How to Make Your Website Appear More Professional

Increase Sales W/ These 5 Tips

Have you ever visited a website, liked the products/services listed, but felt uncomfortable placing an order because the site didn't look "professional?"

If your website does not look professional, I can almost guarantee that it's costing you sales. Give your site an instant checkup in the following five areas to see if you're losing customers. 

1. Be Conservative w/Color: Use a simple white background. This makes your site easier to read because that's what most of us are used to. I don't linger on sites with colored backgrounds because it usually takes my eyes a few minutes to adjust. The point: don't give potential customers even one reason to want to leave.

Stay away from bright colors. Start noticing really professional looking sites -- they usually use blues, grays, dark greens -- conservative colors like this are not only good design choices, they inspire certain emotions. Why do you think the standard interview suit is navy and/or black, instead of a yellow or red?

Colors & Emotions

Blues are associated with honesty, devotion, hope, and harmony. They can instill feelings of calm, quiet, serenity, and comfort. Blues slow the heartbeat, lower blood pressure and ease stress (more conducive to making a sale).

Greens are associated with harmony, honesty, and balance. Greens instill a feeling of acceptance and stability. They are associated with kindness, caring, compassion, and sharing.

Whites are associated light, purity, grace, cleanliness, innocence and tranquility. Whites provide a background for other colors to really "pop!"

Overall Design Tip: Usually the more conservative and clean looking, the better.

2. Complete Information: Did you know the more information you give about a product/service, the better your chance of making a sale? I've left sites because I simply couldn't find the dimensions of an item I wanted to purchase. At a minimum, give size, color, weight, a few sentences of vivid descriptions (eg, it feels like velvet to the touch, etc.).