Atlantic Business Technologies, Inc.

Category: User Experience

  • ABT Hosts Crop Meetup, Drafts “Design Bill of Rights”

    First 2016 Crop Meetup Preludes Raleigh’s Annual Hopscotch Festival

    How do we turn Raleigh into a global design destination? That is—how can we, as creative professionals, help develop the creative community in the Triangle Area to the point that it’s recognized the world over?

    After an extended holiday sabbatical, Crop hosted its first meetup of the year Tuesday to discuss just that. Hopscotch Design Director Marie Schacht put on a discussion workshop in Atlantic BT’s Level 1 lounge to explore what the future looks like for the broad collection of designers and creatives in the triangle area.

    “We’re our strongest when we’re aligned and working together to solve a problem, whatever that problem is. It usually includes people from different backgrounds with different perspectives,” says Eileen Allen, VP of Experience and Strategy at ABT and Co-founder of Crop. “The goal of Crop is for us to reach out and give people from different disciplines the chance to talk with each other about design. With Hopscotch coming up, it seems like as good of a time as any.”

    A Culture of Collaboration Affirms Its Rights

    The meetup preluded the annual Hopscotch Design and Music Festivals that will take over downtown Raleigh September 8–10. With festival organizers synchronizing the two schedules to further integrate the music and design aspects, it made sense for ABT to host the event, as collaboration is cornerstone to the ABT business model.

    “I rarely ever work on a project alone for very long at all,” remarked Corey Brinkmann, ABT’s Design Manager and the other Co-founder of Crop. “That’s why we try so hard to make ABT a place that can attract the best people. A collaborative culture is only as good as the people that make it up, but that model has the potential to be more than just the sum of its parts.”

    Collaboration was also key to the workshop. About 25 people were divided into teams and then asked to draft a ‘design bill of rights’ that identified the liberties they consider most sacred as designers.

    bill of design rights

    “We the people declare that design matters. It shall henceforth be a staple factor in how we make decisions and organize the community. We will hack life and make all things better, easier and intuitional,” read one such bill. “We the people will promote the freedom to collaborate, challenge ideas to make the world a better place… using thumb wars as an ultimate tie-breaker.”

    “It’s good to do things like this as a group of designers to establish more ties to each other and to what we collectively think is important,” says Emily Davidson, Front-End Developer at ABT. “The more we collaborate with each other and talk about design, the stronger the community becomes.”

    Davidson might not be completely impartial, however. While enjoying the complimentary catered dinner, she also won the raffle grand-prize—a ticket to the Hopscotch Design Festival.

    “I always look forward to the festival,” Davidson said. “I always stumble onto great bands that I’ve never heard before and this year I’m finally going to be able to go to the design fest!”

    Davidson later described Hopscotch as “a couple of really fun, slightly weird parties and of course, unlimited inspiration” to serve as a place to “discover the people designing the future.” The organizers of this music and design festival make it a point to try and appeal to designers from completely different backgrounds.

    Hopscotch: Where the Creative and Functional Meet

    Accordingly, this year’s Hopscotch features will include talks by bestselling author and CEO of Change Academy Dan Heath, as well as graphic designer and creative entrepreneur Tina Roth Eisenberg and many others.

    Similarly, Crop is a meetup designed to bring creative individuals with various specialties together in order to practice crafting innovative solutions.

    “Designing simple is very hard,” says Allen, who came up with Crop while having beers and talking shop with a coworker. “But I really believe that the power of design is that it can provide elegant solutions to complex problems. It’s about finding a creative solution with whatever you have available. To me that’s why I love design, it’s the intersection of creativity and functionality.”

    Expect to see more events from Crop in the near future, and stay hydrated at Hopscotch.

  • Uncover Your Most Important Browser Rendering Issues in 6 Easy Steps

    Somewhere out there, someone can’t use your website. Believe it or not, there are dozens of bugs on your website right now. You may think that your site works perfectly and renders beautifully from the latest Chrome on your Thunderbolt display, but someone out there is bringing up your website using a device or a browser you didn’t know was still alive. You don’t want to know what they will see.

    That person might be a potential client who was directed to your website or landing page via a very well-orchestrated marketing campaign. Fine, so what’s the worst thing that could happen? They arrive at a destination that is not at all the beautifully designed website you intended for them to see and you have just kissed a potential client goodbye.

    The way I see it, whether you’re overspending on paid traffic or under-converting, you’re losing money. You can throw more money into your advertising pit, or you can chose to do more with the traffic you’ve already attracted. Most people don’t need help figuring out how to spend more money, so I’ll spend some time helping you with the latter here.

    The Testing Tools

    You can’t realistically account for each and every device and browser version on the planet. What you can do is come close enough to affect your bottom line without investing a ton of money. Two tools that will help you with your quest:

    1. CrossBrowserTesting
    2. BrowserStack

    Both of these tools let you see your website through the eyes of any visitor or potential client, even those who are loading your homepage from a Safari 7.0 browser on their iPhone 4s.
    BUT WAIT—before you launch down the rabbit hole of pulling up every possible browser/device combination, you’ll want to figure out which ones really matter.

    The Pre-Test

    So, which browsers and devices should you be testing? For this we turn to analytics. There are loads of analytics tools out there to get the job done, but for those of you who use Google Analytics, here are some instructions:

    1. Go to your Google Analytics Reporting Dashboard and set the timeframe for the past 30 days.
    2. Go to Audience and under Technology, select Browser & OS.
    3. Scroll down to the browser versions and make a list of the top converting browsers.
    4. Still in the Go To Audience category, select Technology under Mobile category.
    5. Make a separate list of the top converting devices.
    6. Repeat the steps for the past 60-day, 90-day, and 180-day timeframes to measure the consistency of your results.

    Here’s an example of a table that you could build to help you organize your data:

    Browser Version %Sessions Goal 1 CR Goal 2 CR
    I.E. 56.04%
    11.0 55.97% 96.41% 97.00%
    9.0 18.02% 0.64% 0.41%
    10.0 15.83% 2.94% 2.60%
    Chrome 26.86%
    44.0.2403.157 34.38% 46.75% 38.86%
    45.0.2454.85 15.28% 7.13% 22.91%
    45.0.2454.93 14.68% 21.59% 17.24%
    Safari 7.82%
    8.0 53.22% 33.33% 7.16%
    7.0 9.60% 33.33% 60.37%
    9.0 8.88% 0.00% 0.00%

    Make a separate list for mobile devices:

    Device %Sessions Goal 1 CR Goal 2 CR
    Apple iPhone 40.19% 9.09% 1.93%
    Apple iPad 13.52% 9.09% 16.30%
    Samsung Galaxy S5 11.1% 81.82% 81.76%
    Samsung Galaxy S4 1.32% 0.00% 0.00%

    Once you’ve got the data, you can raise some important questions. For example, why does your Goal 1 conversion rate drop significantly for I.E. 9 sessions? If a large percentage of sessions are taking place on that browser, it may be worth looking into. On mobile devices, maybe you’ll want to dig deeper into why Apple devices convert less than the Android devices. It could be a rendering problem.

    By the way, don’t judge—the issue isn’t whether or not people should be using an older browser or device, but how you can improve their experience with whatever technology your visitors are using. This is about data, not opinions. Don’t make assumptions about which browsers your visitors are using or how much they could be converting until you get the data.

    Now that you have your list of suspects, plug the browser and device info into the browser testing tools I mentioned earlier and see what comes out. If you notice any issues, they are probably related to:

    • JavaScript errors
    • Browser compatibility with vendor-specific CSS styles
    • HTML/CSS validation errors (the W3C Validation Service can help with this)

    Fix these issues or get a Front-End Developer to do it. Bottom line, don’t risk losing sales over fixable browser rendering issues. On the flip side, there is a pink elephant in the room: the performance of older browsers is inherently diminished, which also affects usability and conversions. To learn how to tackle this issue, check out my blog post on improving the speed of your website.

  • Web Education: Preparing for GenZ

    Connected!

    I remember the first time an AOL CD-ROM appeared in my parent’s mailbox. It promised me thousands of minutes to connect with others through our computer. A computer, that up until that moment, had been used primarily for solitaire.

    I patiently waited for the program to load. Nothing happened. Where was my Internet? I didn’t realize I needed a phone line to connect. I “borrowed” a phone cord from my parents room and figured out how to connect the computer’s modem to the phone jack. For the first time, I heard the strange sound of dial up, and the word “Connected!” appeared. I was online.

    Learning to use the web has changed slightly since then. While everything in the past had to be self-taught, we can now get degrees or go to bootcamps to learn all kinds of Internet technology. Indeed, staying abreast of the latest techniques is a must for developers to do their jobs. Learning more about the latest technology trends led me to attend ConvergeSE, where I heard a keynote that blew my mind—Pamela Pavliscak’s talk on Gen Z and the Future of Technology.

    As Pamela Pavliscak explained, GenZ is the first generation who are truly digital natives. They make up 25% of the population, representing how future technology users will navigate the web and expect applications and interfaces to work. By paying attention to how GenZ uses the Internet, we can both improve the quality of our own work and make future technology more accessible and useful going forward.

    The Future of Community

    The definition of community for GenZ is different from what I grew up with. My idea of a community was going to the park and seeing kids on the playground. Today, kids have fewer physical hangouts. Instead they hang out online in spaces like Twitch. These digital communities allow teens to have their own identities and play around with their social presence. Because GenZ uses the web to create a vast social community and develop real relationships online, their communities have the power to be both local and global.

    What does this mean for the future of technology? It means we can control the context. This means allowing and encouraging GenZ to participate in grown-up conversations through technology. We also need to know how to protect ourselves and GenZ from turning toward Dark Social–the social sharing of content that occurs outside of what can be measured or tracked by web analytics. Because everything in Dark Social is anonymous, it often leads to bad (even illegal) behavior. To combat this, we have to promote a digital culture of openness that shifts how we identify ourselves and others through the web.

    Communicate in All the Ways

    GenZ’s communication style favors immediate, diverse, and ever-changing connections. For GenZ, phones are no longer for talking. GenZ spends more time texting and talking to Siri than they do talking to real people. They do not email. Why would they? An email isn’t real time. Emails don’t offer instant gratification or connection like text messaging or Snapchat. GenZ wants to create a memory and experience something together. This means they want to re-frame, reshape, and re-experience the moment. For them, a memory isn’t something that is set in stone. It’s a moment in time that is captured and built on.

    The future of technology allows us to communicate in all the ways: to convey a mood, to show rather than describe how we feel, to constantly stay connected, even when we have nothing to say. We have to learn how to incorporate all kinds of technology into our communication, from voice to texting to video capture. GenZ communicates in bite sizes. They communicate in symbols. They speak in emoticons and emojis. The symbols provide context and create subtext for their private conversations. If we can understand what these symbols and shortcuts mean in our language, we can use the right visual and textual vocabulary in our technology and design.

    Default to Private

    GenZ often uses technology as a way to escape the everyday. This explains why they are usually the early adopters of new social networks. For them, new tech trends are like new wearables. For example, when I was a kid, everyone had slap bracelets. If you didn’t have one, you weren’t cool. For GenZ, being connected to the latest tech trend is their slap bracelet. They don’t want to be the only kid in school who isn’t on Twitch. GenZ is constantly online, but that doesn’t mean they want you to know everything about them—they understand how to hide and limit who can see their posts using privacy settings.

    What’s our lesson? Educating yourself on how to use privacy settings is imperative. We are stepping away from wanting everyone to know everything to only wanting to share with those that we know. This trend will lead to more social networks adapting stronger privacy settings. Besides affecting how we advertise and communicate on these networks, this also means we need to learn how to protect ourselves from what we share. As we continue to create our own social brands using technology, we need to know how to portray ourselves without losing our privacy. And when we design new communication technology, we should make user information private by default.

    Leave it Open

    Being creative and playing is about combining off-screen and on-screen. GenZ wants to be able to create. They want to to see what they are creating on-screen. Zs want to do anything but read on a device. They want to tell stories and they are using their devices to do this, by creating art with their screens. They create short animations through different apps. They build entire movies out of photos. They do this, not for themselves, but for their family and friends.

    When designing for the future, we need to leave our platforms and technology open. GenZ doesn’t want the story to end. They want to make their own choices. If there is an ending, it doesn’t appeal to them. We need to design for GenZ’s short attention spans, allowing them to operate multiple screens at the same time.

    We also need to learn how to build for the worst case scenario. For example, GenZ cares less about having the latest technology than just being connected. Growing up, they typically inherited older devices from parents or siblings, so they became experts at connecting with slower tools. Our lesson? If you’re building for mobile, you need to develop apps that work well on older devices instead of focusing entirely on state-of-the-art smartphones.

    Understanding Our Future

    I thought back to my first online experience. No one showed me how to connect to the web. I was lucky to have a computer. I had to teach myself everything that I learned about technology.

    This is not the case for GenZ. They will never need to figure out a dial-up modem or wait to connect. They were born with online technology, and navigating it has become primary for them. And one day, GenZ will be the ones who provide us with our future web education. Zs will be our teachers and we will be their students. But before that happens, we can learn from how GenZ uses the web: making our technology more secure, more connective, and more open.

    What are your experiences with how GenZ uses the Internet or web-based technology? What are you learning from this new generation’s preferences and practices? Let me know in the comments below.

  • Let’s Get This Content Started

    12 Ways to Begin Long-Form Content

     

    You’ve got a brilliant idea. And it’s a detailed idea—it’s the kind of idea that merits a long-form blog post, not just a tweet or two. You dash to the keyboard and put together an outline. This only makes you more excited about writing your post. You’ve got an original idea, a relevant subject, and an organized structure. You are guaranteed to win at the Internet as soon as this content gets published.

    But first you have to actually write the opening sentence. And the more you love your idea, the harder this is—and if you can’t hook your readers with the opening, they’re unlikely to read the rest of your brilliant idea. How do you craft an interesting beginning to your long-form content that will not only guarantee people read it, but also comment on it, share it, and drive it up to the lofty heights of Google’s ranking system?

    Sad to say, there is no opening sentence that guarantees these results. However, there are proven strategies to write compelling openings for long-form content. Here are my 12 favorite ways to begin a content post, including classic strategies, less conventional openings, and hated practices that actually work.

      1. Classic Opening Strategies

    • Ask a Leading Question
      What is the biggest obstacle that digital marketing campaigns face today?

      The advantage of leading with a question is that it makes your post curious and conversational. Even though the reader cannot answer you outside the comments section, he will ponder possible answers to your question and then keep reading it to see if he answered correctly (or at least, in a way that agrees with you).
    • Use a Quotation from Those Who Know Such Things
      “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
      –Arthur C. Clarke

      This proven opening strategy works because you get to begin with the words of an expert. In addition to borrowing language by a reputed author, this technique also implies that those words support whatever you’re about to argue. The main downside is that you have to find a compelling and relevant quote from someone that the reader would recognize and respect.
    • Start with a Provocative, Short Statement
      Everyone hates ads.
      Shakespeare sucks.
      The information age is finished.

      Provocative statements have the potential to grab the reader’s attention by disrupting her expectations. She thought he was reading a nice, polite blog post and then BOOM—she finds a fundamental assumption questioned. Because surprise is key to making these work, it’s crucial these statements are short enough that the reader doesn’t see the disruption coming. You also need to actually prove whatever unexpected statement you make in the post itself.
    • Lead with Statistics or Numbers
      70% of people immediately close blog posts that don’t begin with numerical facts.

      This is arguably the most boring of the classic strategies, but leading with an interesting statistic immediately gives your post a foundation of analytic rigor. Statistics imply you’ve done your research, making the rest of the post more trustworthy. Of course, now you have to find a relevant stat from a reputable source to back up your argument. If this takes a long time, you might wish you’d tried another strategy.

      2. Less Conventional Openings

    • Let Me Tell You a Story…
      Two minutes into a presentation on gameification in marketing, the speaker used earning extra airline peanuts as an example of gaming rewards. “My God,” I thought, “he literally said customers are working for peanuts.”

      Everyone loves a good story well-told, and this strategy can get the reader leaning forward to find out what happens next. Once you have the reader’s attention, use an elegant transition to tie your story to the core subject of your content post. When the end of the story interweaves with your main point, your reader is hooked.
    • Offer a Seemingly Unrelated Comparison that Is Actually a Metaphor
      Despite some differences, premium face cream and hyperlocal digital advertising have a lot in common. For example, both use targeting on areas in need of an uplift.

      The key here is subverting the reader’s expectations by presenting insightful information in a new way. Challenge the reader’s thinking with an inventive or funny comparison, and you can pique his interest to read the rest of your post.
    • Begin at the Ending
      Not only did a major cruise line increase brand awareness by 28%, but it also booked more than 500 new passengers last quarter. How did this happen?
      Her mouse hovered over the Confirm Purchase button. We were about to find out if we’d reached the right customer at the right time, or the right one a little too late.

      Instead of building suspense like a typical post, skip to the most important part of the story. Beginning with the end is a nice way of telling a results-oriented reader that getting through this story will be worth it. Start at the climax, and you throw your reader right into the crux of the post, and entice her to find out how she got there.
    • Unexpected Humor
      “In the beginning the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” –Douglas Adams

      While this isn’t the easiest approach, beginning with a surprise joke is a great way to approach a topic in a more lateral, creative way. Using unexpected humor suggests to the reader that what you wrote isn’t the same old tired discussion of a familiar topic, and he’ll be more likely to read the entire post.

    3. Hated Practices that Actually Work

    • Make a General Statement about Life
      When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them…

      As much as your high school English teacher taught you not to begin with general statements to reach a universal reader, Thomas Jefferson used this approach in the Declaration of Independence. The lesson from this is that general statements CAN work, but they need to be gorgeously written and avoid clichĂŠ.
    • Beat Up the Straw Man
      After 45 minutes on hold with the cable company, I realized definitively that customer service meant nothing to them. Here are eight ways customers know a company doesn’t value them.

      Beating up a straw man is not a sophisticated way to win over a reader, but if you choose a universally scorned evil like cable companies, telemarketers, or the NSA, the reader will often so identify with your criticism that blinding hate will overshadow the reader’s reason. Before he sees through your ploy, he’s already reading your post. Sneaky, but effective.
    • Refer to a Recent Popular Post Written by Someone More Important.
      As Nate Silver pointed out in the latest fivethirtyeight post…

      Consider this the less-elegant version of beginning a post with a quote from someone famous. Here you ride the buzz of a public figure’s recent statements or arguments to introduce your own thoughts on the subject. It’s crucial that the statements you’re referring to are widely known and familiar to your audience.
    • Jump Right In (Because Artistry Is for Sissies and Nonprofits).Shoppers are buying something this summer, and the right digital solution can make sure you’re the one selling it to them. Here’s how it works.

      Let’s face it—sometimes your reader wants you to get to the point as fast as possible. This is when a direct opening is your best move. It also gives you more space in the post to discuss the subject at hand, since you’re not spending more than a sentence opening the post.

     

    A Clever Opening Is Just the Beginning

    So how do you choose the opening strategy that’s right for you? Know your subject matter cold. The better you’ve outlined your idea, the easier it will be to tailor one of these opening strategies to fit your post. More importantly, remember that your brilliant blog post is only one part of a larger content strategy.

    How will you boost your brand exposure and help your company lead the online conversation? What technology and best practices will you use to target the right content at the right audiences? We’d love to hear your answers to these questions in the comments section below—and if you need help, we’re ready to partner with you toward a smarter content strategy.

  • On Edge about Leaving Internet Explorer?

    Our Answers to Your Internet Explorer FAQs

    On January 12, 2016, Microsoft ended support for older versions of Internet Explorer (IE). For those of us in web development, this was cause for rejoicing—we now had fewer browsers to support.

    However, for the many organizations and businesses who have relied on older IE versions to run their applications and websites, this news left them feeling a bit on edge. At Atlantic BT, we’ve heard a lot of questions from our clients who depend on IE: Why is Microsoft ending support?  Which versions are affected?  What happens for applications that remain on IE? And (most importantly) what are next steps I should take?

    Though we don’t know why Microsoft made the decision to end support for older versions of IE, we can help with the other frequently-asked questions.

    What Does End of IE Support Mean?

    Companies like Microsoft announce the end of support when the company feels their product is at the end of useful ‘life’. This decision usually means the company intends to focus its resources on supporting and developing newer software rather than patching older versions.  

    For Internet Explorer, end of support means that Microsoft will:

    • Cease technical support
    • No longer provide downloads of the browsers
    • Stop security updates

    All of these changes are excellent reasons to transition your company away from older versions of Internet Explorer.

    Which Versions Are Affected?

    The end of support announcement affects several versions of IE. Specifically, Microsoft has decided to end support for IE 10 and all previous versions; while IE 11 will continue to receive security updates this year, Microsoft has announced IE 11 will be the last version of Internet Explorer.

    This makes it vital to transition away from Internet Explorer. If you’d prefer to stick with Microsoft’s browser, then you should begin using Edge, Microsoft’s new browser for Windows 10. Microsoft developed Edge to better compete with Chrome and FireFox, so it offers new features found in these browsers. In addition, Microsoft is offering free upgrades to WIndows 10 for a limited time.  Because only Microsoft knows how “limited” this time is, it’s important to upgrade sooner rather than later.

    What Happens to Applications Running on Unsupported Versions?

    Older versions of Internet Explorer will not be automatically uninstalled from computers. So applications running on unsupported versions can still run on old computer systems.  However, this is not recommended because of the risks involved, including:

    • The end to security updates. This risk opens the application or website up to vulnerabilities from malware or malicious attacks. This puts your business application and its data at risk.
    • Appearance issues. If a user attempts to open your application or website in newer browsers, there’s a strong chance your site will not look the way you intended. The user may experience broken images, misplaced buttons and text, and an interface that appears scrambled.

    What Are My Next Steps?

    Considering the answers to these questions, it’s important for your business to plan its transition away from older versions of Internet Explorer. As digital problems solvers, AtlanticBT can provide direction as your business moves to newer technology.  We can help you:

    • Evaluate your current web applications and website to determine the most effective way to upgrade.
    • Redesign apps and webpages using cutting-edge technology that works across modern browsers such as Chrome, Safari, Edge, and Firefox;  these web browsers provide faster and more secure access to websites and services.
    • Develop a solution that is mobile-friendly; this means being more accessible on tablets and mobile devices, unlocking another path for business growth and productivity.

    And once your application or website has been updated, we can help you to stay up-to-date. If you’re interested in learning more about how we can help your business transition away from Internet Explorer, please contact us.

  • A Happy Accident: Why Your Company’s 404 Page Matters

    Someone made a mistake.

    Maybe it was a typo in the URL. Maybe he followed a broken link. Maybe she was searching for a hidden page, and the search was for naught. In any case, she tried to access a page on your domain that did not exist.

    What’s her reward? No, I’m not kidding. This visitor took the time to go to your site, search your content, and engage with your brand. How are you going to show your appreciation on the 404 page that appears?

    It’s easy to treat your company’s 404 page as an afterthought, a tiny element of your digital presence that ultimately doesn’t matter. However, every touch point with a potential customer is an invaluable opportunity, and the special circumstances surrounding your 404 page make it especially important.

    If a customer sees your 404 page, someone made a mistake—and how you react to it tells that customer a lot about your company, your brand, and your service. Here are some ways to use your company’s 404 page to your advantage (with my favorite examples in hyperlinks):

    Best Practices for Your Company’s 404 Page

    Present the Right Attitude—Every time your 404 page loads (outside of testing), something went wrong. In awkward moments like this, it’s important to acknowledge the mistake without blaming the visitor or escalating the tension that can come from an error. Humor is a proven way to strike this balance—a gentle joke or funny image accompanied by a “something went wrong” message can make your visitors feel at home on your site even when they don’t find what they want.

    If your brand would rather be serious, it’s a good idea to make your error message fit your company messaging. For example, a big data company focusing on customer analytics might use a 404 message like “Even the best analytics can’t find what isn’t there. Sorry, but the page you’re looking for does not exist.” This offers a gentle plug for the company’s value while letting the visitor know that an error occurred.

    Adapt Your 404 Page to the State of Your Site—If you just redesigned your site’s look and navigation, remember to update your 404 page to match the new design. It’s also a good idea to include a message on the new 404 page reminding visitors that you just redesigned your site, so some URLs may be different. In addition, you can use this message to invite visitors to comment on the new site navigation in order to guide future development.

    Helps visitors find what they’re looking for—Chances are, whoever landed on your 404 page was trying to find a specific page on your site. To get this visitor back on track, provide links to the most popular pages on your domain, such as your blog or eCommerce page. You can also provide a search tool or steer the user to your contact section so he can tell you what he was trying to find when he landed on the 404 page.

    Learn from the kind of pages your customers wanted to find—A broken link is rarely a garbled string of letters. By analyzing the key terms your customers are trying to find when they land on your 404 page, you can gain insight into the kind of pages your customers want. For example, if multiple customers keep trying to access a /FAQ page on your domain, you should consider adding that kind of page to your site. And if a visitor landed on your 404 page because of a misspelled link on your domain, you should fix that link immediately.

    ——————————

    Because your website is the digital face of your business, you want every element of your site to represent your brand—even when something goes wrong. While your 404 page may seem like a tiny aspect of your digital presence, it represents a small but powerful component of your brand strategy. By showing that your company cares about every public-facing element of your business, your customers will have greater confidence in your ability to listen to and meet their needs. To learn more about how to design your digital presence to engage your ideal customers, visit the Atlantic BT page on creating a strong user experience.