I’ve written in a different blog post (which may or may not have already been posted – I’m not sure when each of these are being published) about the KISS principle or Keep It Simple, Stupid. The idea there was to make sure that your site was simple and “uncluttered” so that it can be easily read. This is kind of an extension of that idea.
Spacing and Fonts
The first issue that you seriously need to address is your spacing and choices of fonts. I’m sorry to have to tell some web marketers this but the 6 point font that you think allows you to get everything “above the fold” is not worth anything. Nobody is ever going to read all that tiny print and I have a feeling that Google’s engineers may even consider it to be spammy because it seems like it’s meant for the spider’s benefit as opposed to the reader’s benefit.
Instead, you want to focus on building sites which have readable text which real people can look at. Also, don’t be stingy with your spacing. Keeping everything tight and difficult to read means that more people will click away from your site and look elsewhere because they simply cannot be bothered with trying to figure out what it is that you’re trying to say.
Make It Easy to Navigate
The next thing to keep in mind when designing your website to maximize sales is navigation. Your customers are busy people and they simply do not have the time to waste figuring out your creative version of a site. Generally, people will look below your headline to find the navigation buttons. If you decide they should be down below or off to the side or hidden because they’re unsightly until you hover over them, you may think that sounds cool but in reality, it’s just going to annoy people.
Don’t Worry about the Number of Clicks
There is a school of thought in the world of web design where people claim that if you need to do more than 3 clicks in order to make something happen, you’ll lose most of your customers. This is however largely the modern day equivalent of an old wives’ tale. While you should strive for simplicity in your website design, you don’t have to arbitrarily decide that if it’s more than 3 clicks it’s too much.
Length of a Page
Finally, as I said above, you want to keep your writing “airy.” It should not seem dense. Think about when you open a book and flip through it. While most people don’t realize it consciously, what they are doing is looking for space. They want to see if the thing seems really dense or not. This means that length of your page is not nearly as important as the density. In point of fact, often, a lengthier squeeze page can be a great benefit because it allows you to offer more detail. The thing is, you want to design it so that people don’t have to feel overwhelmed. Let those who want to see more detail see it while allowing those who are interested in the bottom line to get there as well.