What makes a good homepage design?

We talk about the Nielsen/Norman Group's "4 Credibility Factors"
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/trustworthy-design/

How can you incorporate these factors into your homepage?

1. Design quality
2. Upfront disclosure
3. Comprehensive, correct, and current content
4. Connection to the rest of the web

How should you guide users?

1. Primary & secondary calls to action
2. Provide more ways to engage, like social following
3. Use current user data to promote your most popular content upfront

How does primary content gets broken down into micro content? That micro content essentially serves as ads on social media platforms that point back to your primary content. We talk about the role of tertiary content—the long-form posts we write that few people read—and why it shouldn't be viewed as primary. I go into an example of my in-laws' bookstore, which has taken this model and seen great success as a local business. Even though this is outside of our client base, it's a really easy example to grasp and it shows that you don't need much in the way of original content to draw people to your website and achieve your goals. Our "50 Pieces of Content a Week" goal is a little weak compared to Gary Vee's 64 piece a day prescription, but we think this is more manageable for small and mid-sized organizations. 

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/technical-seo/website-navigation/#close

Users come first: Your website navigation should satisfy users first. Then, optimize your navigation for SEO performance. Never compromise the user experience.

https://www.orbitmedia.com/blog/website-navigation/

“What we do” doesn’t actually say what you do. Neither does “Products,” “Services” or “Solutions.” Descriptive navigation that uses keyphrases is better for two reasons. Here’s where SEO and conversions come in.

Descriptive labels in your navigation are good for search engines and visitors
 

Navigation labels such as “videos,” “photos” and “white papers” tell visitors the format of the content, but not the topic. People don’t go to websites looking for videos or whitepapers. They visit websites looking for answers and information.

Nielsen Norman Group recommends against using format-based navigation.

Usability studies show that dropdown menus are annoying. Here’s why: visitors move their eyes much faster than they move their mouse. When they move their mouse to a menu item, they’ve likely already decided to click… and then you gave them more options. It’s a hiccup in the mind of the visitor.

Depending on how they’re programmed, they may lead to problems with search engines.

But the research shows that one type of drop down menu performs well in usability studies: The “mega drop down.” These offer lots of options, making that moment of friction worth it.

• Primacy effect: Items at the beginning of a list are more easily remembered.
• Recency effect: Items at the end of a list (or things that just happened) are more easily remembered.

Here are some examples of decisions you might make based on your analysis from these reports.

• Remove items that rarely get clicked, if they aren’t critical
• Rename or relabel that rarely get clicked, if they are important
• Move items that often get clicked to the beginning

Adding the word “menu” may help visitors find this type of “hidden” navigation. The Nielsen Norman Group warns that hidden navigation increases task completion time for visitors.

https://www.quantumdynamix.net/blog/improve-websites-navigation-9-best-practices/

There are bread crumbs at the top of the page’s content showing each of the following pages that led to this page. You can click on any of these breadcrumbs to go back to a previous page.

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/technical-seo/website-navigation/#close

• Cross-linking between content silos: Content relevancy between pages is important for ranking, which comes naturally in a well-categorized, hierarchical site architecture. However, this can have limitations when it lacks cross-linking between content silos where some pages are just too deep or too far away from receiving a good amount of link juice from other sources.
• Blogs to products, products to blogs: Create high-quality content that is helpful and relevant to your target audience. If these blog posts help in a product buying decision, then link to the blog post from the specific product page(s).
• Tracking parameters: Avoid using them; use the onClick event handler on links for tracking purposes. It is always safe to have a self-referencing canonical tag.
• JavaScript links: Avoid using JavaScript to write content and links. If there is no way around it, there are methods to make it work.

• Why did we choose roadmapping as a new approach?
• How are we addressing the problems of our former approach?
• How does roadmapping help clients?
  • Get the diagnosis right
  • Less committment
  • Start projects with confidence
  • Create a portable plan of action
  
  
• Common objections to roadmapping
  • Why pay when I can get an estimate for free?
  • I know what I need, just built it.
  • What am I really getting for this price?
  
  
• Who is the ideal client for roadmapping? And for Tallest Tree in specific?

This week Cord interviewed Brian Phillips, the Vice President for Communications at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Cord & Brian discussed launching a policy tour of Texas, integrating polling into your organization, and how TPPF took on a recent property tax reform effort.

Policy Tour

Polling & Messaging

Property Tax Reform Campaign

Brian's book recommendation: Damage Control (Revised & Updated): The Essential Lessons of Crisis Management by Eric Dezenhall.

Brian shouts-out Illinois Policy Institutes's news-focused approach to policy and the Foundation for Government Accountability's communication's team as great examples of successes in marketing good public policy.

Brian also advocated trying new things, even if those things are only new to you. R&D can mean "rip-off and duplicate."

Parting wisdom: there's no such thing as "the general public." You must have an audience in mind with everything you write or create.

Please remember to rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, follow Tallest Tree Digital on Twitter, like our page on Facebook, and share this show with other public policy marketing and communications professionals like you.

This week Cord interviewed Todd Myers, Director of the Center for the Environment at Washington Policy Center. He is one of the nation's leading experts on free-market environmental policy and the author of Eco-Fads: How the Rise of Trendy Environmentalism Is Harming the Environment.

Cord & Todd talked about:

Todd's book recommendation was Brian Caplan’s The Myth of the Rational Voter.

Please remember to rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts, follow Tallest Tree Digital on Twitter, like our page on Facebook, and share this show with other public policy marketing and communications professionals like you.

Rob Montz is a director at We the Internet TV, a fellow at the Moving Picture Institute, and co-founder and CEO of Good Kid Productions.

Rob's work has been featured in the New York Times, BBC World News, the Economist, USA Today, and The Washington Post. His documentary works have covered topics including free speech on college campuses, the North Korean regime, criminal justice reform, and the virtues of entrepreneurship.

His latest docs are Trump as Destiny: Why the Reality Show Presidency Was Inevitable, and Is Instagram Destroying Teenage Girls?

Hosted by Cord Blomquist of Tallest Tree Digital.

Scott Barton is a nonprofit leader focused on digital communications, strategy, persuasion, and building entrepreneurial teams, which makes him a perfect guest for our show.

While working at the Institute for Humane Studies, a university-based nonprofit, Scott co-founded and directed the Learn Liberty project, a digital education platform to promote the ideas of free markets and individual liberty to college students.

Scott helped Learn Liberty build an impressive library of over 400 videos with over 25 million views.

Scott has recently taken his talents to a new home, the Pacific Legal Foundation, where he serves as the Director of Communications and Outreach.

Scott talked to Cord about how organizations can tell persuasive stories about their ideas, mission, and work.