1
Jun
Estate Agents, can your website design improve business?
Design and usability matter a lot when creating any Web site,
for estate agents getting it right could be the difference between
success and failure. Troy Stanley, Technical Director of web
designers and software provider Resource Techniques, offers some
good advice.
Getting Web design right is both hard and controversial. If you
ask a cross section of the population their opinion of a particular
design, there are usually as many opinions as the number of people.
To try to understand design, it's worth asking what's the
difference between design and art? I would define design as the
constrained application of art. Good designers are interested in
the practical application of their creative output. And design is
not just about aesthetics, it also embraces usability, good
functionality and of course cost.
Designing a Web site that can sell successfully is an art in its
self, and as getting it right can be the difference between
business success and failure, building a web site that achieves
this goal is critical.
Design basics
The aim of design has to be to support the objectives of the
site and in turn the business it's supporting. In the case of a
site for estate agents, it primary goal is to attract buyers and
sellers of property.
How can design help to achieve this? First of all we must
communicate the brand message that the company wishes to convey to
the target demographic. If there is any disconnection between these
two, this will jar with prospects and significantly reduce their
likelihood of buy in.
The next objective of design, and closely related to brand, is
the prime message. Maybe the site wishes to communicate a
contemporary feel, maybe something more traditional. Whatever it
is, it's the objective of the designer to create an emotional
reaction in the people engaging with the site. We call it the WOW
factor, research confirms that a site has around 3 seconds to
impress the user enough make the stay and not press the back button
and exit your site in favour of your competition, the WOW factor is
critical.
Design has the chance to bring clarity to what is offered on the
site, establish trust and clearly explain how the offering can be
accessed. Good web design will attract visitors, impress them and
make them stay, make them enjoy the experience, keep them coming
back and tell their friends about.
Marketing
Creating a point of difference... How can you as an estate agent
in a hugely competitive market place stand out from the crowd? How
can you have a clear point of difference? Essentially all estate
agents offer the same service, the same selling features,
rightmove, newspaper adverting, boards etc, etc...
Your website can create that point of difference, if it stands
out from the crowd, if it offers a rich user experience with large
high quality images of each property, large easy to read floor
plans, PDF brochures, mapping highlighting local amenities such as
schools, doctors, dentists etc, Google street view and email
alerts.
There is little point in attracting people in your site if they
aren't able to quickly access what they're looking for, research
shows that 97% of visitors come to an estate agents web site to
search for property. It is therefore essential to have clear 'calls
to action', 'Property Search' should be clearly identifiable and
navigation to relevant property information should be easy and
require minimal input.
Usability 101
When designing websites, there are some principles that should
always be applied. These include keeping your site simple and
easy-to-use. As above, make sure that there are clear 'calls to
action' like how to access 'Property Search'. Use common metaphors
such as About Us, and Contact Us. Also stick to common concepts,
such as making the logo clickable.
Remember that buyers can arrive at any page on the site via
search engines, so ensure that each page supports the brand
proposition. This is another reason for providing contact details
throughout the site, including telephone number, e-mail, and
physical address.
Remember the key rule of usability - if in doubt just keep it
simple.
The final word
Your web site is your shop window to the World, it has the
potential to bring new business 24/7, ensure your website is
driving traffic to you and not away.
For further help and advice contact:
Troy Stanley
Resource Techniques
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