It’s all about appearance.

“You can’t judge a book by its cover.” Whoever said that, in my opinion, is crazy. Appearance is everything! When you meet someone for the first time, that first look formulates your opinion of that person for quite some time to come. The initial impression that person gives you is going to vary depending on if they are neatly dressed or completely disheveled.

In the world of the Internet, you have only a few seconds to make that initial impression on the person visiting your website. If you’re site looks disheveled, has outdated content on it and is an organizational nightmare, do you think customers are going to stick around to shop from you? Here are some tips to make that first impression count:

• Keep your navigation simple - break down your nav bar into clearly defined “departments” to avoid confusion.
• Don’t clutter your front page or landing pages - don’t overload them with tons of product, loads of text and blinking or flashing distractions.
• Keep content fresh and timely - if it’s January 3rd, you shouldn’t have your holiday products featured, unless you’re blowing them out. Change your featured products at least once a week.
• Keep customer comments updated - last thing a potential customer wants to see when deciding whether to order from you or not is a comment from a customer dated four years ago. Kill the dates or replace outdated comments with new ones.
• Get a designer! You’re neighbor in 8th grade is NOT a designer. You wouldn’t have him paint your house and you shouldn’t hire him to design your website. Professionalism is important.

Now, here is an example of “appearances count.” I was on a US Airways flight this past weekend and sat in row 1 which is a bulkhead seat. As in any bulkhead seat, you’re going to have people putting their feet on the wall getting it a little dirty. But the appearance of this bulkhead wall was something more than just a “little dirty” as you can see from the photos below.

First thing that came to my mind was, “wow, if they can’t take five minutes to bring in a rug shampooer to go over that wall, are they doing regular maintenance on their planes?” Being this plane was a 737-400, it’s at least 20 years old but that isn’t an excuse to not clean it. I’ve been on some 737-200’s that were a lot cleaner and older.

Don’t let your customer’s minds wander when they hit your site, make that first impression count!