Best Practices in Website Design

Making the most of every Website visitor

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 61

Making the most of every visitor: Website Design Considerations

• What is the primary objective of a Website ?

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 62

Making the most of every visitor: Website Design Considerations

1) Information Architecture

- Is your website organized in a user-friendly, logical layout?

- Does the information sequence flow naturally?

2) Usability

- Is your website easy to gather information quickly?

- Would the every day use be able to interact with your website?

3) Visual Design

- “Visitors spend an average of 7 seconds on the homepage”

- Does your website integrate eye-catching, visually appealing images?

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 63

Website Design Best practices

Information Architecture and Usability

• Principal objectives

1) To help people find the content they need as quickly as possible

2) To put content in context so that it becomes part of a cohesive body of knowledge

3) To present content in its most readable format

4) Facilitate the user taking the desired action

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 64

Making the most of every visitor: Website Design Best practices

Design - Key Components

– Branding

• Keep branding fluent throughout all pages of site

– Primary Navigation

• Location & Consistenc is key in providing users quick and easy access to relevant information

– Calls to Action

• Put the calls to action in prominent and obvious places on website “Discover the Destination” and “Search Package Deals”

– Push Marketing

• Direct the user to promotional offers within homepage

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 65

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 66

• Interior page of skamania

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 67

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 68

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 69

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 70

• Layout and Design Fundamentals

– Choose sans-serif fonts for the web

– Avoid using small font sizes

– Avoid things that move and will distract users from reading content

– Avoid splash screens

– Be consistent in navigation, labeling and presentation

– Avoid the page "fold" on the homepage and avoid excessive scrolling

– Use visual hierarchy in an effective manner

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 71

• Layout and Design Fundamentals:

– Three column layout is effective layout for sites with a large volume of content

• Left: Navigation

• Center: Editorial

• Right: Features

– Design the site according to the order of action you would like the visitor to take in mind

– Repeat the primary calls to action appropriately throughout in a simila way to navigation and branding

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 72

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 73

Hospitality Industry Website Best Practices

E-site Marketing 2005 Usability Study

• E-site Marketing has completed the following usability study exercises to help our customers meet their goals and objectives.

• Purchased and researched hospitality industry Hitwise Reports

• Competitive Website analysis

• Analysis of 2004 Web Trends Statistics for our client's Websites

• Review of ClickTracks Analyzer Software statistics

• Online surveys submitted by Reservation Managers, Meeting Planners and Guest Services

• Conducted three customer focus groups

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 74

Hospitality Industry Website Best Practices

Key Findings:

• The highest ranked pages of resort, hotel and industry related Websites are the special offers pages

• The second highest ranking pages are Destination/Accommodation/Hotel/Resort information pages

• Third highest ranking pages are photo gallery pages

• Placing fourth and fifth are Reservations/Rates and Services/Amenities respectively

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 75

Search Engine Friendly Website Design

• Each page must allow the Search Engine spiders to crawl at maximum capability,

• Embedding branded Meta tags on every page

• Incorporating optimized keyword-rich content

• Minimizing or limiting the use of flash

• Integrating Style sheets which are text based allowing the Search Engine spiders to crawl throughout the Website more effectively.

• A sitemap which provides flat HTML, along with text links

• Including a fact sheet which serves as an opportunity to put text links within the content to other sections in the Website so that the spider can crawl throughout the Website faster

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 76

Group Exercise: Internet Marketing Website Evaluation

1. Form groups of 2 or 3 members

2. List 5 of the main search terms or keyword phrases you feel describe your website

3. Complete the exercises utilizing the indicated tools

4. Discuss results

Measuring Reach

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 78

Measuring Reach

• How often have you heard from your stakeholders:

– Are we getting enough website traffic?

– What can we do to get more website traffic?

• Establish your season watermarks

• Interest in your website should follow the seasonal patterns of your destination

• From our research organic website traffic growth is starting to plateau

Felix Laboy & Paolo Torchio – September 2006 79

Measuring Reach

• Track the changes in traffic volumes by type (SE, Linkage, URL)

• Analyze the behavior of the visitors by type

– Each type should be interacting with the site in different ways

– Measure time and actions taken by type

• Consider impact of promotions

We will develop Key Performance Indicators and ways to define specific objectives for each traffic type tomorrow