A Sticky Website

Written by Albin Dittli


This morning, after my wife and I walkedrepparttar dog, we took some time to look atrepparttar 132693 flowers in our garden. The morning was still cool, but we knew thatrepparttar 132694 temperature was already climbing and would be somewhere inrepparttar 132695 90s today.

Some yellow daisies where swaying gently inrepparttar 132696 light breeze, as if to say, “look at me. Here I am.” Where they trying to catch my attention, orrepparttar 132697 attention of honey bees and butterflies? Though God maderepparttar 132698 flowers for us to enjoy, I suspect that they are more interested in attractingrepparttar 132699 attention ofrepparttar 132700 insects that will help spread their pollen. The flowers need to attractrepparttar 132701 attention ofrepparttar 132702 insects to survive.

Internet marketers that have their own website are much likerepparttar 132703 flowers. They must attractrepparttar 132704 attention of potential visitors and entice them to visitrepparttar 132705 web site. If no visitors come thenrepparttar 132706 site will eventually die.

How to attract visitors to a site is whatrepparttar 132707 very broad subject of Internet marketing is about. Numerous articles and books have been written and are available about Internet marketing. Let’s just look at one small part of it today.

As you watchrepparttar 132708 honey bees andrepparttar 132709 butterflies onrepparttar 132710 flowers you notice that they stay on one flower for a while, then go on to another for a while. Sometimes they stay on a flower for a very short time and sometime they stay for a fairly long time. Sometimes they come back torepparttar 132711 original flower and sometimes they do not.

The people that visit our web sites act muchrepparttar 132712 same. Some times they just take a quick glance and click to another site. Sometimes they stay longer and look around. It all depends on how interesting your site is. Does it have a good headline that captures their interest and makes them want to get more information? A good headline is probablyrepparttar 132713 most important single item on your website. Take time to create a good headline.

Isrepparttar 132714 site simple to view? A site should not have text written on a background with a design. It is too hard to read and oftenrepparttar 132715 viewer will click away instead of trying to read it.

Is it easy to read? If there is not enough contrast betweenrepparttar 132716 background color andrepparttar 132717 text color then it could be hard to read. Whenever I see a site with black letters on a dark color background I leave immediately. So do a lot of other visitors.

Doesrepparttar 132718 site take too long to load? Many people have very little patience these days. Ifrepparttar 132719 site is slow to load they get tired of waiting and go to a different site.

Does your site have music? If it does be surerepparttar 132720 music is appropriate forrepparttar 132721 type of visitor that you are trying to appeal to.

Ok, you’ve done things right andrepparttar 132722 visitor stays around long enough to get beyond your headline. How long will you be able to keeprepparttar 132723 visitor?

Is your site easy to navigate? Arerepparttar 132724 buttons easy to find and understand? Ifrepparttar 132725 visitor gets confused he can get frustrated. If he gets frustrated he is very likely to leave in favor of a new site.

Does your site have a benefits list? Most people are looking at your site because they want something. If a quick read of your site fails to show them that you can provide what they want then they are out of there. This is where a strong benefits list is important. If they see their ‘want’ in a benefits list they will read on for more details.

Website Accessibility explained - what YOU can do

Written by Polly Nelson


Standard society The widespread use of standards to facilitate equality is familiar in our society. Just as buildings must be designed to be accessible to everyone, so must websites be. The Internet was founded onrepparttar principles of accessibility; however most websites currently fail to comply with evenrepparttar 132691 most basic level of accessibility, currently renderingrepparttar 132692 internet largely obsolete to around 100 million people.

Legal obligations A 100 million-strong global audience is hardly a market not worth targeting. There has always been a sound business case, as well as a moral impetus, for web accessibility. Now there is also a legal obligation to make your website accessible to disabled users.

The 1999 Disability Discrimination Act makes it clear that information online should be accessible to disabled people. Although there has been no UK court action to date, there have been high profile cases in other countries where claimants have been awarded significant compensation for disability discrimination as a result of a non-compliant website.

The UK Disability Rights Commission recently announced that one thousand websites will be investigated for their ability to be accessed by Britain's 8.5 million disabled people. You should comply withrepparttar 132693 Disability Discrimination laws as a matter of best practice. Everyone will benefit from your accessibility, including you.

W3C-WAI The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) was created in October 1994 to leadrepparttar 132694 World Wide Web to its full potential, partly by creating some common standards to ensure interoperability. This commitment includes promoting a high degree of usability for people with disabilities.

The 'Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0' (WCAG) is a W3C specification providing guidance on accessibility of Web sites for people with disabilities. Developed byrepparttar 132695 W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative (W3C-WAI),repparttar 132696 specification contains fourteen guidelines which are general principles of accessible design. These guidelines not only make pages more accessible to people with disabilities, they make them more accessible to all users, including those using different technologies to viewrepparttar 132697 pages. The WAI home page (www.w3.org/WAI) has up-to-date information onrepparttar 132698 Web Accessibility Initiative.

Accessibility levels Legally, you achieve web accessibility determined on how your site measures up againstrepparttar 132699 de-facto W3C-WAI standards. These standards point to 3 levels of web accessibility:

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