Having a content management system is the great new thing for all new website owners.  There are many different CMS systems and any shopping cart site has a CMS system allowing the owners full reign over all their content.

What many website owners forget, however is that how their content is placed on the page is as much of the design as the graphics are.  Unfortunately I’ve seen website owners use unusual fonts that don’t match the design or bright colours or different fonts on different pages or use irregular spacing or photos that look stretched as they weren’t resized properly.  All of this affects the overall look and feel of the site and unfortunately sites that have beautiful graphics and designs are now marred by these changes loosing their wonderful design.

So if you have a CMS here are the things you want to be careful with:

Fonts: Keep your fonts consistent with the design or at most add one font that is complimentary.  Stick to web safe fonts that compliment the design.  i.e. if you have a modern design don’t use Times New Roman as your font.

Font Colours: Keep your font colours the same but choose one call for action colour that is used consistently from page to page.  Having too many colours on a page causes a confusing and busy look.

Photos: If you add photos to your site most CMS systems have a way to resize with “constraints”.  Constraints mean that it will retain the same proportions and shrink the size consistently without stretching the photo one way or the other.  If your CMS doesn’t offer this than buy a simple photo editor like Adobe Elements for $99.  Having poor photos on your site will hurt the over all look and make your site seem unprofessional.

Spacing: Some website owners feel having double spacing or larger spacing between lines or indenting their text makes the site easier to read and it may, but the overall look will make a site look strange as no other sites do this.  Stick to formats that still look professional and similar to what other sites look like.

Having a CMS puts the responsibility of maintaining the professional look of your site on your shoulders and whenever in doubt keep it simple.

Over the past 5 years web design has  certainly evolved.  Website owners and business owners have learned the value their website has and the importance to appeal and hold visitors to them.

First it was important to have a modern and current looking site.  Then as attention spans shortened it was important to have a modern, current looking site that also visually communicated your company’s or website’s services or products.  Then it was important to have animation, movement and life to your site.

Now website owners are actually having to revamp and redesign their sites every 2 years to stay current. With all this website design trends have started to show up in the last 3 to 4 years.  3 years ago it was all the rage to have a black and grey site. Soon that trend died off and beiges with pastel pinks and blues became very popular.  Now glassy web 2.0 looks with bright neon greens and oranges are popular.

Like clothing, website fashion trends only last for so long and if you are interested in staying on top of the trendy styles you also have to be willing to accept that in a year or 2 it’s going to look outdated and you’ll have to redesign the site.  Do you have the time and capital to invest a thousand or so dollars into your site every few years.

The other option is the little black dress that since the 1900’s has never gone out of style.  Choose elegent, professional colours and styles and your site could be good for 4 to 5 years instead and even then may only need to update some photos, graphics or add in some flash animation or a video.

You don’t need to be on the cutting edge of every trend and every new design feature, but having a professional site that is current is invaluable.  It builds trust with the visitor and shows them you value your business as you invest in a good website.  84% of consumers won’t shop from a store that doesn’t have a website, 72% of consumers also won’t buy from a shop that has a poor website.  A poor website included an outdated look, broken links, broken buttons, missing pages or generally an ugly site.

So what is the best strategy for your site, the little black dress or the latest in fashion trends right of the runway from Paris?

So many people who come to us for website designs are so focused on the overall design, the navigation and that it looks professional, so much so that they overlook their content.   Now don’t get me wrong, a professional, modern looking website is very important - for the first 10 seconds… to build consumer confidence and to visually demonstrate what your site has to offer, once on the site they stay for the content.

This is where so many ecommerce sites now fail.  Not only do a lot of ecommerce sites to fail to provide reasonable information about each product but they have horrible pictures.  Horrible in the sense that they don’t look professional, or they don’t match in size throughout the site, or they are blurred, or they are small, you get the picture (no pun intended).  Horrible in the sense that they cost these websites sales!

The picture is likely the biggest selling factor of any ecommerce store.  People want to know what they are getting and expect and accurate depiction of the product.   Shopping online has it’s limitations as most people like to feel and touch a product before they buy it in a brick and mortar store, however you can’t do this online so they expect very good photos.  They expect photos that are clear, show the whole product and the exact product they will be getting and if available in more than one colour, they expect to see all the colours. 

So many ecommerce store owners either rely on their suppliers or manufacturers to supply the photos or take an unprofessional photo themselves.  If your supplier or manufacturer doesn’t have all the photos you need or offers unprofessional photos then:

1. Invest in a tripod, background and some photo lessons

2. Hire a professional to photograph the products

If you opt to take the photos yourself, the photos don’t need the highest resolultions, they only need to be 72 dpi, so any standard digital camera can take the photo.  You do need to make sure you have a good background and consistent lighting.  You may then need to hire a graphic designer to clean up the images for you afterwards.  Also consider taking the photo from other angles if its a larger product or has a lot of elements or details (obviously you wouldn’t need to do this with a t-shirt, but with a car engine you would).  Also makes sure you take photos of all the different colours available and if it comes in a box a photo of the closed box as well as any extra products that come with it (Tiger Direct is a good example of this they typically have a photo of the box, the product and all the wires, cables, batteries etc that come with the product). 

This may seem like so much work and a real investment of time and money, but not having a great photo to show off your products will loose your business valuable sales!