What your customers really think about your website.

30th November 2010 Posted in Useful Info / Web

In today’s economic climate, it has never been more important to maximise your company’s web presence as more and more competitors try to attract your customers.

A recent study by Tiffany Jonas, president of Aio Design showed that 75% of customers judge a company on the design of their website. This is made even more important due to what psychologists call ‘The Halo Effect’. Dr Lindgaard from Carleton University explains, “If a person believes a website looks good, then this positive quality will also spread to the websites other areas, such as written copy, blog articles, images and designs. Since people like to be right, they will continue to use the website that made a good first impression, as this will further confirm that their initial decision was a good one.”

Many businesses argue against the importance of investing in a professional website as it may not directly generate revenue. This is very wrong. Whether you have a full e-commerce website with an online shop, a booking system or just a few pages profiling your company’s services, your website is acting as a spokesperson for your company 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. You should really care what it’s saying about you.

Having a website designed ‘on the cheap’ never works. It may save you money to have a ‘friend of a friend’ quickly knock one up, but your customers will know that you haven’t paid much, if anything, for it. This is very problematic if you wish to appear trustworthy or affluent. People will wonder why you haven’t paid a professional to design it for you?

It has long been known that users’ attention spans are very low when viewing websites, due partly to the fast pace of work life but also due to the vast amount of alternatives available. If a user cannot find the information they are looking for quickly and easily, they will lose interest and try their luck elsewhere. Web users are a fickle bunch.

So, what can you do to keep customers interested in and returning to your website?

• Understand your user’s goals (this might be purchasing a product or booking a holiday)
• Allow your users to achieve their goals quickly and easily
• Centre your content around what you can do for your customer
• Update your website regularly, with useful and informative articles
• Make your site intuitive to navigate
• Make sure your site is professionally designed