Site accessibility is all about making sure your website can be used by any user, regardless of what browser, device, or possible disabilities they may have. Compliance with W3C guidelines is critical in making your site accessible to different types of users. Here are three ways can improve your Site Evaluator’s accessibility score.

 Ensure your site navigation and structure is logical and intuitive

Making your site’s layout and overall navigation logical and intuitive is imperative for making your site accessible. Viewers need to be able to easily discern between main headings, subheadings, and content. An intuitive main navigation system is important so that users can easily move throughout your website without any confusion

Use contextual links for disabled users

Many users who are disabled use screen readers that read out loud links on a page. Text links within copy will be read out as the term that as the hyperlink attached to it, rather than the page/content it is linking to. Make any contextual links in copy as descriptive as possible so that disabled users may easily navigate throughout your site. Use a descriptive link like ‘click here to see a list of products’ versus just ‘click here.’

Provide Alternative Content

Make sure your content can be used by anyone regardless of special needs. Some easy ways of doing this are allowing users to choose different font sizes, levels of contrast for colors, and providing text for non-text content like images.

Choosing a website designer is an extremely important decision when building a new website. As a business, you need to ensure you do all your research and find the closest thing to a perfect candidate possible. Here are five tips to do just that!

Technical Skills

Whenever looking at different web designer options, it is important to take note of what they are adept at. If you want infinite scrolling/page-less design, find a designer who knows how to do that. The most valuable designers are ones with some experience coding and programming, because they know the limitations and advantages of different content management systems. They will be able to confidently say ‘choose this solution because it will work perfectly with what you want.’

Web Designer’s Website

The best indicator of a web designer’s abilities is usually their website. This is essentially their portfolio, and will tend to be reflect the full scope of their expertise. Pay attention to things like their use of color, graphics, layout, and navigation scheme. Combined, do they create a compelling website?

Familiarity with Business/Industry

Finding a designer with previous work in your industry is very important. You need to find someone who knows your target audience and how to appeal to them. Do they share or understand your business vision? If they don’t, move on!

Internet Marketing Knowledge

Websites are one of, if not the most important piece of internet marketing. They are becoming the brick and mortar storefront of the 21^st century. The web designer you choose must have a working knowledge of internet marketing tactics like color schemes, SEO, layout, social media etc.

Experience

An experienced website designer is usually more valuable to any company. They have been around the block, have best practices in place, and know the ins and outs of website design. However, an experienced website designer may be more expensive, and may not always have exactly what you are looking for. If you are looking for new, unbridled, fresh, outside the box thinking it can be worth taking a look at younger designers. This is especially true if your audience consists of younger generations.

In order for you website to realize its full potential, it needs to have an optimal level of usability. This means making it easy for users to navigate, find, and use content. Site Evaluator looks at a bunch of factors when providing a usability score to your website, and here are 3 ways to improve your score.

Include a suitable site map for users and crawlers

Every website needs to have a well-structured site map that users and site crawlers can use to navigate to different pages. A site map most commonly refers to buttons or links at the header or footer of every page that connect to major areas of the website. If users find it hard to navigate your site they will leave. If search engine crawlers find it hard to navigate your site they will give you a lower search ranking. If you make life easy for users and search engines they will reward you with more traffic.

Make sure every link and file isn’t broken

One of the most annoying things on any website is when you see a link that connects you to something cool and it doesn’t work. Nothing makes a user more frustrated and more prone to leave a site than that. Every link and file needs to be working so that you don’t drive potential customers away. Take care of the little things and your website will perform much better.

Ensure content is fresh, ample in supply, and with no errors

You can have the greatest website design on Earth, but if you lack consistently fresh content no one is going to come back for more. The Internet is a ‘what have you done for me lately’ industry. Everything on your site needs to be fresh, and error free so that any user can take advantage of everything you have to offer. Search engines look at this too and will reward you with higher rankings for doing so. Keep up with developing trends, and throw out anything that isn’t fresh.

Deciding on a great web developer to create the website you want is a critical decision in the business world. There are tons of options out there, but only a handful that are right for your company. Many of them have their own unique proficiencies, and your mission is to find the one with the right blend of skills for your website. So what are five things you should look for? Read on!

Experience

Some web development firms have been around for a few months, and others for years. Older web development firms have the advantage of plenty of experience, having best practices in place, and years of knowledge of the internet industry. This can be highly valuable, but at the same time do they have the right TYPE of experience? Do they know the industry YOU are operating in and what your needs and wants are? Can they deliver on these? You may find that the older firms you look at don’t, but the younger ones do. That’s why it’s important to do your research. Ask to see a portfolio, and take a look at their website to see what they are capable of.

Great Customer Service

An important aspect of the web development process is customer service. Once you have your website completed, you will invariably have more questions. The web development firm you choose should be one that will stick around to help you as you acclimate yourself to the content management system and features at your disposal. Some firms will even offer ongoing support packages that can be very beneficial if your team doesn’t have a lot of technical experience.

Pricing

The price of custom developed websites can fluctuate greatly. Some may cost $500, while ones with more complicated features like e-commerce can cost thousands of dollars. Establish your budget and features needed before beginning your search. This will help you to narrow down the pool of potential developers. Also, ask for an estimate before finalizing any sort of deal. Many development firms will do this for free.

Communication Skills

Much like customer service, great communication skills are crucial during web development. The firm you choose needs to be on hand at all times to respond to all concerns and questions you may have. It is wise to choose a developer that is close in proximity to your business. Choosing a development firm that is headquarters half way across the world can create timing problems if not handled correctly.

Turnaround Time

Time is money. And this is especially true when it comes to web development. Developing a website is a lengthy process that will invariably need revisions, meetings, and troubleshooting. Having a developer that can establish a clear timeline and meet your deadlines is very important. Make sure to ask potential candidates for their expected turnaround times for deliverables, and compare these with your needs.

Social media is becoming more and more important in business. It allows you to engage your target audience directly, as well as serving as a valuable SEO and lead generation tool. Site Evaluator analyzes your use of social media using a variety of metrics. Here’s three ways on how to improve both your social media, and overall site score.

Place social media links/buttons on your website pages

This has quickly become a must-have on any website. If you are using social networks to reach out to consumers you absolutely need to have buttons linking to your accounts on every page. Make it easy for users to see how to connect with you. Oftentimes, social media is the place where people get to see a different, more personable side of the company. If this means more sales leads, you need to make sure to link to these accounts every chance you get.

Actively engage your target audience on social networks to improve Klout score

Engaging your audience does mean sharing content you have generated with your networks. It does not mean force feeding them your content. Don’t spam your followers, and be sure your content is actually interesting to them. If they start sharing or re-tweeting your posts you are in good shape. Also, take any opportunity you get to share their content, as long as it is relevant to your business. People love attention on social media. Klout is a service that measure how people interact with your posts and you with theirs. The more back and forth there is, the higher your influence score will be.

Actively share your website and any content you have on your website with links pointing back to your site

Inbound links from social media networks are becoming increasingly important. This is a huge part of inbound marketing. Make sure these links are connected to great content that will help retain user traffic. Once you have a good content generation system in place, people will take notice, and actively search for your content on social networks. Great content means more followers, which means more traffic, and that means more sales opportunities.