One Technical Thing To Make A Website Work?

I think it should be idiot-proof clear what you want a visitor to do.

For example:

If your website is a a squeeze page / lead gen. Make sure you tell the prospect where to put their info and what to do (ie: hit the enter button")

If it's a corporate style site - make sure the navigation is clear and unconfusing.

And so on.

Marvin and Drez,

Good advice and thank you.

Thinking about it I didn't make myself all that clear when I was on about the tech stuff - let me try and narrow it down.

What's the one most important thing to drive traffic to a website? Let's assume the client doesn't have a list to email to.

For example it might be SEO (I have no idea if it is...)

Okay one more thing.

Estimate how much traffic, concurrent users/visitors, bandwidth and storage you may have/need.

This will help you decide whether a shared or dedicated hosting environment is required.

If it's a new site shared hosting should be fine, However if you grow make sure you have (affordable) options.

Hi Steve, Great question...

To be honest, it really depends on the website... Is it a squeeze page, sales page, business to business website? etc.

You have to keep in mind you goal, for what you want the website to achieve. When your visitor visits your page, there's usually something you want them to do, what is it?

Keeping this in mind throughout the entire process, the entirety of your page should be designed around this one particular thing. This is what it all comes down to, this is why you spent hours or dollars, to get your user to your website in the first place... They're there for a reason, your website should reflect that in all it's entirety...

For example,

If it's a squeeze page, everything on the site should be guiding their eyes, their thoughts and desires, towards filling in that e-mail address.

If it's a lead capture page, same thing, start them off where you want them to be, get them glued to your page, and your sales process needs to gently guide them from beginning to end.

On a sales page, the entire thing should lead them down the intended sales path, which is why long form copy tends to work well. You have more time to guide your reader down one strong, linear pathway, from beginning to end.

Keep in mind where your readers eyes are, and where their focus is, as they move through your page, and make sure you're never leading them astray, and you'll have a website that supports your copy. :-)

Hope that helps.

I have a good answer for your client.

This is an answer most consulting firm give. I should know. I worked in one.

The answer is: It depends.

Like everyone so correctly point out, it depends on what your objective is. Some sites are purely for branding.

Since WF is mainly for marketers, I guess the answer (objective) for most people here is to make money.

This is how we used to handle such question.

It depends. What is your objective?

(client answers)

Well then, no single element is more important than any other. You need (spell out all the elements) but the most important thing is they all have to connect and work seamlessly.