2009 New Years resolutions for your website
It’s only a few days until 2009 and your website isn’t working nearly as hard as you are. What’s up with that? Isn’t your website supposed to be your number one salesperson? He’s (“He” because he’s not pretty enough to be female) online 24/7, 365 days a year, no breaks, no vacation days, nothin’. So why do you feel like you’re doing 90% of the work in this relationship?
Maybe we should make some new years resolutions for your site to try and change the tide and ensure your website is more effective and profitable. Here’s a top 5 list to make things easy:
1. Blog
If you haven’t already heard it a thousand times, you will in 2009. A blog for your website is becoming a more and more vital element to a successful website. Blogs allow your visitors to:
- Get to know you
Having a personable and approachable website allows your visitors to connect with you in a new way. This connection will increase their comfort level with you and the chances of them contacting you.
- Improve your search engine optimization (SEO)
By consistently adding new content to your website, search engines will begin to crawl your site more often and soon begin to consider your site as a more valuable resource than before.
- Create a following
When visitors to your site realize that you’re constantly adding valuable information that could help them personally or professionally, they will become fans of your blog and return more and more often.
2. Content
The content on your website will determine the overall value of your company to every visitor and search engine. This is a bit hard for a trained graphic designer to write, but the content is more important than the design. How long would you keep reading a book if the content was useless, even if the cover was beautiful? You buy a book for the value of the content, not the aesthetic appeal. Unless, I suppose, you’re an illiterate book collector.
3. Conversions
Every website is built for a purpose. Whether a personal blog or a 500-product e-commerce site, every site exists for conversions. The conversion for a blog may be the user reads a post and is informed. A conversion for most websites, however, is users either purchase a product or contact the company for more information. Here are a few ways you can increase conversions on your site:
- Forms
Add a simple form on your site to be contacted, and not a mere email address.
- Landing Pages
Create a few different landing pages for your top products or services. Build a few new pages on your site that focus exclusively on one important product. Add a simple form on that page as well as your phone number. If you have a live chat feature, add it. Make access to buy your product as simple as possible. Finally, find other sites online to link directly to those landing pages. Do not send visitors to your homepage if they’re likely seeking a specific product on a different page.
4. Design
For the first few years of my web design career, I didn’t think twice about eye tracking, heat mapping, content flow, conversion rates, bounce rates, accessibility, or most of the other web standards that are so critical to a successful website. I would simply design it so it looked as kick-asterisk as possible and assume that good design would compensate for the rest. The sites ended up anything but “kick-asterisk.” They were more like suck-hyphen. They had high bounce rates and low conversion rates.
So, is design nothing but fluff? Of course not. There is a reason why the affluent in our society all drive slick (but functional!) sports cars and live in very fancy homes with a high focus on aesthetics. We live in a world addicted to beauty and trends. This addiction leaves web surfers constantly seeking aesthetic websites that have a fresh look and feel and are current with the latest trends.
Check out our portfolio or these examples of aesthetic, yet functional sites.
5. SEO
Search engine optimization and search engine marketing are going to become some of your best friends in 2009 – assuming you desire success online next year.
With a dramatic increase of websites online every day, your market share is organically shrinking every day. You’re going to have to work harder and smarter to increase your traffic and conversions on your site.
If you need help with SEO and SEM, our specialist, Seth Jenks, is a great resource. SEO and SEM are the workers that will build the superhighways to your website. Without them, you’re nothing but a hot dog stand in the Gobi desert.
If there is any one thing that you can do this coming year to boost sales and exposure for yourself or your company, it will be your web presence. Remember that “you get what you pay for” in the business world. This applies especially to web design and development. Don’t skimp where it counts most.
Make a new years resolution now to give your site the TLC it deserves and it will give you love you need (not that kind of love, dude) in return.



With his unique vision, informed by experiences in Thailand and Italy, Adam creates sleek designs the combine a classic European aesthetic with fresh Asian elements. Beyond his design expertise, Adam has the technical savvy to make your company come alive on the web.