Web Design

Jan 30
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What to think about when redesigning a website

Posted by | Web Design | No Comments

Have you been thinking about updating your current website? When it’s time to update or redesign a website, there are a number of aspects you need to consider before moving forward. It’s important to understand why you need to redesign, or if you just need to update parts of the site, or the entire layout. As someone that has redesigned a number of websites over the years, I’ve put together a list of questions you should ask yourself before making your final decision.

10 questions to ask yourself before redesigning your website:

  1. Why do I need to redesign my website now?
  2. Does my current website provide enough information for my visitors?
  3. Does my current website design appeal to my visitors?
  4. Do I need to update the entire website or just parts of it?
  5. What feedback have my viewers given about the current design and layout?
  6. Do I have a budget for this redesign?
  7. Where do I find a web designer?
  8. Do I need to update just the frontend of my website or the backend (or both)?
  9. When is the best time to launch a redesigned website, and how?
  10. Will this redesign help grow my website?

Ask yourself these questions, take as much time as you need to think this project through, and develop a project outline. If you need help getting started with a project like this, give me a shout!

Dec 22
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I made a 404 error page!

Posted by | Web Design | No Comments

Now that I have time to look over my website, I have been investing a good amount of time into improving the user experience, and trying to tie off loose ends. One page that most people seem to overlook is the 404 error page. This page is where visitors will go if they try to land on a page that does not exist, and your server redirects those users to a default error page.

Why have a better 404 page?

  • You have a second chance to show the visitor the right direction through your website.
  • If you are a website that is selling a service, you could display your service offering here (that way you don’t lose your main call-to-action).
  • Have some fun, these pages are typically a bad experience for a website visitor, so if you can create some humor around landing on this page you might have a better chance of keeping them on your website longer.

Here is my first crack at a 404 error page.

404 me1 I made a 404 error page!

Dec 15
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Have you been looking at your landing pages?

Posted by | Analytics, Online Marketing, Web Design | No Comments

Do you monitor your top landing pages? These are the pages that visitors land on when first arriving at your website, and typically they are the primary pages on your website (for example, my top landing pages are; homepage, experience, portfolio, blog, and some of my individual blog posts.)

Where do I find my top landing pages? If you are using Google Analytics, you can simply go to the “content” section, and select “landing pages”, from there you will see the top ten landing pages on your website. With this information you can start to think about a few action plans. One, if you notice that your top landing pages are not properly setup for site conversion, you can start looking at redesigning each page individually. Two, you can look at the “source” of traffic to all of these pages, and determine how you can nurture the relationship with those websites that are sending all of the traffic.

What else can I do to improve performance of my top landing pages? Start to track what your visitors are doing on these landing pages, and if you can, implement a tool to run A/B testing so that you can learn how to improve conversion rates on those pages. With A/B testing, you can try things like; moving your call-to-actions around the pages, add or remove content, change design elements, and test different wording to see what drives more page interaction.

If you want to use a simple, inexpensive tool to implement A/B testing, try using Optimizely. You will find this tool very easy to integrate on your website, and you do not need to be a professional website designer to use it. Give it a try!

 

Dec 14
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seanhurley.com featured on Folio Focus

Posted by | Web Design | No Comments

Last week, my new website was featured on Folio Focus, which is a design inspiration website that features some of the best online portfolio designs around the world. Since being featured on this site, I have received over 650 unique hits to my website, and over 2,000 page views on my blog. Thanks Folio Focus, for featuring SeanHurley.com!

About Folio Focus:

Folio Focus is a web design gallery that exists to showcase excellent portfolio sites. Here you will find the best collection of portfolio sites from web and graphic designers, photographers, and other professionals that use a portfolio site.

While there are hundreds of general web design galleries, niche galleries like Folio Focus can prove to be a very valuable resource for anyone who wants to quickly find the best websites of a particular kind. Folio Focus is part of a network that includes four other niche galleries:

Link: http://foliofocus.com/sean-hurley-me/

Dec 13
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Is your site designed for the right browser?

Posted by | Web Design, Website Development | No Comments

Now that there are a handful of really great web browsers in the market, we need to be more aware as site owners and website designers that a website is not complete until we have done extensive cross-browser testing. How should you start? Simple, open your website in all of the major browsers; Chrome, IE (IE 6 too!), FireFox, Safari, and Opera. Now that you have your website open, look for things like correct fonts, page alignment, image breaks (some browsers do not handle .png files correctly), and just an overall layout preview. If you see that your website looks the same across all browsers, you are ready to launch!

If not, make sure your website designer has this task on their todo list before launching, and also double check that they have done it correctly in the past for other clients. Depending on how your website is designed, you will likely not run into any issues. However, if you are doing some complex CSS styling you might notice errors in IE, and Opera.

The cost to design for cross browsers “should” be relatively cheap, but if they are not you can always go back to your Google Analytics and find out which browsers are the most popular when viewing your website. Just like when you are deciding if you need to design for mobile browsing, or if you need to translate your website, Google Analytics is a great tool to help you answer these questions.

Before you contact someone to help you develop cross browser design, do some of your own research ahead of time, so you know what you need and how much business you are losing due to poor brand experience.

Dec 08
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Loving Google Chrome!

Posted by | Web Design | No Comments

For as long as I can remember, I have been referring people to use Firefox as their default web browser when searching the Internet, and for the most part it was the best solution for the job. Now that Google has entered the browser market, there is another player that is offering faster page load times, reduced spam, better integration with third-party applications, and is as light weight as possible.

One of the most important tools for me is being able to use the “‘website inspect feature”. This tool allows you to identify a number of characteristics about a website (for example: This tool will allow you to see a websites css sheet, html, image files, and help debug your website using a built-in console). When I first switched to chrome it was a very easy transition; before I started browsing they had already auto-detected which applications I was using with my other browser. After a few minutes of browsing, they had me hooked.

Here are some of the notable features of Chrome:

  • The most extensive app store of all browsers
  • The fastest page load times
  • Easy integration into the most common social tools (I have been using Evernote)
  • Great integration with all Google products
If you have not already tried using Google Chrome, I would highly recommend taking a few minutes to download, install, and start browsing.
Dec 04
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YouTube’s newest redesign

Posted by | Social Media, Web Design | No Comments

A few days ago, YouTube released a new design for all profile pages, playlists, and integrated a better way to connect your social channels. Now, when you log in to your YouTube account, you will see a much clearer (more minimal) design for your subscriptions, favorites. If you have connected your account to your Facebook, you can also see what videos your friends are posting. As a lover of minimal design, the newest release by YouTube has inspired me to finally finish my profile and use it as a real source of communication.

(Did you know: In 2011, there were more YouTube video plays, than Google searches.)

If you have a few minutes to spare, and have not seen the newest design, I would highly recommend logging back into your account (or create a new account) to see what new features are awaiting you.

 

Dec 01
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Should I have a mobile site?

Posted by | Uncategorized, Web Design, Website Development | No Comments

If you had asked me a few years ago if I thought having a mobile site was important, I would have replied “no”. After the release of smartphones, we had to change the way we were designing websites both in content and graphic weight. If you had a website that was too image heavy, or wasn’t coded to be viewed properly on a mobile phone, you would quickly see how horribly it resolved on your phone.

How do I know if my website is mobile ready? An easy, yet not 100% garnered way to determine if your website is mobile ready, would be to open the site on a smartphone, and if it loads quickly without wreaking the layout, then there is a good chance it’s made for mobile viewing. The best way to find this out would be to locate the mobile.css file on your web-serve, and ensure that it’s coded correctly.

If you’re still on the fence about whether or not to hire someone to style your website, do yourself a favor and pay close attention to your website analytics. Most website owners use the free service Google Analytics to see how much traffic is really coming from mobile browsing. If you are seeing an increase month over month, it’s a good indicator that your demographic is starting to use smartphones to browse your website. Most people ask me, what per cent of site traffic should mobile browsing be before I move forward? There are a few ways to answer this question: 1. If you’re  seeing around 20% of total site traffic using a mobile phone, and 2. I respond with another question, “Should you really wait until it’s too late?” Is the cost of hiring someone to convert your site more or less expensive than someone having a bad experience with your brand?

If you need help determining if your website is mobile ready, or if you would like to better understand why it’s more important now than ever to have a mobile site, ask me!

Feel free to ask me anything, anytime! Contact Me