In a previous article I introduced website Feng Shui's five elements. These five elements are Infrastructure, Design, Functionality, Content, and Marketing, and understanding how each of these elements can help allocate resources to construct a successful website.

Though it is definitely useful to understand each of these elements, the way they interrelate with each other can also boost your website success.

Let's look at some examples of how understanding the connectedness of the five website elements can improve website performance.

Infrastructure and Functionality
If you make the decision to add significant functionality to your website, then you may need to evaluate the impact it could have on your site infrastructure.
 
For example, perhaps you are ready to make the jump to a full e-commerce website and want to install a shopping cart. You have reviewed shopping cart solutions, and your web development contractor has suggested that you use a product built using the Cold Fusion programming language.
This shopping cart may be the perfect product for your business, but your web site hosting company may or may not support Cold Fusion programming language. Not all hosting companies do, and support may require an additional monthly charge on top of your regular hosting fees.
 
So when making a significant change to your site functionality, make sure your infrastructure can accommodate it.
 
Design and Marketing
Search engine optimization is a very important component of a many website marketing programs, and the site element of design has a lot to do with SEO success.
 
For example, the Flash intro on your home page may be something your CEO thinks is really cool. Your site visitors also enjoy it. But it may prevent search engines from effectively listing your site in their databases, which means it will be difficult for prospective customers to find you. If driving visitors to your site from search engines is important to you, then this is a problem.
 
Facilitating cooperation between your designer and SEO marketing specialist can ensure that the beautiful design on your site is also search engine friendly.
 
Design and Content
A really effective website has a flow between the look and feel of the site and the style and tone of the content. If a site's design is very conservative and corporate yet the content is sassy and irreverent, it could be a confusing experience to site visitors.
 
Coordinating these two elements can magnify the positive experience a visitor has when coming to your website, which will then translate to sales. A good example of complementary design and content can be found at www.puffincharters.com, a fishing charter business website.
 
When redesigning its website, Puffin Charters expressed the desire to have an "informative and fun" site. They sought a balance between communicating their fishing experience, which is an important sales point for booking charters, and some whimsical fun, because fishing is a recreational sport and a popular tourist activity in Alaska.
 
The design color scheme of orange, green and blue signals energy. The puffin icons that appear as users mouse over the navigation are an entertaining addition. The font used for the testimonials is casual and warm.
 
The content has very detailed information about what to expect on your fishing charter, but it also has many fun references, like a description of the ugliness of a lingcod.
Content and design interrelate very closely. Thinking about how they can best complement each other will add impact to your website.
 
Content and Marketing
Good online marketing provides a strong call-to-action that sends the maximum number of targeted visitors to your site as cost-effectively as possible. But your website content that displays when those visitors arrive must be what the visitor wants and expects or else they will leave immediately to find a more relevant website.
 
Your marketing and website content need to complement each other to provide that consistent experience for the visitor. This consistent flow creates trust and communicates credibility, a key factor that influences web user's decision to purchase.
 
A good example of coordinating content and marketing is the use of "landing pages" - website pages with interim content between your actual web pages and your advertising. Landing pages can be a very effective way to bridge your marketing messages and your spectacular web content. It can allude to specific content on the site that meets the needs of the new visitor and send them there efficiently, without sending them to the home page to fend for themselves.

These are just a few examples of how the interrelation of the five website elements is important to your site's overall success. As you move forward with any web projects, try to imagine when changing one element will impact the other elements.
 
This will help you avoid spending money on unnecessary work, prevent cost overruns from unanticipated problems mid-project, and increase sales due to a more cohesive, successful site. And provide you with a little inner peace as well.

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