A Website That Works – Unheardarts’ Resource Guide
We're here to assist and are happy to share some of our knowledge with you in the form of this brief guide.
| First Your Idea -Part one | Second Your Website -Part two | Making Your Website Work -Part three |
Blending Real and Virtual Worlds
A lot of what happens on a website (a virtual world) is supposed to support activities and events that take place in the real world. Only it doesn’t. People get a site because it’s a 21st century ‘must have’ but you really need to decide how important it is to the success of your venture. If you’re plan is to bring together a group on a regular basis to share, discuss and unite around a cause; will this be helped by saying, 'and I’ve set up a website?'
If you think the resources you can make available via the site will enhance the growth of the group then that’s fine. However, if the group’s growth has nothing what ever to do with having some web space – why bother investing time, effort, and money into producing one?
If you get it right, then the website will raise and promote your goals – if you’re all about meeting, then it’ll fill in the gaps between meeting up, helping to seize and hold the attention of new comers.
Locating Your Space
So you say your website will be an extension of what you’re trying to do (community, group, venture, art, campaign). But where are those you want to involve in the doing or to share what gets done with? You may see your audience as being local and assume your website will attract local interest but a website’s a window to the world and the benefits and challenges of this need to be taken into account.
Make the material you post on the site local as well as open and inclusive – embrace the wider reach that the medium makes possible. A website that caters for a handful of ‘like’ visitors isn’t likely to reward the time you invest in it.
Your Site Promotes You
Consider is your market (too commercial) then consider the range of people you expect to visit your site and how you can cater for a variety of visitors?
Not everyone who comes is going to be a first-timer and at the same time, to generate interest, engagement, interaction, you’re going to have to attract the casual visitor.
Bright Ideas – get known through your site – is it (are you) listed with local council sites, arts groups, the central library, etc...
Aside from obviously making sure you’re listed on other related local sites and directories, think about what local events, sights, scenes, etc… you can feature, discuss or use.
What about a top ten, best of or popular features section – what about the information you have that others aren’t likely to have – where do you love to go, what do you love to do – can you weave this into the site to increase interest? Who else around and about has similar interests or is doing similar things – find out, is there any opportunity for collaboration, support or sponsorship?
Getting Listed by Search Engines
There’s a lot of art and science spoken and written about this but experience suggest that once Google has picked your site up, the others will follow. If your site’s been registered and ‘alive’ for two or three months, Google may have already picked it up, but if not try registering your site here:
http://www.google.co.uk/addurl/
Other things to consider in brief:
An Exchange of Links
Links to other sites (and on other sites to yours) are good, but be cautious about who you link and who wants to link you.
Using Keywords to Attract Visitors
The wording you use on the pages of your site is most critical in terms of attracting the right kind of interest (triggering visits based on search engine searches). You’ll need to work on this over time, evolving the right words and relevant content. A key is to provide content around and about your idea, subject area or theme.
The Incidental Search
In reality people aren't going to search for your web site address, they're going to search for words or terms.
Making Visitors Feel At Home(page)
Your homepage is important. Of course, visitors can "crash" into your site at any point (a search result may have led them to any page) but if they have arrived and are remotely interested, they’re going to visit your homepage.
See – Our Services
Want Further Advice and Guidance
Would you like some help deciding how to promote your aims?
There’s a lot to know and much more we can help you with. We’re here to help, bringing a personal touch, our passion to assist and lots of experience – if you’d like to know more, contact us at
unheardarts@unheardwords.com
