Location, location, location

It’s always helpful to actually work with clients, preferably at their own computer, and watch the way they use their websites and the internet in general.

What have I noticed? That a lot of my clients are confused between the location bar and Google search. Many people have Google set as their home page, and to get to a web page they type the URL (http://www.somelinkhere.com) into the Google search bar. Then they click “Search” and click on the link to the site they were looking for.

So what’s wrong with this? First of all, it has lots of unnecessary steps. But secondly, and most importantly, many times Google has not indexed the page the client is trying to get to (especially if, as in the case of my beta and building sites, they’re blocked from Google). That’s when I get the panicked calls: “I went to link you sent and there’s nothing there!”

Here’s what I send them:

Do you do this? Don’t feel embarrassed. You are in very smart, very successful company. But make your life easier and use Google for searching and the location bar for URLs.

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