7 Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Web Designer to Create Your Book Promotion Website — Part 2 of 2

By BNI & Referral Institute - Sep 05 , 2008

By Beth Sobiloff

In Part 1, I discussed these questions (click here to review Part 1, for the full text):

1. How will you build a website that will load fast, capture the attention of your book buyer within seven seconds, and keep them coming back again and again?
   
2. Do you know how to set up an email-capture form and hook it up with an autoresponder?
   
3. Can you design my site so that the call to action is clear and prominent?
   
4. Will my pages be optimized for the search engines, and how?

Here are the final three questions, followed by a couple of bonus tips:

5. Which browsers and which versions do you check to ensure that the site is workable?

As you may know, the two major browsers being used today are IE (Internet Explorer) and FireFox. AOL has its own version of IE. Mac users have Safari as a browser.

Your web designer should be checking your website at least in the last two versions of IE, FireFox, and Safari to ensure that everything works properly. Although there are standards for coding web pages, browsers see things differently. You want as many people as possible to see your site the way it was meant to be seen.

6. Will my site be designed according to the accessibility guidelines and other W3C standards?

The W3C is a non-profit commission that sets the standards for website coding. There are guidelines that should be followed to ensure that people with disabilities have the same access to your website. For instance, on a lot of sites these days the links fail to be underlined. They will make the linked text another color instead. Someone who is color blind will likely miss the different color and fail to know that the text is a link.

7. Can you design the navigation so that it is clear, understandable, and the visitor will always know where he is in the site and can find what he wants without clicking more than three times?

The 7-9 second rule applies here. If the visitor is unable within 7-9 seconds to figure out where to go for the information he seeks, he’ll move on to the next website. A common, unfortunate phenomenon is referred to as “mystery meat navigation”. This refers to the use of images for buttons, but they fail to have a text prompt! You have to run your mouse all over the site to try to figure out where the information is.

If a web designer can answer these questions to your satisfaction, then there is a good chance that he/she will be able to create a site that will bring buyers for your book. It doesn’t even matter so much whether they specialize in book and publishing industry websites, as long as they can answer these seven questions to your satisfaction. You can provide book industry specific info.

Some bonus tips for choosing the right designer for your book promotion website:

• Make sure that YOU are the owner of your domain name. Some web designers register their customers’ sites in their own name. But what if something happens to that person? You have to jump through hoops to convince the domain registry company that you are really the owner! I recommend www.godaddy.com for domain name registration.
• Make sure that you have all of the hosting company codes and contact information necessary to access your website, even if your web designer is maintaining your site for you. Again, if something happens, you need to be able to get to your own site, or know who to call so that your new web designer can access the site. If you are looking for reliable hosting with personal service, I recommend www.charlesworks.com.

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Beth Sobiloff is the owner of Birchwood Enterprises, a web design, Internet marketing and search engine optimization company located in Hanover, Massachusetts. Beth is the author of a DVD entitled “Search Engine Optimization: How to Grab Your Customers Online”. She has been creating websites for small businesses and entrepreneurs for over eight years.