What am I on about? Well, go to your site now, (after you finish reading this excellent article that is), and take a good look at it. Do this from the perspective of a customer, and note down your first impressions. Why? Because the feel of your site has a huge impact on who uses it, who returns to it, and how many of your products they buy. Interested? Read on.



Picture two business premises side by side on the high street. One is dimly lit, emits the rich aroma of sandalwood oil, and the sounds of Indian zither music. The other has a full glass front, fluorescent strip lighting, and a modern blue color scheme. If you were shopping round for a laptop, which business would you be attracted to? On the other hand if you yearned for some incense and a caftan, which shop do you think would enter to find these?

Well your website is YOUR online business frontage. It is very important that as well as information, your site presents that information to your customers in a suitable way. Again, after you have finished reading this article, have a browse round and look at the pages presented by a major financial institution like a bank or insurance company. Chances are they have sharp clean lines and colors at the cooler, more business like end of the spectrum. Going further, I would be surprised if there were horoscope links or sparkling stars following your mouse! This is simply because that financial institution would have adhered to their research that told them that people want strength and reliability in their dealings with them, and sharp clear lines with cool business colors are the best at projecting that.

Now, go and find a site that would love to sell you something warm and fuzzy like a teddy bear for your kid, or some vanilla bath bombs in pink wrapping. What is the bet that this site will have a soft feel with ovals rather than rectangles and warm colors with flowers and squiggly lines. Same methodology here, with the designer matching the site to the products or services on offer.

All this is leading to the strong suggestion that a site matching its products, and matching the expectations of its potential customers, will work at its optimum.

So, as was mentioned in the introduction, look at your site and see how it feels to you through the eyes of a visitor. Then figure out who your customers are, and what they will be most comfortably expecting your site, (business frontage), to look like. Do they match? If so, well done and all you really need to do is fine tune the details like ensuring easy pathways to purchase and clear honest communication with your customer throughout the process.

All the best with optimizing the feel of your site, and have a great time doing it!