O
scar showed me the event he was promoting on social media. Upon reading it, I noticed that the description looked like a label on a commercial product: it was full of precise, technical details..I promptly asked: “In which way will this benefit my event?” When I saw him hesitate, I told him: “focus on the experience that I am going to have and not on the specifications of the event.”
Even though a detailed description is important, the experience you are offering me is much more important and should be the first thing that jumps at you.
Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, others will praise God.
2 Corintians 9:13a
For the younger generations, experience is everything. If you offer a good experience on your website, they will visit it more often and stay on longer, which are the two, most important metrics for search engines. So, what technologies can be offered to improve your users’ experience? Explore these 4 technologies that will take your website to another level.
Streaming
Antonietta discovered that she could stream live on social media and began to do so immediately.
What Antonietta does not know, is that every recording that is made by these means remains available on said media. This means that the social network can do what it likes with this video, filters it through its algorithms, and can bury it in oblivion.
In addition, you video:
- Does not have the quality to be redistributed by other channels;
- Is not indexed by search engines;
- May be affected by a change in policies;
- Is arbitrarily censored without notice; and
- Advertising cannot be incorporated.
Live streams are possible due to the ongoing download technology known as streaming. This ongoing download allows the video to be temporarily buffered in the memory, that making the download speed greater than playback speed.
I would recommend that you shift your live streams to a proprietary system where you have control over the content, broadcast, playback, and redistribution.
I like to work with Boxcast. With Boxcast, you can not only stream live, but you also stream simultaneously on Facebook Live, AppleTV, Roku, thus giving you immediate presence on Smart TVs, and Vimeo/YouTube.
Incorporate live streaming to your website to pick up traffic and give your users an added value to all the other resources you have available.
Shopping Cart
The same principle of utilizing a proprietary system for your live streams applies to the following technologies on this list. By doing this, you will be giving priority to your website and you will be the sole owner of all your content.
If you have any products you would like to sell, or even if you offer a wide range of free products, it is a good idea to install a shopping cart on your website.
A good shopping cart will allow your users to create accounts with their data. This will allow you to get to know them better and relate to them in a more personalized manner.
I like to work with WooCommerce. This plug-in is easy to install and allows you to offer areas for membership and recurring subscriptions. Furthermore, it is a complete e-commerce system that calculates taxes and shipping. It will even let you control your inventories.
Electronic Payments
No shopping cart would be complete without a link to process electronic payments. PayPal is the most popular way to achieve this. However, it is the one I least recommend for institutions and companies due to its high costs in addition to the fact that they can retain funds for long periods of time.
I recommend the implementation of a payment portal that works with a direct link to the processors thus avoiding middlemen. That is why I work with Purpose Payments from Purpose Financial.
Purpose Payment is ideal because:
- It is a complete solution to all your online and offline needs;
- It will receive payments via credit card, e-checks, and text messages;
- It offers lower rates because it does not utilize any intermediary banks;
- It has its own control panel which can be used for different purposes; and
- It deposits your funds to your bank account on the next day following the transaction.
In addition, Purpose Financial can be integrated to your shopping cart and can even be configured to your website if you still do not have an e-commerce system installed.
Translation to Other Languages
If your website’s reach expands to various regions and you provide services to users who speak more than one language, it is important that you take control of the translation of your content.
Do not let translation tasks to fall into the hands of imperfect translators such as Google Translate. Translate your pages and articles so that they say exactly what you mean to say.
I have used two plug-ins interchangeably to this end: qTranslate-X y WPGlobus.
qTranslate-X has a system known as short codes. It is rather versatile and allows you to translate any text on your website into several languages. Short codes are small snippets of code enclosed in square brackets [ ] that allow you to add functionality; translation in this case. You can choose :en for English or :es for Spanish, as shown here:
WPGlobus, on the other hand, requires a bit more programming knowledge for those areas of your content which are not outfitted for several languages, but if your images include text, it allows you to choose different images with translated text for all your pages and articles, by using the WPGlobus Featured Images plugin.
In any event, both provide language selection so that your users can switch to the language of their preference.
With these 4 technologies, your users will be more satisfied.
If you wish to consult me regarding these (or any other) web technologies, do let me know.
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