I just recently read an article about the basics of visual communication and it struck me that the rules that apply to a good speech or offline presentation also apply to your online presentation.
Your Online Presentation: Structured, Meaningful and Modern
Did you know that you actually only 30% remember of what you see? If you are just hearing something the rate drops down to 20%. Combining the two channels brings you up to about 50%. You can increase that rate even more, if you tell somebody about what you saw and heard. If the subject is about something you can do, you can increase the rate to about 90% if you actually do it.
What does it mean for an online presentation or website?
The main channel through which we perceive information online is the visual channel. Through the concentration to one main channel, our brains natural information filter gets even stronger, bringing the purely visual perception down to probably under 10%, unless we manage to trigger some interest, which can loosen the filter. So the question is: How can we catch the interest of a visitor?
Structure
Things that you say on your page should always be down to the point. As visitors hardly read any information on your page, but use what is called scanning, you will need to be very precise on crisp about what you say. You should also structure your information by using headings and lists, where possible. Emphasise important points by putting them in bold letters. Don’t overdo it though.
On the other hand your main navigation should not have more than 5-6 items and should not be deeper than 3 levels. If you can’t fit all you have to say in this structure you should in any case use a breadcrumb navigation, so that visitors don’t get lost. Additionally you should provide an on page search and a site map.
Meaningful
Make a list of 2-3 keywords for your text and write your content around those keywords, if you feel to wander from your subject/keywords, rethink the structure of your site and add another page. As a rule of thumb, you should never write more than 3-400 words per page, as you will inevitably loose your audiences attention.
Modern
Your design needs to be up-to date, otherwise your page will look old fashioned and visitors will deduce that your content is too. At the moment you will find a lot of pages that use horizontal navigation. The classical header image seems to disappear, instead you will more and more large images or videos in the content itself. Another rather popular feature is the footer site map, which will give you easy access from whatever page your on. Using such a site map also makes it easy to reduce the main navigation to the most important points.
What about search engines?
Search engines have evolved so far, that they now recognise things that are positive for human perception, to be good for search engine ranking too. So when you stick to the above mentioned rules, you will have a good chance of not performing to badly in your SERPs.
What can I do to increase the perception of my audience?
Add other perception channels, unfortunately you are a bit limited on your website with regards to that, but you can in any case add some audio. I don’t mean nice(?!) background music that can probably not even be turned off, I mean audio content. Tell the people about your business, let them sit back, relax and deliver the content actively instead of having your visitor do all the work. You can increase the effect even more by adding some meaningful video. But always remember to offer good quality content, may it be text, audio or video.