All usability standards are designed with one premise in mind:  meet the needs of the user.  The company and the web designer who really spend time trying to understand the website visitor, their reasons for visiting, and what they are expecting to get out of the visit will design a better website.  The guidelines just help focus the efforts.

When it comes to the issue of branding, the first thing most potential customers want to know when they come to your site is “Who are you?”  That question is then very quickly followed by “How do you help me?” and “Why should I trust you?”

To answer the “who are you” question, the website usability standards say you should prominently display your logo in the upper left-hand corner of the page.  Americans are taught to read from left to right, top to bottom, so the most important image and words should be in the upper left.  If you are designing for an Asian market, your image and text positioning would be different.

Studies have shown that the eye gravitates to images before words, and photos draw attention the quickest.  Website design usability standards suggest the use of photos whenever possible.  Graphic elements should be spread out over the page, at the top, middle, and bottom, to draw the visitor’s eye into the text.

Your headline and tagline need to grab attention.  Put it in English.  Don’t be overly cute or clever.  You have at most 5 to 8 seconds to capture their attention.  If you can answer the question “How do you help me?” in a clear, captivating tagline, you will be miles ahead of your competition.

The path to the information the visitors seeks should be clear and obvious.  Don’t make the visitor guess where they are supposed to go next.  We’ll discuss this more in our post about navigation, but despite what you may have read that the longer you can keep a customer on your site, the better, if they are on your site getting frustrated because they can’t find what they need, they will leave and never come back.  That’s not the goal.

As for building trust, your site needs to meet the visitor’s expectations.  Misspellings, broken links or slow downloads, all of these issues feed into the website visitor’s first impressions.  It may seem cliché, but most visitors expect to see a tab that says About Us and Contact Us.  These convey a sense that you are legitimate and trustworthy.

After an initial design is done, you need to step back, put yourself in the customer’s shoes, and approach the website’s home page as the potential customer might.  Did you show the customer who you are?  Did you tell them how you could help them?  And are you demonstrating that they can trust you?

We try hard to design usable, visitor-friendly websites. Our Columbus Ohio website design team is here, ready to help build your brand.  We don’t just build your website, we build your business.

It’s important that any new business establish a business goal for their site. The goal for the site will, in many ways, dictate the budget, content, design, programming, and ongoing maintenance requirements. All of these considerations play into what is “affordable.”

Though there are many variations on the theme, there are typically four types of websites: 1) the electronic business card or brochure, which is designed simply to reinforce the brand (example: http://drnorm.net); 2) the self-service consumer education or customer service portal (example: http://newdirectionscolumbus.com); 3) the direct sales Ecommerce or lead generation model (example: http://makeafrienduniversity.com); and 4) a content site which derives revenue through advertising other’s products or services (example: http://asianuniquetravel.com).

Each model comes with its own challenges, opportunities and costs. For instance, websites designed for Ecommerce or customer service support purposes will typically cost more than a website that is designed as a brand extension because they will require a more robust, more sophisticated backoffice. In an ideal world, there is a simple interface that allows the company to easily add products, promote special offers, changes prices, etc., without the use of an IT programmer. Building that interface will cost money initially. However, a professional Ecommerce sales website, properly designed and promoted, will often cover its development, maintenance, and marketing costs very quickly. The return on investment can be very high and very fast. The brand extension sites, like traditional space advertising, are harder to justify with hard and fast numbers.

While cost has to be a consideration, price alone should not be the determining factor in building a website. Before choosing a website design company, make sure they take the time to get to know you and your business goals. Make sure they are experienced in the type of site you need. Find out what reports they provide and what training they offer. Do they offer services beyond just building the website, like logo and branding design or social media marketing and online promotion services?

Only after you determine your business objectives can you truly evaluate which affordable small business website design team offers you the experience and support you need. At mywebWOW!com, we understand you have choices in selecting a website design company to work with and we encourage you to compare our rates and services with any of our competition. We believe we meet and exceed our customer’s expectations on every level. Click here to get a FREE QUOTE and get started today.

Are you getting the results you want from your current website? If you are like many small business owners, the answer is a resounding “No.” Often, in an attempt to keep the process affordable, small business website design companies try a one-size-fits-all approach to design, and then leave the small business owner on his or her own, trying to figure out what to do next.

More than once, a frustrated small business owner has scrapped their existing website, hired a new website designer, launched a new redesigned website, and ended up with the same lackluster business results. They blame the website designer, but really, it’s not their fault. The business owner simply did not take the time to identify the real problem.

Before embarking on a total website redesign, ask yourself these questions:
- What are my competitors doing with their websites that I am not?
- Is my brand identity represented effectively in my current website?
- Does my current website look professional?

If you are unhappy with the answers to these three questions, then you definitely should consider a complete website redesign. However, if you are satisfied with the answers, you may not need a complete redesign, maybe just a tweak or two. But don’t stop there. Now, ask yourself these questions:

- Is my current website appearing on the first page of search results for targeted keywords?
- Am I reaching my potential customers effectively and are they interacting with the site the way I intended?
- And finally, am I using today’s social media strategies to my best advantage?

If the answers to these questions are “no,” then you may need assistance in creating a search engine optimization strategy, which may involve some website redesign, but not always, and also seek assistance from someone in the areas of online marketing.

The answers to these questions will form the basis of your goals for any website redesign and/or online marketing initiative you undertake and will help you narrow your choices of affordable small business website designers or marketers. Not every website design firm is qualified or equipped to also address your marketing needs, and not every online marketing consultant is able to assist you with search engine optimization or website redesign.

Luckily, mywebWOW!com can do it all. We pride ourselves on being a one-stop shop, and we mean it. We love to design from scratch, but we are equally capable at taking your existing website and making it more search-engine friendly. We can also offer you a wide range of social media management programs and online marketing strategies that will have you saying “WOW!” in no time.

To get started with a website redesign, click here and request a quote. One of our friendly representatives will assess your needs and get you on the path to the website results you deserve.  If you are looking for ways to improve your online marketing, click here.  We’re here to help.

So what, exactly, is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

On its surface, SEO can seem very complicated, very mysterious.  And in a way, I suppose it is.  But to those of us who understand it, it is simply a strategic process by which a website designer strategically makes the site relevant to a search engine so the site appears highly ranked in the “organic” results (not the paid ads) for a selected keyword.

It all starts with understanding how your potential customer would use a search engine to find you.  The words or phrases they type into a search box are called keywords.  No two people search online exactly alike.  For instance, if someone wanted an SEO expert in their neighborhood, one person might type “Columbus Ohio Search Engine Optimization,” while his daughter would type “Search Engine Optimization Columbus Ohio.”  Yet another person might simply type “Columbus Ohio SEO.”    

For each of those searches, the search engines deliver different results in a different order.  It is this variation in keywords and the resulting organic results that creates opportunity. 

You see, unlike paid advertising where the competitor with the largest bank account can buy  the number one spot, the organic search results don’t rely on how much money you throw at advertising.  Instead, it relies on a strategic mix of website content, internal site link structure, appropriate tags, and external backlinks, all surrounding targeted keywords.  Any website that tried to shut out the competition on every possible keyword variation would end up with a site that no one could use or understand.

The SEO experts here at mywebWOW!com work with you to find keyword variations that have less competition in your field.  We then develop your site so that your content, your links, your tags, any external links, and even your URL address, are all supporting those targeted keywords so you can appear as high in the search results as possible.    

If you are in an extremely competitive business area, you may not be able to get on the first page of Google for “the” phrase.  If you insist on trying to optimize for that phrase, sometimes the best you’ll do is page three or four.  Your efforts will be wasted.  It’s unfortunate, but the fact is that 80% of online searchers never look at the sites beyond the first page of the search results. Ouch. That’s why you need SEO experts like the team at mywebWOW!com to help you find and analyze the keyword variations that you can exploit to get first page search results.  It’s better to be on the first page of the search results on a keyword variation that is not searched often than to be on page four of the search results for the most popular search phrase.

Our goal is to build your website in such a way that your customers find it in search engine results, will click on the link, and will do business with you.  That’s our goal for you – we want to build more than your website, we want to build your business.

To get started today, simply click here.

Free website design platforms are great, but that’s all they give you- a website design. You don’t get own your source code, there is no expert integration of SEO keywords, and your generic website design falls flat. You get a robotic website design service with no personal touch and no personal attention. There is a reason why professional website design services exist.  Simply, there’s good website design, and then there’s just website design. You really get what you pay for.

Having mywebWOW!com build your website is a partnership. We  provide you with all the web design service you could ask for at an affordable price. Columbus, Ohio has been good to us. Now we want to be good to Columbus, OH.

Go ahead and check them out at:  www.Columbus-Ohio-Painting-Services.com !

Google Maps is a function that is often activated when you type in a gepgrapgical information when conduction an online search?  An example of some our clients would be one of our Tan Envy Spray Tanning service provider.  Type in “Tan Envy Spray Tanning Louisville Kentucky” and you will find our client!

Other clients include “OVI Lawyer Columbus Ohio” (Columbus Ohio DUI Lawyer) and STNA classes in Ohio (STNA Training Provider)