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Learn SEO: Assessing Your Sites Usability
By Kimberly Bock | March 12, 2008
So I’m reading Aaron Walls “SEO Book” this morning. I’m kinda cheating too. A friend bought it so I asked him to pass it my way. (sorry Aaron)
I picked the chapter about usability because I had just stopped by Ruuds short but sweet post entitled “Semantics: Call It User Friendly“.
Says Ruud:
“instead of using Urkel speak and freaking geeking everybody out, use words that make sense in business” (lol..Urkel speak)
It got me to thinking about this website, which is just as much yours as it is mine.
What can I do to improve upon this sites usability so your experience here is a beneficial and pleasurable one?
If you are new here, it is important that you know I am also learning and passing it on to you as I go. We can learn together and have fun with it.
So I’m reading Aarons experience with this really crappy gas station. It was the only gas station available for many miles and he was already in need of gas, so of course he had to use their services.
The pump read “Pump then pay“. But he went ahead and slid his credit card through the system to get it over with.
He got a warning message telling him that the system was down and to see the cashier about it.
He then tried to pump first as the sign said he could do, but the pump didn’t work.
He goes inside to find a negligent cashier munching away on chips or something, in complete disregard to Aarons needs.
The cashier told him that he hadn’t yet turned on the pump. (by this time, the cashier had ample time to do so)
The point?
What if this service provider (gas station) had been your website?
In Aarons situation, he did not have an ample amount of gas to drive to another gas station or he certainly would have.
On the web, there are plenty of alternatives to ‘drive to’. If your site is not usable or convenient / pleasurable for your audience they will find another place to give of their loyalty.
Consider it to be similar in comparison to relationships. If you are not satisfied, you move on.
Sometimes in that process, word of mouth will take it to further loss.
Usability establishes a mutually beneficial ‘relationship’ with your audience. Loyalty.
When loyalty is established, word of mouth then becomes your friend providing future gain. And of course, gain is the goal.
If you treasure your audience and make provisions for their needs they will happily grab your feed, grab that subscription, put you on a pedestal and promote your content which is equal to free advertisement.
Aarons suggestions for good usability:
1. Allow the user to control their experience.
Example: Use relative non exact text values when creating content. This allows your audience to choose their text size needs.
2.Don’t use excessive text inside your images! This looks spammy and doesn’t add value with the SEs either.
3. Be consistent with your site design. In my opinion, a site that is consistent about its format / design begins to feel familiar and welcoming. Something you can ‘bank on’ when you visit. Encouraging it to be, visually and otherwise, ingrained in the memory. And of course, you want your site to be as memorable as possible.
4. Your navigation should be clear. Precise. Recognizable.
5. Make use of alternative text tags when using images.
Advantages people-wise: Increased visual stimulus equals increased memory and expresses further relevance as well as appeal.
Search engine-wise: Text gooood. Search engines need all the text you can give them so as to index, index, index!
6. Keep file sizes small! Oops..I am sooo negligent where this is concerned which sucks because it can have negative affects on your valuable time. Smaller files, faster load time. Sorry, I’ll work on that one.
7. Provide your audience the convenience of a site search box or, as I use, a sitemap. Make it available on every page. A sitemap lays out your content on a clean formatted page which allows your audience to access what material may be of their primary concern. They won’t always be there for the homepage content or your newest blog post.
So there it is. I’ve learned a few things this morning and hope you have too. I see that I need to make some adjustments.
I found a goldmine of information in the “SEO Book” and would have gladly paid the asking price in a heartbeat.
The SEO Book training program can be found here
Until later, have fun learning SEO!
Topics: SEO/SEM Training |