It’s worth spending some time carefully editing the images that you use on your website, starting with the home page. This is the most likely entrance for potential customers and the images need to encourage them to stay on your site and convert to a paying customer.

Your homepage needs to be eye catching and include welcoming images that are relevant to your sector. Always make sure that your imagery suits your company ethos – whether your company is strictly corporate, or relaxed and friendly.

You don’t need to stick to the obvious when it comes to imagery. Photographs can be used to suggest the things that you offer, which is particularly important if you are selling a service or idea, rather than a product. For example, a company offering loans might show a picture of a happy couple with a new house, rather than documents or a pile of money. You can buy these types of lifestyle photos from picture libraries such as iStock.

Once a customer has been convinced that your message is relevant, they will hopefully move on to your products and services. If you have an e-commerce site, you need to make sure that product photos are well presented. If a customer can’t see your product because the photograph is blurred or too dark, it’s unlikely that they will have the confidence to buy it online. It’s therefore worth investing in professional product photography, or alternatively source images from your suppliers.

The about page is another place where you should consider placing images. This gives a personal view of your company and is a space where you can introduce yourself and your team. Head shots or a group photo are perfect for this. You could also consider adding a photo of your premises.

At every stage, the quality of the images you use should be your top priority. Pixellated, distorted, dark or blurry images are a big no-no. You need to make sure that all of your pictures are taken with a good quality digital camera. If you’re not confident taking the pictures yourself, consider hiring a professional photographer.

If you’re still not sure which images would be best for you – talk to your web designer. They will have worked with similar websites before and will understand what does (and most importantly doesn’t) work!

The post What pictures should I use on my website? appeared first on eSterling.

Your customers need to be able to find your site when they are searching for your products or services, which is where SEO comes in. SEO stands for search engine optimisation and it’s the behind the scenes stuff that gets your website noticed in Google. Without it, your website is like a shop with no signs – not good!

There will be some of you that already have SEO covered and your old website has brilliant Google rankings. Your customers are finding you, but when they get to your site they don’t like what they see. This is something we internet types refer to as ‘bounce rate’ – if your bounce rate is too high it means that too many customers are bouncing straight off your site using their metaphorical internet space-hopper. One way to make sure your customers stick around is to upgrade your website to something more modern, slick and shiny – a website to be proud of.

Whatever category you fall into, you need to be aware of the ways that SEO and web design can work together for you. A good internet solutions company (like eSterling of course) can help you with the complete package, making sure your website attracts visitors and keeps them interested.

Web design and SEO go hand in hand like fish and chips or gin and tonic… I just wish the web designers would learn this and make the SEO team a cup of tea once in a while!

The post Web Design and SEO Go Hand in Hand appeared first on eSterling.

The key benefit of a CMS is the separation of design, content and structure which allows advantages throughout the lifecycle of your website. Each section can be amended independently, which allows you to change content without jeopardising the front-end design. This separation creates the flexibility of a CMS, allowing the editor to safely create content, add images, multimedia files and much more….

• Consistency of design is preserved.
  Because content is stored separate from design, the content from all authors is presented with the same, consistent design.
• Designed with non-technical content authors in mind.
  If you can write an email, you can add content to your site! Absolutely no specialist knowledge required.
• Decentralized maintenance.
  You can edit anytime, from anywhere with an internet connection
• Configurable access restrictions.
  Users can be given certain permissions that prevent them from editing content which they are not authorized to change.
• Navigation is automatically generated and adjusted.
  Menus are generated automatically based on the database content meaning links would not point to non-existing pages.
• Content is stored in a database.
  Central storage means that content can be reused in many places on the website
• Cooperation.
  Encourages efficient and effective updates.

If you think you would benefit from having a CMS for your website please get in touch for a competitive quote.

The post The Benefits of Having a CMS appeared first on eSterling.

New viewing mediums

With the web now extremely prominent on mobile phones and tablets and even HDTVs, the way the site can be viewed will be different on each platform. Users will also have a variety of different resolutions on their monitor and each browsers visible screen size will be different depending on the size of the toolbars. This means there isn’t a specific ‘above the fold’ point where all of the content must be.

Negative impact upon the design

If you scale down a website by around 300 pixels then the design of the site will significantly suffer. The original design will no doubt include plenty of white space around the design so the user can ‘breathe’ when looking through the site and everything is clear and easy to manoeuvre around. However, once that is removed and many of the elements are bunched up, the site will be a lot more difficult to scan and will probably result in the user either not noticing key information or not bothering to explore the site further.

Users are willing to scroll

Research has suggested that although the user will naturally spend more time looking at the top of your website, they are more than happy to scroll down to view more, especially if the site is designed to be scannable. In research carried out by ClickTale.com it found that 76% of users scrolled and that a good portion of them scrolled all the way to the bottom.

The post Why scrolling on a website isn’t the end of the world appeared first on eSterling.

The key to success for any website development project is a strong foundation. This comes from having a clear and precise understanding between the client and development team from the very beginning. For this reason, we meet with all of our clients to ensure that everything runs smoothly.

The procedure usually goes something like this:

• An initial meeting is arranged with our Directors to discuss requirements. At this stage basic elements of design and functionality of your website are discussed, as well as budget and timescale.

• The next step is to meet with the Project Manager and the development team to lay out an exact specification of what you need for your new website to be as effective as possible for your business.

–         This part is where you can tell us your ideas, from aesthetic preferences through to functionality. During this meeting we take note of any other websites that you like (and what you don’t like) and also get a feel for what message you are trying to put across to your customer.

–         It is also agreed between both parties as to what exactly is feasible within the constraints of time, budget and scope. An exact price is calculated to suit your budget are we also give you an expectation of what end product you will receive.

We find that these early meetings are important for the success of the project. As Project Manager, I find that I’m able to plan your website build more effectively after discussing your needs in detail.

Every project can be faced with hiccups along the way, but if the project has been built on this strong foundation then the difficulty can be overcome – leaving you happy with your new website.

The post Back to Basics Part 2 – The First Steps to Your New Website appeared first on eSterling.