Internet Business Blog
« Previous | Home | Next »

 

Blue, Blue, Blue Yes I'm Blue... Links that is!

Share/Bookmark

February 17, 2007

In some of my posts on web site design, and in my Introduction to Web Site Design Course www.WebSiteTrainingOnline.com, I emphasize keeping web pages clean and simple. Not everyone is tech savvy, and not everyone thinks like you do, or thinks like you were thinking when you designed your web site. You need to make it easy for anyone to follow your layout and your navigation. Your objective when creating a web page for your Internet business should be to improve sales. If your objective is not sales but something else like list building or even getting the visitor to pick up the phone and call for more information, the objective should be improving that desired action. Everything about your web site should be optimized toward having as many visitors take that desired action, placing an order, or adding their contact information to your list. The measure of how many visitors actually order or take the desired actions is called conversion ratio. The higher the conversion ratio, the more profitable your Internet business will be.

One thing that affects conversion ratio is the design of the links on your page. Eric Graham just posted the results of a split test that he performed that shows blue underlined links perform almost 10% better than non-blue, non-underlined links. You can read his whole report here: www.ConversionDoctor.com/conversion-blog/2007/usability-split-test-results-link-appearance-matters-more-than-you-think. Why is this true? Because the default link display behavior of web browsers has historically been blue and underlined. So people get used to it. And like a herd of cattle they follow. You can dress up links and use CSS or slices of images to make your links prettier or fancy, but guess what - it will cost you in lost sales.

I had configured this blog to have blue links, but only the links inside the actual posts were underlined. The post title links were not underlined, nor were the links in the left and right columns. After reading Eric's post I quickly edited my CSS file to make all links underlined as well. By the way, that's the nice thing about CSS, I didn't have to edit my web pages, or edit each of my blog templates, just a quick search and replace, save the CSS file and upload it to the web site and it's changed. Learn more about CSS with my Introduction to Web Site Design Course at www.WebSiteTrainingOnline.com,

The purpose of an Internet business, or any business for that matter, is to make money. I'd rather have an ugly web site that paid the bills vs. a pretty web site that does not. So even if you don't like underlined, blue links, if you want higher conversion ratios and a more successful Internet business stick to blue, underlined text links.

Take care,
Fred

About the Author

Fred Black is an experienced online business operator, programmer, web site developer, father, husband, musician, and songwriter. Visit his Internet Business Blog at: http://www.pqInternet.com.


You may reprint or distribute this article as long as you leave the content and the About the Author resource box at the end intact.


Get Free Updates! Enter your name and e-mail address to receive a short notice each time I make a new post.

First Name:

Last Name:

E-Mail Address:

E-Mail again:

NOTE: You will receive a confirmation email. You must click the link in the email to activate your free updates. Please check your spam folder(s) if you don't receive the email.


Share/Bookmark

Tip Jar: Leave a Donation

Comments: 1,   TrackBacks: 1.

Posted by Fred on February 17, 2007 | Printer-Friendly

TrackBack: http://www.pqInternet.com/Blog/mt-tb.cgi/19


Assigned Categories: Copywriting | Internet Business | Internet Marketing | Web Site Design, HTML, CSS


Related Entries:

 

 
Comments and TrackBacks 
TrackBacks:
  1. Fred Black: pqInternet.com...
    Rolling, Rolling, Rolling... Get them Links a Rolling!
    As noted in a previous post, the color you use for links on your web page can dramatically effect how many people click the links. In addition to the link color, the behavior of the links when you move the...
    Posted On: February 27, 2007 10:18 AM.
Comments:
  1. From: Eric Graham

    Fred,

    Love all the BLUE underlined links!

    Yes... In my test I found the blue underlined had an almost 10% increase in CTR, but that 10% increase in CTR translated into a 34.9% boost in conversion rates.

    So, blue is beautiful!

    Eric

    Posted by Eric Graham on February 17, 2007 12:40 PM

 


Post A Comment




Remember personal info?




Comment Policy <--- Read the comment policy (Updated 1/13/2010).

About  Contact  Free Products Fred W. Black

Blog Feeds, EMail, etc.:

Subscribe by EMail

RSS 2.0 Feed for www.pqInternet.com.
Add to Google Toolbar

Free Updates via EMail

Receive Free Updates.

Free Products and Software.

Search

 

Link to Me!

How to Link to this Blog.

Products

Products I Use & Recommend

www.3WayLinks.Net

www.1WayLinks.Net

Free Traffic System

Wordtracker Keyword Research Tool

www.aweber.com Opt-In List Management.

1&1 Hosting

Categories

All

ClickBank

Copywriting

Free Videos

Funny

Internet Business

Internet Marketing

Life

Search Engines: SEO

Social Media

Technology

Traffic

Truth and Freedom

Web Site Design, HTML, CSS

Recent Entries

Facebook Fan Pages and Static FBML Part 3: iFrames!

Facebook Fan Pages and Static FBML Part 2

Facebook Fan Pages and Static FBML - Part 1

Texting Social Media Updates - Useful vs. Useless

Success or Failure in an Internet Business Depends on Who's Looking Back at You in the Mirror...

Bullets from God - The Greatest Copywriter of All Time?

Success is not Sticky - You Have to Hold the BALL!

Birthday Salute!

New Layout

What's the Value of a Link to SEO (Search Engine Optimization)?

Internet Business Ethics 101

Exploding Your Copy (and life) From Sissy to SEISMIC.

Long Tail Keywords

I'm a Slasher!

Start Your Own Home Internet Business with these 7 Easy Steps...

All Entries

Recently Commented On

Mozilla Thunderbird Email Client - Part 2: Corrupted Inbox

Facebook Fan Pages and Static FBML - Part 1

Long Tail Keywords

Bullets from God - The Greatest Copywriter of All Time?

Success is not Sticky - You Have to Hold the BALL!

Success or Failure in an Internet Business Depends on Who's Looking Back at You in the Mirror...

Replacing a ClickBank Vendor's Sales Page with Your Own.

Facebook Fan Pages and Static FBML Part 2

Archives

All

Blog Roll

Clayton Makepeace

Terry Dean

Ryan Healy

ProBlogger

Internet Business Resources Blog

Michel Fortin

G. Brent Riggs

Jonathan Leger

Mark J Ryan

Dr. Joe Vitale

Search Engine Journal

Friday Traffic Report

Links

Cell Phones for Soldiers

Front Street Playschool

Clebe McClary

the IconFactory

Fred Black Music

Daryl Laws Sports Performance Blog

Williams High School Booster Club

Jacob Ingle

Light Peak

EasyIRS.com

Web Hosting

My Recommended Web Hosting Service: 1&1 Hosting

Mugs, Mousepads, etc.

About this Blog...

By:Fred W. Black

Contact Information

Powered by:Movable Type 3.34.

Copyright 2006 -2010, PhaseQuest.Com.
All rights reserved.

Subscribe by EMail RSS 2.0 Feed for www.pqInternet.com.

Add to Google Toolbar
My Facebook Fan Page
Twitter
Add www.pqInternet.com, to Google. Add www.pqInternet.com, to My Yahoo! Add www.pqInternet.com, to My MSN. Subscribe to www.pqInternet.com, with Bloglines Add www.pqInternet.com, to Your Technorati Favorites! Add www.pqInternet.com, to Windows Live

rs

Some photos are by: Lee Hinshaw Photography

© Copyright 2006 - 2010 PhaseQuest, all rights reserved.

 

Get Free Updates!

Insert your name and e-mail address to receive a short notice each time I make a new post.

First Name:

Last Name:

E-Mail Address:

E-Mail again:

NOTE: You will receive a confirmation email. You must click the link in the email to activate your free updates. Please check your spam folder(s) if you don't receive the email.

*I value your privacy and will never sell, rent, giveaway, or abuse your information.