We have all been hearing the buzz about “green” strategies and sustainability.  We are all responsible for molding the future of the web and contributing new content in responsible ways.  Sustainable (or “green) website design is just part of this.  It starts with committing to the mentality and applying it to how we conduct our operations online.  Most great Internet marketing strategies start with a great website.  So let’s talk about some ways we can be more efficient in design and functionality.

It has all started with the greening of data centers and hosting providers.  Data centers and hosting control panels are now leading the way in energy reduction, cooling, and bandwidth requirements.  Much of this strategy is a result of the ability to give back the responsibility to web developers and designers.  The more efficient we are at web design, the more we all contribute to helping data centers conserve energy and bandwidth.

Web standards like XHTML and CSS create more efficient websites by using less code.  Tableless website design makes it easier to reuse code through cascading style sheets.  This makes functionality and maintenance easier resulting in less bandwidth requirements.  And guess what else…its great for SEO! 

Specific design patterns can also be used to reuse code, imagery, and media.  For example, the same JavaScript can be recycled in an e-commerce shopping cart and distributed from product sku to product sku.  Even front end design elements can be reused.  The key is to separate the code from presentation and style.  Themes are a great way to recycle designs through simple customizations. 

Another great way websites can be standardized without developing new customized code (that increases bandwidth requirements) is the use of all the great open source technology out there.  Using open source technology reduces time, energy and cost.

Hardware is being refurbished and recycled as well.  Data centers and now even being located near renewable energy sources.  We are still at the beginning of sustainable website design and development strategies, but it is what we do now that will keep the improvements coming.

Does your website perform they way it is supposed to?  Do your visitors see the content you want them to and take action?  Web design and conversion optimization is all about maximizing your website’s potential to convert traffic into some kind of attainable and measurable goal.  Whether the goal is to collect emails, registrations, downloads, or purchases all the same rules apply.

Make your message clear

Make it simple

Make it easy

Here are a few suggestions to enure your visitors take action and become customers! 

Use simple but compelling language to communicate your message and its value.  Then compliment that message with a large and noticeable “call to action” so the user understands what the next step is.  The image below shows a good example of this:

The use of space, color, and page layout are very important.  Below is a great example of a good blend of color and space.  The more space you have around the call to action “buttons” the better.  Studies show that the more cluttered a page is the more likely the user is to get confused and not understand what you want them to do.

Notice how clean the page is and that a couple options are given.  The use of space is done purposefully to provide clarity and simplicity.

Other suggestions to improve conversions on websites and landing pages include:

• Trust factors – let the user know it is safe to enter their information or download your product
• Simple bullet pointed content – don’t make the user read to long paragraphs, keep them moving
• Compelling design and images – the pages of course should look clean and compelling to keep bounce rates low
• Large buttons – size does matter
• 3 to 5 step process – using a simple “step” process helps clarify what the user needs to do to complete your “sales cycle”

It is always surprising to see major brands and companies that have been around for decades that still have website built in the 90′s.  It is fairly common and many times this is simply not a priority especially if the company “doesn’t gain new business prospects via the web”.  The response to this kind of comment of course is “Of course you don’t if your website is old and invisible to Google”.

More large companies (across all industries) are starting to realize the importance of improving their online marketing capabilities.  For most, it is a matter of simply focusing on it, making the commitment, and having an internal team to head up the effort.  Even if the Internet marketing and website development initiatives are going to be outsourced, mostly companies will still need and internal marketing team leading the charge.

Some company owners and executives wonder if now is a good time to invest in improving their online exposure.  The answer of course is that it has never been a more crucial time.  During good economic times, consumers and potential customers do not scrutinize these types of things as much nor do they price compare a shop around as much as they do now.  You have one shot when someone visits your website.  This is important especially if your website is your key resource for providing information about your company and services.

So once you have decided that it is time to make the commitment, what is the next step?  Here are some tips for getting started:

• Define your business and marketing strategy: Your business goals should drive your marketing strategy.  Look at what you are currently doing (or not doing) and set some benchmarks.  Research your competitors that are doing it better.  If your major competitors have a better website (that has been redesigned in the last 12 months), great rankings in the search engines, and an exciting social media campaign, then you have some work to do!  But don’t worry…the fact that they are doing it proves that you should be too.
• Website redesign/redevelopment: Before launching the marketing strategy, you need to prepare your online platform for traffic and converting traffic into new business.  Think of this as having a house warming party.  You wouldn’t send out 100 invitations and make big plans to show off your home unless you have done spome “house cleaning” first.  Your website needs to be compelling, user-friendly, offer great value to your visitor, and have good calls to action so the user know what you want them to do.
• Internet marketing strategy: Start with the basics.  A good search engine optimization (SEO) campaign is the right long term investment to make.  There is no point investing in a new website if noone is going to ever see it (or at least not many people).  Remember my comment above about companies saying that they do not gain new clients or business from the Internet?  Well this is meant to change that.  Great rankings relevant to your industry, business, and services, will eventually build traffic and foster new customers – if the website is set up to convert.  Pay per click (PPC) advertising can be a great way to get quick results in the search engines, target specific areas and consumers, and get faster results than you will with SEO.  PPC is advertising where as SEO is more like a true investment in the future of your business.  Other strategies include social media marketing, email marketing, display ads, retargeting, etc.

The best way to get the process started is to talk to people you trust who are currently doing it.  The most important thing to realize is that consumers in all industries are researching online and could find you if you take the time to “be found”.  The web is a trasparent place and people want to know who you really are.  The days of hiding behind a website that has limited information are over (if you want to survive).   Consider starting a blog and get the executives involved.  If the CEO of Ritz Cartlon can make time for blogging and Twitter, so can you!

Conversion optimization was born out of the need of lead generation and e-commerce internet marketers to improve their website’s results. As competition grew on the web during the early 2000′s, Internet marketers had to become more measurable with their marketing tactics. They began experimenting with website design and content variations to determine the layouts, copy text, offers and images will improve their conversion rate. – Wikipedia

Conversion optimization is more important than ever as companies move more of their marketing budgets online seeking more cost effective ways to achieve their goals.  The approach has two angles.  The first starts with researching the industry and target markets of the company in need of improved conversions.  Once the data has been collected, a more targeted marketing message can be planned.  Secondly, comprehensive testing such as A/B testing is done to monitor results and make adjustments to continually improve the conversion rates. 

Conversion optimization is about achieving business goals and gaining the best possible ROI from the marketing efforts.  Here is a chart that outlines the basics:

The foundation behind conversion optimization is website design.  Once you have the marketing message put together and before you start running the campaign and testing results, you have to design the site and landing pages accordingly to achieve your goals.  Like anything esle there are some best pratices to follow when putting together a landing page.  The basics include the following:

• Keep it simple and focus on the message
• Message must be associated with ad campaign
• Keyword association
• Clear and obvious calls to action
• Simple content (bullet points)
• Trust factors
• Short registration forms
• Must be well designed and compelling

The bottom line is that a good Internet marketing company will first help you define your business goals, then help you assemble the message, and then put together the campaign, launch it and test results constantly.  Continually updating your landing pages will improve results dramatically which will lead to a well spent marketing budget!

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One of the hardest jobs for any company is creating a website that matches the feel for their product.  Take the real estate sector for example.  There are a ton of developments all over the world that claim to be “luxury.”  The term “luxury” has been thrown around so many times in the real estate field that it’s almost become a cliche.   For example, a condominium development may be luxurious but sometimes the website will not convey that same image.  Website design can be one of the trickiest aspects in the whole marketing process but it is the most important.  Everyone – no matter what the product – real estate, car, cell phone – will 99 times out of 100 go to the internet first and check out the website.  In essense, the website is your best salesperson.  If your condo development is actually luxury and high-end, your website needs to convey that image.  You need to draw the user in and keep them interested if you want that prospect to turn into a sale.  Keeping with the real estate, luxury condo developments need luxury websites.  Before you delve into the website, make sure you contact an internet marketing company that will give you advice on how to code the site to make it SEO friendly.

There is a big difference in basic website design and design done with SEO in mind.  What good is a site if it will never have the chance to achieve good rankings in the SERPs for relevant keywords?  Many website design companies out there are very good at what they do, but a truly well rounded Internet Marketing company will develop websites with search engine optimization in mind from day one.

Assuming a website development firm is building both the front end and back end of the site SEO needs to be part of the plan, even if it is not “part of the plan”.  If a firm is hired just to build the skin and another group will be handling development, coding and implementation, these two teams should be in communication from the very beginning.

So what is SEO website design?

These days, with Internet marketing on the tip of everyone’s tung, website design and development should always incorporate proper SEO site structure.  Three of the five or so key elements in a search engine friendly site are site structure, internal linking, and unique content.  All of this should be part of the plan before a wire frame is even built.

The best way to accomplish all this is by using the following steps:

• Perform a lengthy discovery period with the client as soon as the project is taken on.  This should ultimately encompass many conversations and take up to two weeks or more (depeneding on the size and scope of the project).
• Discuss keyword research and understand the client’s brand and target audience.
• Develop and detailed Functional Specifications Document that includes ALL aspects of the project including keywords, technical specifications, timelines, milestones, etc.  The FSD should include a section discussing optimization requirements, title tags, meta tags, and content (on page content, blogs, forums, etc.)

A good Internet Marketing company that offers website design will deliver a website that uses proper site structure, has great internal linking, contains appropriate amounts of unique content with keywords, and has title tags, meta tags, H1 tags and URLs that support that content.  Even if the firm is not going to be performing SEO at a future date, any client these days should expect a website product that has a healthy foundation from which to perform proper SEO strategies.

A comprehensive website design project will usually have many different moving parts.  Sometimes the client will “know” exactly what they want, provide mock-ups and a full functional specifications document.  This can be very helpful to the design and development team…or it can be troublesome because the client might micro-manage the project so much that it is pushed out of scope.  On the other hand, many clients have a general idea of their vision but seek the expertise of the designer in how to properly implement it.  The best case scenario usually falls somewhere in the middle and the designer is given creative license to excercise their skills.

Any well-rounded Internet marketing company will approach a website development project in specific steps in order to develop a full FSD that the client and the firm have agreed upon.  A good design team will create a website that is good to look at, functional, fast, and SEO friendly.

Website Design:  Website design is like an art project for the designer.  They will go through sketches, mock-ups, use various different color pallets, try different calls to action, font, CSS formatting, and layout schemes before deciding on the final version and presenting it to the client.  Even then, the designer will have to respond to what the client wants.  It can be frustrating because the designer wants to produce a site that compliments their portfolio AND that the client loves.  Clients may not always have a good design eye which can take projects off in another direction, but good tactful communication and education from the designer can keep things moving.

A website with an amazing design and beautiful animation has to also be functional, fairly fast, and perform for the basic applications that will result in some kind of conversion.  A great website that no one sees is like having a Ferrari and keeping it in the garage.  Therefore, the site must have a solid optimization platform so that it can rank in the search engines.

Functionality: One of the important aspects to keep in mind when optimizing a site for the search engines is that it must be functional, quick, and provide a valuable user experience.  If the site speed is slow, too much Flash animation is used, and the general site structure is disorganized, then the search engines can not properly “crawl” the site…and will therefore not provide decent rankings.  Solid site structure and proper functionality give the site a foundation from which to build an organic search engine optimization campaign.  Without the framework, the site will only suffer in the long run.  That is why there is almost always some website development work that needs to be done before a website can be properly optimized for search results.

Optimization:  Once the foundation and structure are in place and the site has a nice balance between “look” and “function”, the optimization can begin.  When referring to optimization you can look at it in a couple ways.  There is the optimization for the search engines required to natually build first page search results for desired key words; and then there optimization (in more of a design/development aspect) that is done to the layout and functionality of the website pages to foster conversions.  There is no point in building great traffic coming in to the site if the users do not become a customer or turn into some kind of conversion for the company.

For example, a company might be spending $20,000 per month in PPC but sending all the traffic to a landing page that has a Flash intro that takes 30 seconds to load.  This will usually result in VERY high bounce rates which means the company is bascially wasting all that money.  That is why website design must encompass all aspects of Internet marketing to ultimately achieve the desired goals.

Many of the more popular website development techniques used by website design firms or Internet marketing companies are chosen to increase site speed and usability.  These days advanced functionality and unique technology need to be inetgrated with proper optimization strategies.  All of this ensures that the sites will rank in the SERPs when SEO techniques are applied AND that the user experince is optimal.

One of the website development techniques more popluar these days is the use of AJAX.  AJAX basically combines the use of technologies such as HTML, XML, CSS, and XMLHTTPRequest all tied together through the use of JavaScript (though JavaScript is not the only scripting language that can be used for implementing AJAX applications.

Using AJAX, web applications on a given website can retrieve data from the server without interferring with the appearance of the web page changing for the user.  AXAJ can also improve site speed by only changing certain parts of the page (when a user is navigating through the site) while maintaining other areas that do not need to change (such as headers, navigation, and certain design aspects).  When the applications are communicating with the server, things like the CSS (cascading style sheet) only have to be requested one time rather than each time a user goes to a new page.  Bascially, the drastic reduction of server connections improves site speed and usabiltiy for the user.

From a search engine optimization perspective some of the disadvantages and work-arounds should be noted.  Sometimes a good website design company will focus more on design than optimization.  Great design and functionality is not always synonymous with good organic optimization or conversions.  A professional Internet marketing company will encompass all aspects of the campaign from concept to implementation.

When using AJAX some of the disadvantages to keep in mind are as follows:

• Pages that are dynamically created do not register with the browsers history so clicking “back” will take you to the previous page (but not the previous version of the AJAX enabled page)
• Search engine crawlers do not usually respond well to JavaScript code so the web developer or SEO engineer need to make sure that the content is accessible in another way so it can be indexed
• Users that do not have browsers that support AJAX may not be able to read the JavaScript enabled content

Website development used to be kept separate from orgainc search engine optimization, and often still is by some companies.  A good design firm will develop sites that have at least the basic principles of SEO optimization such as proper site structure, use of title tags, H1 tags, internal link structure, proper use and placement of content, etc.  Additionally, as the world of Web 2.0 and e-commerce have progressed, sites are no longer online calling cards.  They are interactive experiences design to generate customers, expose branding, and increase revenue for companies.  Therefore, proper conversion optimization needs to be addressed to ensure the marketing efforts are providing an appropriate ROI.

Any time an Internet marketing company takes on a new client for SEO, the first thing that should be done is a website audit and usability assessment.  You can’t send traffic to site not designed to capture it and foster conversions (or at least you shouldn’t).  So, when designing sites using techniques such as AJAX a good firm still needs to assess optimization aspects so the site can rank in the SERPs.

There have been many advancements in website design and development over the last 5 years or so.  More software applications are available to increase the speed and ease of a development project.  Engineers do not have to reinvent the wheel every time they take on a new project.  Some of the advancements have to do with specific software and site structure strategies, but others have to do with the methodoligies behind the engineering itself.

One of these concepts that is making the lives of Internet marketing companies (website development firms) and clients easier is the use of the Agile Development Methodoligy.  This is described by a simple and collaborative software development process requiring frequent inspection and adaptation.  The client and the engineer work together to develop the initial specifications and consult on a regular basis throughout the project.  When done correctly this results in a faster and more transparent project management program with a higher quality product in the end.

A professional Internet marketing company or website development firm with use strategies like this to increase both speed and quality of work.  With search engine marketing being one of the most powerful media platforms in existence, the implementation processes used by the best firms must be perfect.  No project management program will ever be perfect, but the use of standardized methodoligies can help streamliine the process.

Used in conjunction with the Agile Development Methodoligy, are often open source web development applications such as Ruby on Rails (RoR).  Ruby on Rails can best be described as a software development platform that makes the entire process easier for the engineer and is used mostly for rather short client-driven development projects.  Ruby on Rails provides a solid development framework allowing engineers to spend less time writing customized code and doing repetative work and more time building out the site.   Ruby on Rails offers several packages that can be used depending on the size and complexity of the website development project.  Additionally, plugins can be used to extend certain aspects of the various packages.

Another great website design and development process that makes projects faster, higher quality, and more appealing to the seach engines is the use of CSS (cascading style sheets).  Cascading style sheets are used to define the style of pages throughout a site and effectively separate content (usually HTML) and design.  This allows also for tableless website design.  Ultimately, the separation of content and design code allows for more clear visibility by the search engine spiders when they crawl the page.  CSS also makes for much easier and faster website development and ongoing maintenance.  When something needs to be updated, the developer simply needs to address the style sheet rather than changing it on several different pages or tables.  CSS also helps predefine font styles and sizes when using H1 tags, H2 tags, etc.

These of course are just a few of the technical and strategic advancements in website development and design.  All of the processes result in a higher quality project delivered much faster than before.  Ongoing development and maintenance for websites is now mush easier as well.