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CONTACT: comp@e-kinetic.com
Tapping The Visual Stimulus of Your Web Site Visitors
by Dan J. Fry, c.
2003-2004, All rights reserved.
"Oh, my eyes, my eyes! What an eye sore.
Quick, click away! Click away!"
Suddenly I wake up in a cold sweat.
What happened. Oh, then I realize: it was just a nightmare.
O.k., I'm
not crazy, and no I haven't had this dream before. But
think about this: what
would you do if you came to a site
littered with either tons of different
colors, loud pinks, purples, greens and reds mixed incoherently, or more
animations and graphics than the rods and cones of your inner eye
can possibly absorb? If your like me I simply go "click, bye-bye".
Our
visual stimulus is ever more so important on the web than
almost anywhere
else. Most definitely the internet is about
information. But, that
information is shown graphically. So, if
you want to keep people at your
site, first appeal to their
visual stimulus.
There are a few
guidelines that you should adhere to when
designing your site, following
known research results on colors
that elicit certain psychological responses
people. The bottom
line is that it is hard enough to market on the internet
today,
why make it harder by bugging your visitors.
(1) Colors and
Their Effect: I prefer blue and white. In general
blue seems to elicit a
sense of trust and white a sense of purity. Gold, on the other hand is the
color of wealth and prosperity, something we are all working towards. So,
with respect to general internet marketing, these colors tend to work the
best. They are easy on the eyes and don't strike up a sense of danger, such
as with the color red. Of course, the colors also depend on purpose of your
site. If selling baby items, pink, which represents femininity, and baby
blue, representing weakness
may work quite well. It depends in part on site
content. A high
tech site selling electronic components may do better with
greys,
silvers, and black.
(2) Animations and Banners: Animations
are nice, but can take
time to load and be distracting. Use them to focus the
attention
of a visitor. Place them at a single page location, at the
center
or all at the left side for instance. If you use more than one and
they are scattered all over the page, where can you expect
your eyes to
focus. Yep, you heard right - click, bye, bye.
Banners can also give you
problems if there are two many and not well organized. Pay attention to the
color design to ensure that it matches your site. Remember, no eye sores
here. Overall,
banner are known not to have the highest clickthrough
rates.
(3) Flash Media: Flash media animations are steadily
gaining
popularity and many sites are tailoring their start-up page
to
include large flash animations. Beware. In online home
businesses, your
primary purpose is content. Only fit in flash
where it is strictly meant to
guide the visual stimulus to a part
of your site. I know, I know, it does
look cool. But cool doesn't
and never will build sales out of potential
prospects.
A few further resources that are of particular interest here
are
(1)http://www.internet-marketing-research.net
,
(2)http://www.infoplease.com/spot/colors1.html
,
(3)http://psychology.about.com/library/weekly/aa031501a.htm .
As a
good rule of thumb, if it hurts your eyes, it probably hurts
others as well.
Keep it simple, professional, easy to look at
with color used just in the
right place to highlight your
content. Content is what will build your home
based business.
Elicit a visual response from your visitors to drive them to
your
content.
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About the
Author:
Dan J. Fry is an independent researcher and owner
of
e-Kinetic.com, a site devoted to providing resources for small budget
home businesses. He has a PhD in Physics and is married with two daughters
and two cats. Subscribe to his free E-Zine on home business resources at mailto:e-kinetic@GetResponse.com or
by
visiting his <a href="http://www.e-kinetic.com">Online
Home Based Business Resources</a> site. He can be reached at mailto:comp@e-kinetic.com .
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