10 Things Everyone Needs to Have on Their Website (and Where Everything Should Go)

10 things everyone needs to have on their website Session Hashtag: #10things _______________________________

Agenda
Panelist Intro
Presentation
Q/A
#10things __________________________________________________

Panelists
Nicole Aro, DNC (@nekaro)
Henri Makembe, Blue State Digital (@henrim)
Alex Kelner, Blue State Digital (@kellnaaah)
Katie Harbath, NRSC (@katieharbath)
Michael Turk, CRAFT | Media Digital (@MichaelTurk)
#10things __________________________________________________

1 - Well organized information architecture hosted on stable, scalable, user-friendly platform #10things __________________________________________________
Your content is only as good as the platform.
If your site goes down, makes it hard to maintain, or difficult for users to find information, the best ideas in the world won't save you.
Your platform should grow to accommodate the campaign.

2 - Clear mission, narrative and branding #10things __________________________________________________ Visitors to your site will typically spend only a few seconds to a few minutes on your site. What are you telling them? How easy is it to find meaningful content? If they leave, and never return, what should they take away?

3 - Integration with offline message & organizational goals #10things __________________________________________________
Clear and consistent message and mission across media - “About” section should reflect a field organizer’s description of your organization.
Cross-media engagement: build, document, celebrate
Online to offline
Event calendar
Hosting opportunities
Share your (volunteer) experience
Offline to online
Email & text signups on sign-in sheets
Hashtags, live-blogging

4 - Prominent email signup/capture #10things __________________________________________________
Email signups = Building online organization.
Online organization = Offline organization
Email signup must always be visible, obvious, and easy
Use analytics to determine most successful placement and strategies
Use splash pages, petitions, etc. at high traffic moments
Be creative !
For example, use FBML on your Facebook page to direct new fans to sign up for email
Use offline activity to build your online list

5 - An optimized donation page #10things __________________________________________________
We don't always know which pages will convert best . Test, test and test again.
Each audience is different. What results in the highest/most donations won't be the same for each website.
Use Google Site Optimizer. Part of analytics and fairly easy to use.
V.

6 - Dynamic/frequently-updated written/visual/video content #10things __________________________________________________
Why would anyone come back to your site if it's the same every time?
Think about your audience. What do they want to read/watch/look at?

Don't blog for the sake of blogging. Have something to say - dynamic content doesn't have to be a blog.

Sometimes being fast/current is better than being perfect.

7 - Interactivity components #10things
Website needs to be two way communication and visitors always given a way to interact with you.
__________________________________________________

Varying levels of interaction people will want to take.
Level 1: Sharing content via email & social networks
Level 2: Sharing thoughts on particular topics
Level 3: supporters interacting with each other.
__________________________________________________

Examples: Facebook share/Retweet buttons, email sign up, Google moderator to ask people for their questions
Engagement & interaction leads to emotional investment
__________________________________________________

8 - Action opportunities with proper daisy chains #10things
When you ask someone to take action on your site it is only the first of many steps. Each ask should be followed by another ask.
Example: After e-mail sign-up, Thank you page should include ask for a financial contribution.
Example: Ask visitor to share content with their friends, then ask them for their email then ask for money
CAUTION: Don’t bombard people with every ask at once, but doing it in a certain order will help them feel like a part of the campaign not just an ATM machine.
__________________________________________________

9 - Basic SEO __________________________________________________ #10things
Fill out <title> & meta tags (i.e. description and keywords)
CONTENT: 1) Use keywords. 2) Use H1 & H2 Tags. 3) Use ALT tags for images. 4) Speed matters.
CAUTION: Don't overdo keywords
Link to other pages on your the site
Use SEO-friendly URLs (i.e. www.mysite.com/section/pagetitle/ is better than www.mysite.com?pageid=123)

9 - Basic SEO __________________________________________________ #10things
Submit sitemap to search engine
404 Page
Use free tools to help you optimize (Google Webmaster tools, Hubspot Website Grader, Seobook's FF Extension)

10 - Data tracking/monitoring (analytics, reporting, etc.) #10things __________________________________________________
Use Google Analytics
Know who your visitors are, where they come from, why they came and where they went
Track the performance of your Ad campaigns & Set up funnels to track the performance of your daisy chains
Make changes to the site based on Analytics
Compare your stats to competitors
Google Insights & HeatMaps

Questions? ____________________________

10 Things Everyone Needs to Have on Their Website (and Where Everything Should Go)

by Henri Makembe on Apr 21, 2010

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