Usability

With factors like personalization and behavioral targeting taking a stronger hold on the search results, the engines are adopting new ways to determine a site’s usefulness for a particular search query. In today’s world, where you rank is influenced by a user’s willingness to stay on and interact with your Web site.

It makes sense. With SEOs manipulating their way up the SERPs, the engines need an unbiased authority to tell them which sites are valuable and which are not. That means each time a search is performed, the engines are tuning in to see which sites users are clicking on, how many pages they visits, how long they’re on the site, and if they’re engaging.  If users are interacting with your site, you’ll be rewarded with rankings. If they’re not…well, that’s where we come in.

The first step in getting visitors to engage with your Web site is to increase its usability and get rid of any roadblocks that may prevent users or the engines from interacting with it. And Outspoken Media’s Usability category will soon be filled with information on how to do just that.

We’ll give you the tips, tricks, advice and guides you need to develop a usable site that takes into account all the new engagement metrics being used by the search engines.  We’ll help you identify the common usability pitfalls and show you how to design around them.

You may also want to check out some of our favorite Usability resources on the Web.  We hope you’ll find them useful.

If you’re interested in talking to us about increasing the usability of your Web site or any of our other online marketing services, feel free to contact us for a free quote.

Usability: Seven Swans a’Swimmin’

December 16, 2011

Oh, the possibilities for swimming puns related to site navigation are endless! I’m going to assume you can see the parallel, and just get right down to the good stuff. One of your jobs as a Web site publisher is to figure out what brings people to your site, and make it easy for them [...]

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9 Tips to Increasing eCommerce Conversions At Checkout

August 1, 2011

On Friday I woke up with the distinct feeling that I was going to fall over. There was dizziness and light-headedness and no ability to discern if these two things were, in fact, the same. So I did what any self-respecting lady would do. I took the day off and spent the afternoon Internet shopping. [...]

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Your Online Form Not Converting? Here’s Why

May 19, 2011

For service-based Web sites, you often live and die by your ability to convert people through your online form. Whether the form is intended to get their information for a follow up call, to allow them to register for an online or physical event, or just to send them a free product or subscribe them [...]

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7 Ways Your Homepage is Like A First Date

May 4, 2010

Dating, in general, kind of sucks. Or at least that’s always been my impression. Unfortunately, unless you want to die alone in your gorgeous Troy, NY apartment under a mountain of cats who do nothing but leach off you and prevent you from sleeping a solid eight hours, at some point you have to get [...]

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5 Ways Twitter’s New Homepage Schools Yours

March 31, 2010

See that up there? That’s the new Twitter redesign that was launched yesterday. Not exactly earth shattering news, but it’s pretty neat. The change was announced by Twitter’s Creative Director Doug Bowman who explained a bit about the reasoning behind the redesign. He wrote: “With the new design, we’re intentionally featuring more dynamic content on [...]

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There Are Two Types of Ugly, Which Ugly Are You?

July 24, 2009

Your Web site tells me a lot about you. It tells me who you are, what kind of customer you’re attempting to attract, the vibe behind your company, and sometimes, that you’re a blind man living in the year 1987. Bad Web site design can happen to anyone, but it doesn’t have to happen to [...]

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Taking the Yahoo Approach To Happier Users

May 20, 2009
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I’m slammed today so I’ll make this quick. If you want happier users, take the new Yahoo approach* and focus your Web site on three things. Intent Objects Openness

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Attract More Visitors By Going Invisible

April 9, 2009
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So, here’s the thing, no one cares about your little Web site. I’m sure your mom does. Your mother is probably very, very proud. However, your customers are using you. They’re like that guy you dated right after college who just hung around because you had a job and a paycheck and he had a [...]

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