Comments on: 6 Simple Web Development Tips for Traditional Media

By: Greg

Greg — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 01:29:44 +0000

Great, I hope your readers like it.

- Greg

By: Nicolas Villaume

Nicolas Villaume — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 21:05:59 +0000

Greg: Great job. You really hit the nail on the head. I am going to repost this on my site to share with my client base.

By: Greg

Greg — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 08:50:38 +0000

Ibrahım,

As always thanks for your input. It will be interesting to see how the ı-Pad changes things.

- Greg

By: Ibrahim

Ibrahim — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 03:50:01 +0000

Hello Greg:

i read the article and walked away with as many ideas as I have questions. But, I will start with some provocative examples.

The first is http://www.cpbgroup.com. The second is http://www.wk.com. Rather than comment what I believe is the most unrecognized movements in web page design and function, I will just solicit your responses.

Although not stated, in many ways, your discussion is really one about relative aesthetics. The relative part goes to the comparison between a geek designed digital display and a paper medium that principally relays on attracting eyes with beautiful photos and the most wonderfully laid out graphics and text. Two different ideas; two different mediums; two different results.

I believe there are silver linings in all of this. The differences between the aesthetics and functions of print and digital media may become blurred. This is because as time goes on more end users will appreciate a wow factor with their newly purchased HD monitors. The result is a digital wow factor that may exceed that one could otherwise realize by reading the Sunday edition of the New York Times magazine.

In the end, we will end up either finding that most periodicals will end up being limited edition collector items that we scatter about our coffee tables. Or, in place of all things analog, we’ll simply place an iPad in front of our guests, and avail them to a digital collection of Ansel Adam’s works.

By: Eric Goldman

Eric Goldman — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 03:55:15 +0000

Greg;
Thanks for the endorsement. The point you make about using Branding in the Menu is so true. We tried something different with our site’s menu tabs, using the benefits of IMA instead of the features like drip-emails, SEO and SMM which so many companies do. I think these buzzwords are meaningless to outsiders or even prospects who have just begun their research.
Keep on blogging will ya!
.-= Eric Goldman´s last blog ..B2B Sales and Marketing Team Integration? =-.

By: Greg

Greg — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 03:40:58 +0000

Eric,

That’s a great idea! My experience is primarily with large commercial web sites. Our development staff was nearly 100 so it wasn’t much of a problem to do continuous usability testing and, for any media company that is trying to build a web business the investment is tiny. Nevertheless, I can see how it would be difficult for a corporate web site and you are truly offering a valuable service.

btw. The most common mistake I see on corporate web sites is the use of internal brands on navigation. This always a bad idea. You should never use anything on your menus that would be unfamiliar to someone who is new to your company. Search engines are perfectly capable of recognizing headings, so there is really no benefit to branding a menu. It just confuses people.

Thanks again for your comment.

- Greg

By: Eric Goldman

Eric Goldman — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 02:37:19 +0000

Greg – once again, a really good article – thanks for posting.
First off, there’s a LinkedIn group called, “Holistic Website Performance” dedicated to just this topic – how to design, build and operate a website which achieves its objectives. Great discussions with some real knowledge behind them.
Next, usability. Apple success speaks to this in volumes, but you have to design this level of usability into the whole user experience – not just the website or device, but every aspect of the user’s interaction. The points you make about every page is a Home Page and those on the Menu Structure are not only valid from the marketing and usability angles, but are of paramount importance to the site’s SEO score. For example, the link in your article on a menu’s use of drop downs is great, because for SEO purposes, you should be able to reach any desired page on the site within 3 clicks. (With so much to scan these days, the search engines lose interest more quickly than they used to). In other words, your site should be no more than 3 levels deep – difficult as it gets bigger and using drop downs is one way to keep it shallow.
Lastly, you suggest testing the site. The reason that it’s so seldom done is that until recently (see below), it’s been difficult to do usability testing of this kind. Hiring, (dare I use the word?) Experts – to do it for you is very expensive; web services which do it charge about $50 per test, but that’s still expensive when you do the number of tests needed to make wise decisions.
I said until recently, because among its many capabilities, Inbound Marketing Automation (IMA) provides free usability testing. Imagine tracking your visitors’ digital footprints around your site, seeing how much time they spend on each page, what order they traverse the site in, and which offers they click on and then reject versus accept? It’s not the total picture of course, because you can’t see the visitor’s eyes or read her body language, or indeed even hear their muttered curses. But it sure beats nothing and the real increases in revenues and reductions in costs it brings are proof of that.
I feel its valid to toot this horn here, because like all the features you mention above, it’s best to design your Sales and Marketing Automation system into your website at the beginning. Both Sales and Marketing Automation systems can be retrofitted, but as we’re both saying, everything works better when all the objectives are designed into the site. Our website’s resources section has a white paper on, “How to get Priceless Market Insight for Free” describing how this approach allows you to continuously improve the performance of your website in an analytic manner (including, also for free, multivariate testing of any pages).
http://www.inbound-marketing-automation.ca
.-= Eric Goldman´s last blog ..B2B Sales and Marketing Team Integration? =-.