My last article stirred up some definite comments and even questions about different things in business. I’m going to keep giving you as much information as I can so that you can continue to do business as IT professionals outside of Russia with other countries.
How do you design a website that will be viewed in the west and appreciated by the people there?
What are the most important elements
for, America and other western markets?
Words that mean responsibility.
Images, that mean openness.
3. Not to technically wordy. Information is more compartmentalized.
Responsibility is the trigger point for America and other western countries. You do not need to say responsibility directly. You can use words that mean that you and your company are responsible.
Example:
This will give high quality to your customers.
The software you are providing will be easily understood, and a time saver for your customers.
We take great care in our software projects, and our developers are high-level professionals.
It’s important to use images that mean openness. It doesn’t have to be exactly smiley faces, but they should be images of people who are welcoming.
Are used to work for a large Russian gym company. I knew the CEO and owner and the namesake of this gym. They asked me why their American gym was having such trouble.
I looked at the website and you wouldn’t believe it. Three Russian men in suits, looking very sour, looking like they wanted to hurt you was the images the greeted you.
And the images of the people working out in the gym we’re beautiful supermodels.
I’m sure you can see the irony in all of this and how it would not work for the western, market especially the American market.
Banners that are put at the top of your website and the images that are used in the website should be open and welcome.
Now I’m going to let my colleague, Kristina Pashnina tell you about the third topic, technical and wordy text. Kristina Pashnina has been working with me in international business relations for quite some time and has her own perspective about western websites. My clients have already found her perspectives valuable.
The first piece of text should be something that catches your eyes. It should be something that is worded in a way to catch your attention.
In the website, we were looking at and reviewing for a client the first piece of text that you see is a technical description.
It would be very preferable to have this text instead.
“Unique software that fits your Business needs and Future Desires”
Why is this piece of text better? It is more welcoming and presents strong mental visualization to the business professional.
When I was looking and analyzing a Russian website that was being redesigned for the American market, I was looking at large blocks of text. My gut reaction……
“I do not want to read it”
In a website that’s properly designed for America, Everything is correctly spaced and easy to read. You can understand what they are selling and what is the point of the text right away.
There is a title that is darker and larger, and a small amount of text maybe one paragraph underneath this. If the information is more in depth, there is a read more button.
The big issues with the Russian website:
1. No bold headlines
2. Mentioning “get guaranteed results” without any specifications of the results.
3. The portfolio of pictures needs a lot of scrolling left to right manually.
Relatively small pictures.
All the photographs of visible at once.
It would be very good to include a short piece of text that have a lot of information about each photo.
4. There’s a lot of things that you have to spend your time on to understand.
5. Clout building (prestige building) is not done in a way that is effective. The logos should be clearly visible, and clearly understandable. The logos, the way they look, should speak of quality. They should look clean and with Good colors.
On an American website for contrast: the logos are intuitively easy to read.
6. A video for building of clout should be included showing people working. A professional video that looks clean. This would speak loudly of responsibility.
7. No get started buttons.
8. Russians would say that they do not trust reviews on a website, however, if the website is aimed towards the west, definitely have the reviews, they do matter.
I really hope that this will give you some pointers when setting up your website that is designed to be viewed in America or other western countries. If you would like to discuss it, please comment below, and I will answer any questions.
My goal is to help the Russian IT business be more successful selling in the west.
