable text.

Use bullet points, sub-headings, bold-print, short paragraphs and a simple writing style to make your copy more inviting. Remember, most users scan, they don’t actually read everything word for word.

#5 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Fixed Font Size

Web design platforms like CSS (Cascading-Style Sheets) provide an option to allow you to disable a web browser’s change font function(s). The default most of the time, 95% of the time in fact, sets the font-size kind of small, reducing readability. This can be especially frustrating for users over 40 or with poor eye sight.

Respect users’ choice and allow them to easily resize the font to a level needed for them…to make it easier, express font-size in relative terms rather than pixel size.

#6 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Page Titles with Low Search Engine Visibility

Your site’s <title> tag is a very important element of your website. It’s what search engines will display in your site’s listing, which is what users first see about your business and will click on if they’re searching on Google or Bing. It’s also the default setting if users bookmark your site. Many sites though say ‘Welcome to’ or begin their <title> tag with ‘the.’ Also, many sites don’t have different <title> tags for each page.

For your homepage, begin your <title> tag with your company’s name followed by a brief, keyword-rich description of what you do. Search engines though only display the first 66 characters but you can have a few more if you need them. For other pages’<title> tag, include important details of the page’s content using keywords you’re targeting.

#7 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Advertisements (…or things that appear as one)

As the web has developed, users have become quite keen on avoiding anything that looks like an advertisement – or anything that interrupts their ‘goal-driven navigation’ as stated by Nielsen. Text-ads in search results are an exception to this rule of course. Unfortunately, many good design elements have similarities to ads and get ignored as well.

It’s therefore best to avoid any design elements that look like advertisements. Banners, pop-ups and overly aggressive animations can all potentially pose frustrations for users. If you have them, it’s more likely they’ll be ignored. Pop-ups in particular may in fact draw scorn from users.

#8 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Violating Design Conventions

One of Jakob Nielsen’s laws of usability – “users spend most of their time on other sites”

Meaning, users have certain expectations already set before they reach your site, which are formed by their experiences on other sites. Consistency is therefore an important principle – when users know what to expect, they feel in control. When expectations are broken, many will feel insecure and leave your site.

Stick with common design conventions in order to maintain consistency with what’s commonly done on most other sites. You can of course, and should, make yours unique from your competitors. But with certain navigation and design elements, you want to maintain some form of consistency.

#9 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Opening New Browser Windows

If you’re like me, having a new window or ‘pop-up’ just come up on the screen can be frustrating as all get out. Considering systems can freeze up, loading a user’s machine with more ‘junk’ can in fact lead to a lot bad feelings. Besides adding pressure on their systems, new browser windows disable the ‘back’ button, which is what a vast majority of users use to navigate away from a page.

Links should therefore only replace the current page with new content. If a user wants to open the page in a new window, they can easily do so by right-clicking on their mouse.

#10 Most Common Web Design Mistake – Not Answering Questions

Since web users are inherently ‘goal-driven,’ not answering important questions about your products or services is a big failing of many websites. Not providing any specifics or burying them deep beneath a bunch marketing jargon will make users think what you offer can’t help them. One of the best examples of this is price – how much does it cost?

Ecommerce sites generally don’t make this mistake but a lot of B2B sites do unfortunately. But many B2C ecommerce sites too may leave the price out of lists like category pages or search results, which can lead to user frustration and reduced conversions.

One principle we always like to remember and urge you to think about – “people buy things from people, not websites.” Therefore, their experience must be enjoyable and not rife with uncertainty and errors. It should move along flawlessly – each flaw reduces good will and ultimately conversions.

But considering the fact many websites contain hundreds, maybe even thousands of pages, it can be a daunting task regardless of how careful you are. Proper planning helps ensure it all goes smoothly…no or very little planning can turn it all into a big nightmare.

Pages can get mixed up, deleted or otherwise not be available on the new site, which can end up costing your company thousands of dollars.

To avoid this calamity, you need to consider the following factors before, during and after. Continue reading to learn about all of these considerations you need to keep in mind when redesigning your website.

Before doing anything though, you need to get some baseline information and backup your old site just in case something goes awry. Load time, conversion rates, search rankings, bounce rates for your top landing pages and a list of important inbound links is information you need to have in-hand before you even get started.

Once you have all of this, it’s time to start your site re-design. Taking the following 34 steps during this process will ensure it all goes smoothly and you begin reaping the benefit of a new website as quickly as possible.

Prior to New Site Launch

1.       Have the old site available to put back online immediately if something goes wrong.

2.       Retain your existing URL structure if possible so you can minimize impact on search rankings.

3.       Address methods to eliminate duplicate content to prevent it from occurring in the first place.

4.       If you’re unable to keep existing URL structures, have a plan on how you will handle switching to the new file structure, including 301 re-directs, updating links, marketing materials and PPC ads.

5.       Keep a copy of the old site on-hand just in case.

6.       Use a link checker utility like Xenu to scan your new site and find any broken links.

7.       Take a moment to review titles and meta descriptions on your new site.

8.       Before launching, check your new site manually using multiple web browsers (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari and Chrome). Many differences exist between these browsers.

9.       Update XML and HTML sitemaps so search engines can easily crawl your new site.

10.   Verify all web forms and other interactive features are working properly.

11.   Protect your site from competitors and search engines during development. The best way to accomplish this is to develop the site locally and internally to your firm.

12.   Review existing RSS feeds

13.   Verify your new site will work properly with traffic tracking codes like Google AdWords and Google Analytics.

14.   Develop a plan to add current analytics tracking to your new site before launch.

During new site launch

15.   Did you back up your old site? If not, now is your last chance.

16.   Update your .htaccess and robots.txt files so any 301 redirects will work properly.

17.   Be sure AdWords and PPC campaign pages are updated and working properly.

18.   Update payment gateways or other important sites if your server’s IP address changes.

19.   Test all email address and make sure they’re working properly.

20.   Remove any temporary no-index tags, robots.txt and be sure any other robot control tags are updated in case you had something blocked off during the development process.

After new site launch – catching any mistakes

21.   Run your spider/link finder once again to catch any broken links you may have missed.

22.   Test your new site’s load time. Google has claimed load time is now a big ranking factor.

23.   Make double-sure you put tracking codes/scripts on your new pages

24.   Check server logs for any 404 or other server errors.

25.   Look at your Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster accounts to see if the search bots are spotting any errors.

26.   Update any broken inbound links at the source of the link or through a 301 re-direct.

27.   Verify PPC ads are still correct.

28.   Make sure your XML sitemap is up-to-date.

29.   Compare bounce rates for the new site vs. the old one.

30.   Monitor how newly indexed (…or re-indexed) pages are ranking.

31.   Now that your site is live online, test it once again with all web browsers and even a mobile smartphone if you’re able to.

32.   Manually test all web forms and other interactive scripts.

33.   Check where your site is in the search results after the search engines have indexed it once again.

34.   Go to Google and Bing and type “site:yourdomain.com” in the search bar to see if the number of pages indexed has improved over your previous numbers.

Taking these all important steps helps ensure your site transition goes as smoothly as possible. Also, they help you spot any errors and allow you to make those corrections before any negative consequences arise.

Double, perhaps even triple check your site to make sure everything is working properly. If not, you’re certain to suffer devastating setbacks in the search engines as well as eroding good will of your site visitors.

Remember what Thomas Edison once said – “Good fortune is what happens when opportunity meets with planning.”

These various pictures and examples can help you easily visualize the concepts author Steve Krug outlines in his book. See an example of a tagline and welcome blurb. See an illustration of how designers view web pages they create and how people out in the real world view them.

Having these illustrations better explains the usability concepts outlined in Don’t Make Me Think and make it more interesting to read. We all like pictures and charts, right?

So if you’ve already read our review on Don’t Make Me Think but would like to see some illustrations to help you understand web usability further, by all means check out parts I, II and III again. And if you haven’t read the book review, start by reading the intro and basic concepts of web usability in part I.

Of course, to really understand web usability fully, we suggest you purchase a copy of Don’t Make Me Think today. It’s available on Amazon at a really good price (…w/ free shipping too!!)

One more note – thank you to Steve Krug for providing these wonderful illustrations from his book. We definitely feel they give our book review the added appeal to make it really useful for burgeoning web marketers.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

(…tune in later for a few graphic images to help you understand better. Or, order a copy of the book and have all of Krug’s ideas at your fingertips)

Happy Reading!!!

Section II – Things You Need to Get Right

With these guiding principles in mind, now it’s time to see how these principles apply to the two biggest and most important challenges in building a website. That of course is the navigation and the Home page.

Since each of these chapters is quite long, I won’t be able to cover everything but hopefully you should be able to easily get the basic idea. For more, get yourself a copy of Don’t Make Me Think from your local bookstore or Amazon.

Chapter 6: Street signs and Breadcrumbs – Designing Navigation

If someone can’t find their way around your website, they won’t use it…it’s that simple. As web users too, just think about how you feel when you’re on a site that’s hard to navigate. You get fed up, leave and probably never return.

So how do I create clear and consistent navigation then?

Krug uses the analogy of a brick and mortar store which is good. Grocery stores, department stores and other retail outlets generally have navigation in a store to help you find what you’re looking for. First you start with the department the item is likely to be in then you move on to find the particular aisle.

Web navigation and site hierarchy works the same way.

When arriving at a site, users are generally looking for something, be it information or an actual product. Like an old fashioned store, they decide to either browse or ask someone. In the online world, browsing is akin to using navigation to find something. Asking someone is the equivalent to using a site search (…a feature all sites should have)

Navigation gives us something to hold onto when surfing a site. It tells us what’s here, how to use the site and gives us confidence in the people who built the site. Navigation elements include a Site ID, Sections, Utilities and Subsections (See illustrated examples on p. 61).

Persistent navigation elements need to be included so users know where they are at all times. Navigation elements should not (…and in fact cannot) be exactly the same throughout your site.  But the following elements should be on all pages (except pages w/ forms like a checkout or signup and the homepage):

• Site ID
• Sections
• A way home
• A way to search
• Utilities

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

Other ways to counteract the whole “lost in space” reputation the web has is to leave what are called breadcrumbs in your navigation. Include a clear hierarchy on each page and be sure you highlight someone’s current location in whatever navigational bars, lists or menus appear on your page.

And be sure the current location indicator clearly stands apart from other elements on your page…simply saying ‘you are here’ is too subtle and ends up just adding more noise to the page.

Tabs across the top are another way you can help people easily identify where they are on a site.

Once you have a mock-up of a page’s navigation, Krug suggests trying what he calls a trunk test. Imagine someone threw you in the trunk of an old Cadillac, drove you around for awhile and dropped you off on a page deep within a site (metaphorically of course).

Well designed pages answer the following questions without hesitation:

• What site is this? (Site ID)
• What page am I on? (Page name)
• What are the major sections of this site (Sections)
• What are my options at this level? (Local navigation)
• Where am I in the scheme of things? (“You are here” indicators)
• How can I search?

See examples of a trunk test beginning on page 85.

Chapter 7: The first step in recovery is admitting that the Home page is beyond your control – Designing the Homepage

Homepages are the water-front property of a website. They have to accommodate several things like site identity and mission, site hierarchy, site search, teases, promos, timely content, deals, shortcuts and registration if that applies to your situation.

In addition to these needs, a homepage needs to meet a few more abstract objectives like:

• Show me what I’m looking for
• …and what I’m not looking for
• Show me where to start
• Establish credibility and trust

And to add insult to injury, you’ve got to be able to do all of this blindfolded. What Krug means by this is everyone in your company wants a piece of the action on a homepage. They want a promo or a link to their section. This is where intense internal turf battles regarding websites emanate from.

Homepages can’t do everything and those who try and make them do everything usually create a cluttered homepage. Failing to convey the big picture is usually the first casualty if you approach the homepage this way.

So how do I communicate the big picture?

Everything on the homepage should contribute in some way to helping us understand what the site is about. However, there are two important spots you should place explicit statements of what your site is about. One is the tagline usually located next to your company’s name in the top left of the page. The other is the welcome blurb.

A tagline is located in probably the most valuable bit of real estate on your homepage right next to your Site ID. In a few short words, it describes what your entire site is about. The welcome blurb is a more terse description of the site that’s usually displayed in a prominent spot on the homepage that’s visible without scrolling.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

Not everyone will use or even see these elements on your page. Most users simply try and guess what a site is. If they can’t, you definitely want a place where they can go find out.

Section III – Making Sure You Got Them Right

Now that we’ve covered the general concepts and things to do on your homepage and navigation, it’s time to discuss implementation and testing. By implementation, I mean the internal disputes likely to erupt between different stakeholders and how you should handle them.

Testing is pretty self-explanatory except for one thing – many websites don’t bother testing since they think it carries a high price tag. Krug lays out ways you can do great testing at a low cost. Considering it helps you find problems with your homepage and navigation, its well worth the effort.

Chapter 8: “The Farmer and the Cowman Should Be Friends – Why most Web design team arguments about usability are a waste of time and how to avoid them”

As you probably can tell, it takes several different skills to build a website. You need a good designer, developer and business development team. And of course, you’ve got the CEO who has their own ideas.

Each of these players has a different perspective on the best route to take. A developer for example may like a site with lots of cool features but not much in the visual department. Designers will most likely think most users like visually appealing sites because they like visually appealing sites.

These two perspectives can often clash and cause bad feelings.

On top of that, a business development team and upper management focus more on making whatever promises are needed to attract customers, strategic partners, revenue-generating deals and venture capital to the site.

Art Kleiner details a culture split between developers/designers (craft) and business development/upper management (hype). This continuous struggle between hype and craft adds even more complexity to any discussions involving usability.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

Debates that often ensue between these parties often are ‘religious’ in nature, meaning they can go on and on. Conversations like these generally involve people expressing strongly held views about things they can’t prove. These debates can go on for weeks while nothing gets accomplished with the website.

Another tendency all of these players fall into is thinking all web users are just like them. So many websites out there are designed with one user in mind. The team who put it together assumes the majority of web users are just like them so they design their site with that in mind. That’s where the myth of the average user comes in.

This belief can cause meetings to be rife with gridlock. After hours of debate, the team decides to find some way to determine what most users like and get a picture of their Average Web User.

Watching web users for many years, Krug certainly believes there’s no Average Web User.

We’re all unique in our own way of approaching the web, each with our own intentions, motivations and thought processes.

If you approach a site with the Average Web User mindset, the idea that good design simply involves you figuring out what people like gets reinforced. While it’s tempting and easy – pulldowns are good because most people like them or having links to every page on your site from your homepage – it certainly is rife with consequences.

In fact, there’s no right or wrong answers to these kinds of questions. You can ask users and certain percentage will say they like Flash while a certain say they won’t. Some people like to use navigation while others like search.

What works good is an integrated design that’s carefully thought out, well executed and tested and that also fills a need.

Speaking of testing, continue reading for a recap of ways you can test your site and address any usability issues.

Chapter 9 – “Usability testing on 10 cents a day – Keep testing simple so you do enough of it”

As Steve Krug will tell you, many companies like to wait until the last minute to do some usability testing. Some don’t even mess with it at all.

There’s many excuses for not testing – not enough time, not enough funds, no expertise, no facilities, lack of knowledge of how to interpret results – are just a few examples.

Many of these excuses are simple myths according to Krug, who explains how usability testing can be done for as little as 10 cents a day. If you can afford to hire a professional do so, but if you’re on a tight budget, you can do the following to learn about the weaknesses in your site.

• Test three or four individuals rather than 8 or more like the pros
• Almost anyone will do. Grab a few people from around the building
• A lab can consist of any office or conference room. All you need is someplace quiet
• Tests can also be done at any time without much scheduling
• Decide which pages you’re going to show and run tests continuously throughout the design process
• Debrief results with your team immediately after the tests

Try to find users that reflect your audience but don’t get too worked up about it. Get further perspective by finding people outside of your target audience. Offer reasonable incentive to your participants and avoid discussing the site with them beforehand.

There are two types of tests you will want to run throughout your development process. One is the “get it” test, which basically means exactly what it says. Does the test subject understand the purpose of the site, the value proposition, how it’s organized, how it works and so on?

The other test is the “key task” test where you ask the user to do something then watch them how they do it. See if more than one user gets hung up somewhere and address the problem immediately.

Typical problems users will encounter include the following:

• They’re unclear on the concept
• The words they’re looking for aren’t there
• There’s too much going on

When you’re addressing problems though, go for the low hanging fruit and avoid the temptation to add things. Krug also suggests you should take ‘new feature’ requests with a grain of salt.

In the end, test early and relatively often. It’s a shame to see sites that obviously haven’t taken the time to see if their pages and navigation are usable.

In the next and final section, we’ll be discussing usability as a courtesy to others, accessibility for disabled users along with interactions with your superiors…so check back next Tuesday afternoon for third and final installment

No matter if it’s a website, an electronic device or a really nice car – if you can’t easily use it, you’re going to get frustrated pretty quickly.

This is especially true of websites…they must be user-friendly for each type of visitor coming to your website. There’s no one-size fits all here!!

With that said the title of a book I recently read on the subject – Don’t Make Me Think – sums up the purpose and spirit of making

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

sure your website is easily usable. If you remember anything from this, remember those 4 important words and you will understand the essence of good web usability, which should answer four important questions in a matter of seconds without the user having to think.

First of all, I’d like to say this easy-to-read book by Steve Krug is a must have for anyone wanting to market a business online. Krug’s strong visuals and eloquent prose help you easily visualize how homepages, sales pages and any other page on your site should be structured.

Besides the good writing and illustrations, the book is an easy read as well. Like Krug says in his introduction, it can easily be read in the time it takes to fly from New York to L.A.

Well enough of the glim and glam, let’s get down to the book and what it’s about. Continue reading for a brief overview of each chapter and the concepts Krug explores. Of course to fully understand web usability, I strongly suggest you get a copy of Don’t Make Me Think the first chance you get.

While this book isn’t very long, a blog post summarizing all of the important points would be. With that in mind, this review will be broken into two parts. Below is the first part of our review for your enjoyment and enlightenment. Check back in a few days for a summary of more of Krug’s insights (…and illustrations too).

Don’t Make Me Think – A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug

Krug’s nearly 200 page book comes jam packed with illustrations and tips for making your website more usable. It’s divided into 4 sections and contains 12 chapters in all. Continue reading for a quick overview of each chapter.

Section I – Guiding Principles

Chapter 1 – Don’t make me think!

Krug’s first law of usability and the one thing you must remember when designing a website. Website visitors should be able to “get it” – what it is and how to use it – without having to think about it. In other words, it needs to be self evident to the point that someone with absolutely no knowledge of what you do can understand it in a matter of seconds.

Making people think when they land on your website saps their mental energy to continue. If your website is hard to navigate, it won’t take very long for someone to get mentally exhausted and leave.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

Many websites contain things that do make us think. Cute or clever names are typical culprits along with marketing-induced names, company-specific names and unfamiliar technical terms. Links to buttons that aren’t obviously clickable is another source of question.

Rather than providing another checklist to follow, Krug says you should simply understand the basic principle of eliminating question marks. If you do that, you will be well on your way to making a very user-friendly website.

Chapter 2: How we really use the web

If you stop and think about it for a minute, most of us don’t read a webpage word for word. We glance at a page, scan some text and click on the first link that we think has what we’re looking for. Many web designers though create websites under the assumption people will laboriously pore over each page and weigh their options before choosing where to go next…nothing could farther from the truth.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

Many designers think their sites are works of great literature while the reality is much closer to a “billboard going by at 60 mph.”

Below are 3 facts regarding real world web use:

1.       We don’t read web pages, we scan them

2.       Since most of us are in a hurry, we don’t make optimal choices, we just ‘satisfice’

3.       We don’t figure things out, we muddle

Krug in fact said something very interesting about muddling and that is experts aren’t really experts, they’re simply “…muddling through at a higher level.” Remember that the next time someone poses as an expert.

Chapter 3: Billboard Design 101

Considering web users are generally surfing the web at lightning speeds, web designers and marketers need to view their homepage and other pages as billboards rather than great works of art.

Those of us who have worked on web pages take great pride in our work. While this is admirable, it’s important we view our web pages in the proper context in order for them to be successful.

In Chapter 3, Krug outlines 5 things you can do to make sure users see and understand as much about your site as possible. These include:

1.       Creating a clear visual hierarchy on every page

2.       Taking advantage of conventions (both naming and graphic)

3.       Breaking pages into clearly defined areas

4.       Making it obvious what constitutes a clickable link

5.       Minimizing noise

There’s nothing new about visual hierarchies in fact. Prominence, grouping and nesting are concepts used in newspapers for ages.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

They’re basically designed to give the reader useful information on the contents of the page before the reader actually reads anything. Conventions are also something newspapers have used for ages. Headlines, sub-headlines, picture captions are some examples of both traditional and online conventions.

#3 is pretty obvious…clearly defined areas are a must. Again, this feeds into the goal of creating a webpage users can figure out in a matter of seconds without any thought.

Making sure links clearly state they’re clickable is also important for maintaining patience and goodwill among your users. And finally, keep noise to a minimum. Visual noise can kill an otherwise good page. Having too many things on a webpage can overwhelm users and cause more of them to just leave.

Chapter 4: Animal, vegetable or mineral? Why users like mindless choices.

Over the years, web designers and usability professionals have spent lots of time debating how many clicks you should expect a user to go through to get what they want without getting too frustrated…many designers in fact have rules specifying the maximum number of clicks to get to any page on a site.

Krug thinks numbers aren’t so important though – while it seems like a useful criteria to him, it’s generally safe to assume most users don’t mind a lot of clicks as long as they’re effortless.

Making choices as mindless as possible is in fact one main task to making a site easy to use. Be sure links and drop-down menus are clear in what they offer.

Chapter 5: Omit needless words – The art of not writing for the web.

Considering the vast majority of web users scan web pages and don’t read them word for word, having needless words in your copy will only frustrate matters from a usability perspective.

In his Elements of Style book, E.B. White details several rules, the 17^th of which is the following:

Omit needless words

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.

Omitting needless words has several benefits, including:

• Reducing noise level on a page
• Making useful content more prominent
• Making pages shorter, which allows users to see more of the page without having to scroll

Therefore, if you’re going to omit needless words, all the happy talk (i.e. self-congratulatory promotional writing) must go. You can tell when you’re reading some. In the back of your head, you hear voices saying, “Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…”

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

Another way to omit needless words is to eliminate instructions. No one is going to read them unless they’ve failed several times at just ‘muddling’ through. Eliminate instructions by making everything as self-explanatory as possible.

From Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. © 2006 Steve Krug. Used by permission

This brings us to the end of part I of Don’t Make Me Think, which outlined some guiding principles you need to understand in order to build a useful website. Check back with us in a few days to learn how you should design your navigation, homepage and even how you can deal with the inherent controversies that stem from building a website for your company in part II of our review and summary.

I for one had a wonderful Christmas and New Year and certainly took my share of time to reflect on 2010 and look ahead to 2011.

In regard to our little web marketing blog, I’ve been doing some thinking about it the last few weeks. Last year we updated the look and layout of SEOe (great work Gaby!!).

Now it’s time to focus on what you come here for, the content.

We’ve been developing this neat little resource for a couple of years now – building it up by providing you with diverse, thoughtful ideas on marketing your business online. We delve into all aspects of this endeavor and don’t focus solely on one piece of the puzzle like many other blogs and sites do.

Like our company – SEO Advantage, Inc. – SEOe is a full service web marketing blog. Here you can find insightful tips and commentary on all aspects of the web marketing puzzle, including:

• Search engine optimization
• Site Architecture, Graphics and Usability
• Social Media
• Content Development (landing pages, blogs, articles, etc.)

We certainly plan on continuing this structure going forward…however, to further build a resource any small business, large corporation, marketing manager or online marketer can find useful, a few changes are in the offing this new year.

Your suggestions are important to accomplishing this goal so please tell us about anything you’d like to learn more about.

Going forward though, you can expect to find more original posts about a variety of topics. Guest posts will be introduced here and there throughout the year. We’ll provide quick reviews of useful books and web tutorials.

As time and resources permit, perhaps more video interviews with various experts both inside and outside our organization will be included. While the frequency of posts will be once a week most of the time, what does go online will be more extensive. Providing a good window of time between posts I think will help foster better discussion.

(And that discussion is not just here – we’re accessible through blog comments as well as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Subscribe by completing the quick sign-up to the right and receive a weekly email containing the blog post(s)).

Above all, we want to increase engagement with you – our audience.

Tell us about your experiences and what works for you what doesn’t. If you disagree with a conclusion we present, tell us what and why.

In the mean time, stay tuned for great insights and tips from us and other industry experts regarding all facets of the web marketing puzzle.

And once again, Happy New Year!!

Nathan

That is of course you’re very knowledgeable and know how you can both have frames and an easy-crawlable site.

To clarify, a frame is actually an HTML element that pulls content from another URL and directs it to a URL of your choice…in a non-technical sense, frames essentially copy everything on a page to mirror it on another page. There are some good reasons why you would want to use frames…just be careful on how you use them to ensure your site indeed gets crawled by the search engine spiders.

Use specific tags in your HTML code to ensure framed content gets indexed

It’s not that Google and Bing don’t index content within a <frameset> tag but what usually occurs is the search engines will index framed and non-framed content separately and catalogue them as two separate pages.

Viewing frames as images is a good way to look at them. If you absolutely must use frames, you should provide a keyword-rich description of the image in case it doesn’t load. The <noframe> tag explains to users and search engines what the framed content is if it fails to load.

<noframes>Put your keyword-rich frame describing content here.</noframes>

Two important things to consider when using <noframes>: (1) place them as high up on the page as possible so it’s easily readable by search engine spiders and users whose browsers don’t support frames and (2) be sure the <noframe> tag is outside the <frames> or <iframes> tag. If it isn’t, that content may not get picked up by the search engine spiders.

Another “frames” tag for that’s gaining a lot of popularity is the <iframe> tag. It’s used to embed dynamic information and a wide variety of widgets on a site…Facebook’s “Like” button/widget is one common use for an <iframe> tag.

Many who use <iframe> though don’t realize that it doesn’t generate a link back to their site – which is one of the main reasons to use the tag in the first place.

Fortunately, there is a way to get that link by setting up the code as indexable content with the <iframe> tag. Setting up the code in the following way will get the content and any links indexed.

<iframe src=”http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php”
scrolling=”no” frameborder=”0″ style=”border:none; overflow:hidden;
width:150px; height:50px;” allowTransparency=”true”>

</iframe>

Generally speaking, we avoid frames on sites we work with if at all possible since it’s very difficult to ensure the content is indexed by the search engines and readable by our users. <Iframe> tags on the other hand can be a good method of building links when they’re used properly.

Homepages are different than landing pages according to Dr. Flint McGlaughlin, who says the homepage serves as the “entry to the house that explains all of the rooms in the house.” Landing pages on the other hand are very specific to a particular product or service.

To put it another way – landing pages introduce offers while homepages introduce the company behind those offers

Therefore, your homepage should describe all of the products and services you offer in a general sense so readers can clearly understand how you can solve their problem…a homepage shouldn’t try and do everything but rather briefly explain all of the “rooms in the house.”

According to a survey of the webinar’s live audience, one of the most common challenges webmasters face when designing a home page is having too many messages for such a small space.

Unfortunately, many homepages do not live up to their potential because they get trapped in at least one of the following five pitfalls:

1. Trying to achieve too many objectives with the homepage

2. Failing to start a conversation (either you have no copy at all or it’s very plain and boring)

3. Over-reliance on multimedia to communicate value

4. Making the homepage a landing page

5. Assuming best practices will work for you

I found pitfall #5 to be very interesting – assuming best practices will always work for you can be a recipe for at best mediocrity and at worst disaster. Flint and the team illustrated this quite well with a site that had a popup box to enter contact information, which goes against some “best practice” suggestions. Amazingly, the site that did this saw an incredible jump in conversions!

Avoiding these 5 common pitfalls can go a long way toward ensuring your homepage generates conversions and engages visitors.

The webinar takes about an hour of your time so I urge you to take a look…they also discuss eye-path and ways you can control what people see and hear on your homepage…enjoy!

In fact, there really isn’t a set amount of words a headline should be. The solution to this problem doesn’t lie in adding or subtracting a word…there’s no mysterious formula out there.

But you can test your headline to see if it’s too long by using the “breath” test according to Copyblogger contributor Sean D’Souza. Take this headline for example:

How To Recognize Six Difficult Telltale Signs Of Disinterest And Lack Of Motivation In Your Student  And     Customer

Kind of long isn’t it? If you didn’t run out of breath, you certainly struggled to read this headline in its entirety. And if you can’t say it easily in one breath, you’re not going to be able to easily hear it one breath either. This will just lead to confusion as to what the page is about.

If readers can’t read your headline in one breath, your message will be garbled.

But like we said above, adding or removing words doesn’t make or break a headline. Take this one for example:

They Laughed when I Sat Down at the Piano. But when I Started to Play …

You can’t say this one in its entirety in one breath either. But the key to this one as opposed to the longer one is the period separating the thought. A period (or comma, parentheses or dash) indicates the end of one thought and the beginning of another.

When you have this “mental pause” in your headline, a reader will instinctively know you have a pause built into your headline and read it as two separate thoughts.

So next time you’re writing a headline and think it might be too long, do the breath test. If you run out of breath or struggle to complete the thought, add some punctuation to separate your thoughts. If this doesn’t work, get rid of the headline and start over.

Giving your readers headlines and thoughts they can’t process in one breath will only lead to confusion, rendering a good headline completely useless.