Posts Tagged ‘video maker’
December 1st, 2008 | 
Author: When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally and serves its purpose. Here is the first of ten important rules of thumb to make sure your website performs well.
Do not use splash pages
Splash pages are the first pages you see when you arrive at a website. They normally have a very beautiful image with words like “welcome” or “click here to enter”. They became popular back in the days when most people were on a dial-up Internet connection, and visitors had a tendency to click away if the site took too long to load. The argument was that if the page loaded quickly, impatient visitors would be more likely to stick around. That may have been so in the past, but things have moved on since then.
Today, with fast connections becoming the norm this argument no longer holds true. Research as shown there are only a finite number of times a prospect is prepared to click links on your website – particularly if it’s a sales website – and that number is getting lower all the time. That extra click from your splash page to your main page, could mean the difference between a prospect clicking on the “buy now” or “go to checkout” link, or getting frustrated and clicking away.
It’s best to give visitors the value of your site up front without the splash page. If you have a long sales letter, try using CSS style sheets to make the page load faster.
In my opinion, you should especially avoid Flash splash pages. Even on a fast connection they can take ages to load. If you must use a Flash intro, give the visitor the option of skipping it.
Shaun Pearce is a video maker and webmaster. You can find out more about running a website at http://www.yourwebsiteacademy.com
Article Source: 10 Golden Rules in Website Design: Rule # 1
When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally and serves its purpose. Here is the second of ten important rules of thumb to make sure your website performs well.
Do not use excessive banner advertisements
There’s nothing more off putting than being greeted by a wall of advertising banners when you enter a website. It practically screams “I only want you to visit my site so I can make money off of you”.
Even the least net savvy people have trained themselves to ignore banner advertisements, so you will be wasting valuable website real estate. Instead, provide more valuable content and weave relevant affiliate links into that content. Let your visitors feel that they want to buy instead of being pushed to buy.
You can do this a number of ways. For example, having a “for more information please visit…” box tied to an affiliate link is probably the simplest. That way, you’re doing visitors a favor and pointing them in the direction of something that can help. The fact that it might make you some money becomes a secondary issue.
Installing Google AdSense on your site is another. These small, classified ad. type advertisements offer visitors information based on keywords found on your website. Every time someone clicks on the ad., you get paid. They’re a good way to monetize non-sales websites – blogs, for example.
Shaun Pearce is a video maker and webmaster. You can find out more about running a website at http://www.yourwebsiteacademy.com
Article Source: 10 Golden Rules in Website Design: Rule # 2
When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally and serves its purpose. Here is the fifth of ten important rules of thumb to make sure your website performs well.
Avoid using audio on your site
If your visitor is going to stay a long time at your site, reading your content, you will want to make sure they’re not annoyed by some audio looping on and on.
Peoples’ tastes in music vary, and what might sound like a pleasant melody to you, can be an annoying noise to someone else.
A couple of years ago, having an audio greeting to encourage people to stick around and read the sales letter or sign up for an eZine was all the rage. Every “guru” was plugging the idea. I split tested it on one of my websites and found conversion fell by a whopping 60% where I added the audio greeting. Needless to say, I dropped it right away!
If you insist on adding audio, make sure visitors have some control over it – volume or muting controls etc.
Video is a different matter, however. An embedded link from a video streaming site such as YouTube can really enhance your website. A picture is worth a thousand words, and if you can actively demonstrate something on your website, it can improve your visitor’s experience of your site.
As with audio, you should make sure the visitor has control over whether he or she watches the video. Do not set the video to play automatically, rather let your visitors click on the play link themselves.
Video testimonials can be a real inducement to purchase your product or service as prospects can see the testimonials are genuine and from “real people”. Go easy on the number of videos on your site, though, as too many can really slow your site’s loading speed.
Shaun Pearce is a video maker and webmaster. You can find out more about running a website at http://www.yourwebsiteacademy.com
Article Source: 10 Golden Rules in Website Design: Rule # 5
When it comes to your website, extra attention should be paid to every minute detail to make sure it performs optimally and serves its purpose. Here is the penultimate of ten important rules of thumb to make sure your website performs well.
Don’t assume everyone has the same size monitor as you
If you’re into web design, or spend a lot of time at your computer, you may have invested in a large, flat screen monitor. It’s a worthwhile investment, but not everybody has one. That’s why it’s important your website can be read by all your visitors without them having to pan across to the left and right using the slider at the bottom of the frame.
I use Google Analytics to track my website visitors, and I’ve discovered that the majority of them have a screen setting of 1024×768; however, some have a screen size of only 800×600 while others have a massive 1768×992!
You need to make sure your site looks good to all your website visitors, not just the ones who have the same size monitor as you.
Sometimes you’ll notice a lot of websites – especially single page “mini sites” – have the content constrained in a table or frame in the center of view. This means the site looks pretty much the same to all web visitors. I find a width of 663 pixels works best. Fill in the remainder of the screen space with a solid color or a repeating graphic. Just make sure it doesn’t distract the visitor from the main message of your site.
Shaun Pearce is a video maker and webmaster. You can find out more about running a website at http://www.yourwebsiteacademy.com
Article Source: 10 Golden Rules in Website Design: Rule # 9