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As the saying goes, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.”

With that being the case, your company’s Web site is an extension of you and your business.

A strong Web site translates into better business opportunities, more customers and in all likelihood, a solid return on investment (ROI). Meantime, a so-so site can translate into missed opportunities, fewer customers and in all likelihood, an average at best return on ROI. So, which one is more appealing to you?

Bad design comes in all shapes and sizes, but it doesn’t have to be that way.

In order to better your company’s Web site design, there are a number of tips you can follow to increase the chances of your site getting noticed and translating into financial rewards. Among them are:

• Defining our goals – Your Web site must have goals before it ever sees the light of day. Are you designing the site simply because you know competitors have sites and you must not fall behind or is the site actually going to serve a true purpose? The sensible argument should be that the site is there to serve a means beyond just that of the competition having one. Your goal should always be that you want conversion, meaning you have to produce a design that is going to make users want to act when they come to your site;
• Content is only half the battle – While having quality content on your site sounds like a no-brainer, you’d be surprised just how many sites fail miserably in this area. Think about the impression you give those who come to your site when you have irrelevant, stale content to present to them. The message many receive is if the information on the site is minimal at best and outdated, what else is this business average at best on? The content needs to be good, but the design is equally important. An unattractive design, coupled with hard to navigate pages and too many distractions, will likely send that potential customer elsewhere. The simple fact is the design needs to back up the content and work hand-in-hand with it, not against it;
• Design with visitor in mind – When you are designing your business Web site, make sure that all eyes are on your visitors. It is important to remember that navigation, layout, color, etc. all play critical roles in bringing together a winning site. In the event you produce a site that is too full for people to digest, has bad placement and distracts more than pleases the guest, you stand a good chance of defeating your purpose. When all is said and done, make sure that consistency plays a big role in your Web site design, as constant changes and confusion will tend to scare away visitors;
• Don’t go ad and pop-up crazy – While it all comes down to preference, one thing that leads me away from sites is those that have too many ads on them and bombard the visitor with constant pop-ups. Yes, we understand the need to sell ads, but throwing them in a visitor’s face can be overwhelming in their visit. Place any ads carefully so as to no try and shove them down one’s throat. This also holds true in avoiding a large portion of blinking and/or scrolling text on the site to distract your visitors;
• Test out different ideas – The only way to try out different Web site designs is to test them. A good means by which to do this is using a stats tool to give you feedback. Whether it is Google Analytics or another tool, study the results you get in order to see what is working and what is not;
• Spread the wealth when necessary – Lastly, make sure that you don’t have a handful of pages that are just sitting there appearing lonely. Make sure you have viable content and/or imagery on each page. On the flip side, if you can condense the material so that it looks better on just a handful of pages, then do that. Look at yourself as an interior decorator if you will; you are decorating your site and you don’t want a hole here or there or something that is too noisy (visually and audio wise) to distract the visitor.

With the proper Web site design, your site stands a much better opportunity of getting noticed and more importantly, getting used.