Usability is about how easy your site is for people to get around, find what they want, get from a to b with the least effort.

Typical web users are lazy – and impatient! That means you and me too. I’m not trying to be insulting, but think about it:

When you’re waiting for a website to download, how many seconds is it before you start tapping your fingers in impatience and sighing a lot? What’s your opinion of that website’s usability?

When you’re faced with a website that you don’t get to work the first time you try something, how much effort are you prepared to put in to work out how the website owner wants you to behave? Do you think they’ve considered usability?

No, I didn’t think so!

So, what about your own website – how does it measure up for usability?

How much effort do people have to put into understand what the website will deliver?

How fast do they get your message?

Is the headline right where they’re looking?

Is the menu where they expect it to be?

Is the column width comfortable for reading?

Are the paragraphs short and easy to read?

Does it deliver the message that they want (not the one you think they should have)?

When you ask them to take action, how easy do you make it for them to do so? E.g. is the phone number right next to the ‘call us’ instruction? Is the explore our services now a link or do they have to scroll back up to the menu?

Usability affects every aspect of a website from the look, to the position, to the message and information on offer. Check yours out; poor usability sends your visitors running for an easier to use website – and they don’t come back!
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You can also find us at Lesleywriter or call us on +44 (0) 1245 473296

If you’ve ever arrived on a website that is a mass of boxes, messages and pictures you’ll know what I mean by the patchwork quilt effect! Websites like this have many things to offer the visitor and the website owner is anxious to show all their wares up front. When it comes to usability it scores low.

The problem for most web visitors is that there’s far too much information, there’s often no single place that is dominant and the messages look very ’salesy’ so some visitors can be a bit unnerved and run away to a less pressured environment – the usability factor is too much effort for them, they don’t want to have to bother.

If you have a wide range of products or services it’s tempting to try to present as many as possible up front, but please resist the urge! If your services are vastly different or if you are trying to target two or more very different market sectors, then have different websites for each so you can focus on what that sector or potential customer is looking for. good usability is based on simplicity and clarity.

Put yourself in the user’s shoes (or in front of their screen) – they’ve searched for something and your website has come up as a possible provider of that. They click the link and they get information overload – much of it not what they were looking for anyway, from a usability point of view the user will see your site as very low on the scale. Most of us are lazy and impatient when we’re surfing the net – we want instant gratification and, if it looks like we’re going to have to make an effort – we’ll go somewhere ‘easier’.

So how do you improve your website’s usability?

1. Have a focal point – a headline that’s bigger than anything else that attracts their attention and gives them a place to start.

2. Don’t give them too many choices – it’s much too confusing! It’s easy to choose between 2, harder between 3 and almost impossible when there are 6 or more options.

3. Think about what they’re looking for and make sure that the web copy addresses that and reassures your visitor that they’re in the right place.

4. If you have visual images make sure they work for their place; they must have a clear message, not be just decoration – for example, if you are providing services to the academic sector a picture of students in mortar boards and gowns won’t help you to make your point!

Remember the KISS technique – keep it short and simple – it will make your website usability factor soar, your message clearer, have more impact and get better results!
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You can also find us at Lesleywriter or call us on +44 (0) 1245 473296

Everyone seems to be obsessed with being ‘on the front page’ of Google, getting up the search engine rankings and getting hotshot AdWord specialists to increase the traffic to their website. Of course, getting traffic is important; it doesn’t matter how impressive your site looks if the only people that ever see it are your existing clients and your Auntie Flo!

The issue is that getting traffic is only half the equation – the other half is all about what happens to the ‘traffic’ when it lands on your site!

Keeping people is at least as important as getting them there in the first place. Not least, because search engine optimisation is an expensive art, takes time and effort, not to mention considerable expertise, updated almost daily as the search engines develop and rules change. If you’re investing anything from £50 to £5000 a month to get traffic, it’s money down the drain if people take one look and then hit the ‘back’ button.

So what should you be paying attention to?

1. A headline that reassures people that the site will deliver what they were looking for. If you have a targeted AdWord account, that means a landing page written specifically with each key word or phrase featured.

2. A design that makes reading easy – a clear place to start, no fancy distracting visuals, copy in the place that people naturally read – there’s a lot of ways to get this part wrong (sign up on the right for the Goldfish Report to find out more). If you have many different boxes on the page with a variety of messages you’ll just confuse people.

3. Compelling copy, focused on the reader and what they get if they buy your product or service.

It’s not quite as simple as 123, but if you’re investing in getting people to your site, you also need to invest in keeping them long enough to persuade them to take action. If you’d like to know more just give us a call.
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You’re probably already guessing at lots of things your website should do – and you’re probably right for most of them, but these are my absolute essentials:

# One – have a clear purpose
Most people will say that their website is to make sales – or sometimes as an online brochure, but then a brochure is intended to persuade people to buy, so that’s the same thing. However, you need to be realistic, if you don’t have an ecommerce site, people are probably not able to buy from you online. This means that the purpose actually is for them to ring or email.

# Two – get their attention right away
If people arrive on your website and have to search to see if you’ve got what they want, your website isn’t working. Most people won’t bother making the effort; if it’s not obvious they’ll just go somewhere else!

If you’re paying for your site to be search engine friendly and get traffic, it’s not good news if people take one quick look and leave.

# Three – don’t put obstacles in their way
Make life easy so eliminate anything that will make people work harder than necessary to get your message. How quickly can they see that you’ve got what they want? Are your pages clear or confusing?

Think about your website from the viewer’s perspective – if you know what you want them to do, get their attention and make it easy for them to take action you’ll be way ahead of most of your competitor’s websites!

Usability is all about how easy it is for people to find the answer to their query, the information they wanted and their way around your site.

The first challenge is that people can see whether you’ve got what they thought they wanted quickly. This is usually down to clear headlines, clean navigation and no confusing clutter on the page on which they arrive and simple, straightforward web copy.

The second challenge is that the site is constructed logically with easy to understand menu choices – so NOT ‘who we are’, but stick to ‘About’; much less creative, but doesn’t require people to think about it! When they get to the ‘About’ page make sure the web copy doesn’t spawn lots of additional pages with details of ‘what we do’, ‘how we work’, ‘mission statement’, etc.

The third challenge is that your web copy only provides the information that people are looking for. Just because you know all the technical detail about your product or service, don’t assume everyone else wants to know it too (hopefully, that’s what they’ll be paying you for – your knowledge and the ability to make life easier for them). Don’t be tempted to write web copy on too many subjects, stick to the point.

The fourth challenge is to keep them focused on the key message – so no fancy whizzy things that take their eyes away from the web copy and resist the urge to litter the page with pretty coloured boxes and options that provide far too many choices for them to decide amongst.

This is just the start of it – but it’s a good start! Sign up to the news service (to the right of here) and you’ll receive lots more useful information in small bite-sized chunks!

Colour definitely makes a difference to a website – it brings it to life and often adds to the professional look and feel.  But sometimes people get it wrong and the way that colours are used make the web copy virtually impossible to read.

It seems that people think red writing attracts attention – that’s true, but try and read more than 3-4 words and your eyes will start to play tricks on you.  Red is one of the hardest colours to deal with on screen.

I’ve already been on my soapbox about pale writing on a dark background, but another real challenge to readability is where two fairly bright colours are next to each other of similar tones (depth of colour).  The usually end up screaming at each other and the reader can’t bear to look.  This means any web copy in the vicinity hasn’t got a chance of being read.

Colour can enhance web copy – it can also destroy it – be careful!

When designers go to design school they learn about colours, balance, shapes and juxtaposition. They learn how to make the visual image attractive, appealing and enticing.

When writers learn to write web copy they learn about benefits, emotional triggers and writing for the reader. They learn how to craft compelling headlines, web copy that excites and calls to action that actually get results!

So where is this black hole? It’s where the words and the design come together. No matter how great the web copy is, if the designer presents it as a visual element only, it can be virtually unreadable. It’s actually very easy to achieve this – and until you really understand how the eye and the subconscious operate in tandem – it’s often a black hole that everyone is completely unaware of.

Sign up to our data service and you’ll have access to plenty of information that will ensure that your website visitors don’t disappear down that black hole, never to be seen again.

It’s no use writing killer copy, if nobody gets to read it!

In order to persuade people to use your services or buy your products they need to read what you’ve got for them – but if the website doesn’t make that easy, they’ll be off before that find out.

Usability is a big issue – and there’s far more to it than nice big fat buttons and a visible menu. You need to know how people connect with the website and where they are looking for the information they want.

If you get that right your conversions will increase dramatically.