The Benefit of a Web Site Evaluation by Web Design Professional
by Brian Marine - January, 2010

Your business has a web site. It's been up & running for a while now, but hasn't been updated in quite some time. You don't get as much traffic and business from it as you'd like, but the web site isn't at the top of your priority list or busy schedule. Even if it was, you are not sure what it needs to be improved, and don't have a lot of money to spend even if you did know what to do.

Does any of this sound familiar? Unfortunately it's all too common an occurrence. In my experience (and I have been developing web sites for 14 years) I see so many web sites that are ineffective due to many things ... poor design, poor site navigation, outdated information, broken links, poor use (or over use) of Flash animation, pages that take too long to load, and so on.

What many business owners don't seem to realize is that many of these problems are easily diagnosed and fairly easy to fix. Yes, there is a cost to the site update (and more so if a complete re-design is required), but in all but the rarest cases ... this investment in their web site will more than pay for itself in practically no time.

But another thing I have found is that web site owners don't know where to turn for advice as to how to improve their web site, or are reluctant to begin the process ... fearing it will either be 1) too expensive, 2) too time consuming, or 3) both. So that is why I decided to begin offering a Free Web Site Evaluation to business site owners. I figured "Free" always seems to work for most business owners, and since they also don't have to actually do anything to get our report (other than filling out a 4 line web form) some might even take advantage of it.

So what do we look for when doing an evaluation of your web site, and what do we provide you? First we look at a site's overall design, layout and navigation. It doesn't matter what your business is or what your web site is offering ... if folks can't find it, or it's not a user-friendly experience ... they will leave. Which brings us to content; does your site provide the information necessary to accomplish its goal, and is that information up to date and relevant? If not, then again ... you will probably lose your visitor (who most likely has many other web sites he could visit with similar information).

Last, but not least ... we check the site's SEO (search eg nine optimization)characteristics. We look at on page text content (especially on the home page) as well as META and TITLE tag data (both important to help attain higher search engine rankings). We also look at other important SEO factors like how many of your site pages are indexed with the major search engines, how many inbound links you have, and your Google Page Rank.

After we've done all of this, we put together a simple report with this information and if necessary (and it usually is), offer our recommendations as to what needs to be done to correct and/or improve your site in these areas. We can then provide a free estimate on what it would cost Marine Creative to do this work ... but there is absolutely no obligation to use our company to do the work.

So what are you waiting for? Complete the Marine Creative Free Web site Evaluation Form today, and let us help you to understand how you can make better use of your web site for your business!