In the of-line marketing world, it is all about trying to get the attention of the potential consumer to a commercial message.
The primary goal is to get noticed by the public.
It doesn’t matter if it is for radio, TV, magazines, newspapers, or posters.
It all comes down to getting noticed.
On the Web, this doesn’t work!
The reason for this is that on the web, the net surfer is actively searching and looking for information from this gigantic data repository and database that we call the Internet.
They are scanning and reading text on websites, and they are mostly blind to graphics and pictures.
In the of-line world the potential target is mostly passive and experience ads in a state of relaxation among other stimulation. Here you must scream out your message to market your product or service.
Off-line people are passive!
On the Web people are active!
What does this mean for your website?
For one thing, when anyone visits your website, you at that moment already have their full attention. So, there is no need to get visual attention to attract your visitors.
They are on your site, already!
But, you normally have their full attention only until they have decided if your site is what they are looking for or not.
If your site is not what they are looking for, or they don’t understand that your site is what they are looking for they quickly leave your site, never to return.
The time between they arrive at your site and decide to stay or leave is very short.
Normally around 10 seconds!
If you use flash or large graphics, which take too long to load, most people leave without figuring out what your site is about. The attention span on the Net is short!
The web surfers don’t look at graphics so much as they are reading the information you present.
When they arrive you need to keep their attention and inform them about what your site is all about and describe its benefits.
You need to keep their attention, but not by an attention-grabbing web design!
Instead, use attention-grabbing text!
The most important attention-grabbing text is the headline!
The headline will break it or make it!
Does this mean that the web design can look sloppy or amateurish?
No!
It just means that the design of a site should not be made with extensive graphics or flash presentation. This will just confuse and take a too long time to download.
If you make a clean and easy navigational website you are much better off!
Yet, what one sees on the Internet is too often a site with an advanced web design that too often leaves you asking what it’s all about and what its creators are thinking!
If website owners and webmasters concentrated much more of their effort on text information and less on the design they would see a much better response from their potential customers.
There is no need to hire a web designer and pay them several to 1000 dollars to make a site attractive and to make it commercially viable.
In most cases this is contra-productive.
The web designer will often kill your sale by creating an attention-grabbing web design.
Instead, put your effort into the text information on your site!
