Web Design for ROI is a book that had huge impact not only on myself. It has changed the way the SEO industry approaches web design and finally made people embrace usability to it’s full effect. Sadly the web developer community wasn’t impacted to the same extent yet. Many web designers and developers, especially of the “failed artist” kind seem to assume that web design is more about flashy animations, fancy graphics and beautiful decoration than real business value or ROI/Return On Investment.

“One of the most striking and true tidbits of web design for ROI is the notion that not the homepage of a website is the most important part of it but the forms. Yes, forms, the most hated and neglected part of web design are the crucial part of the website which determines your business success. It depends on the form whether your potential customers will subscribe, apply, buy, check out, contact you etc.”

This collection of 50 must read web design for ROI, usability and SEO articles also embraces the philosophy behind designing websites for the ROI of it not the looks. It  contains a few all time  favorites from the eraly days of the web which still are true as well as mostly current cutting edge articles and resources.

As stated above the list starts with the most significant part of Web Design for ROI, form design.

Intro

• SEOmoz | Web Design for ROI: Chapter 3, Managing for ROI

Forms

• 25 Web Form Optimization Tips
• Effective use of forms on websites (theory, March 1, 2001)
• Getting a Form’s Structure Right: Designing Usable Online Email Applications – Boxes and Arrows: The design behind the design
• 7 Shopping Cart Tips That Even Amazon Could Use | Improve the Web
• Pop Upon Magazine: Geek Trends: 15 Outstanding Feed Subscription Displays
• Web Form Design in the Wild, Part I
• Web Form Design Patterns: Sign-Up Forms | How-To | Smashing Magazine

Universal Search and Multimedia

• The Local Search Ranking Factors: Ranking High in Google Maps and Yahoo Local
• 19 Ways to Optimize Your Site for Google Images
• blinkx Video SEO Whitepaper [PDF]
• A List Apart: Articles: Understanding Progressive Enhancement
• Guide to Optimizing PDFs for Search Engines
• mezzoblue § Image Replacement + Google
• Why Web Design Matters : SEO Book.com
• 2009 Google Flash SEO | beu blog

Blogs

• Blog Usability: Top 10 Weblog Design Mistakes (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)
• Five Winning Approaches for When Your Audience Doesn’t Read Blogs
• How to Blog Design Style Guide | Blog design Blog for Blog Designers
• Evaluating the Effectiveness of Your Blog Theme | Vandelay Website Design
• SEO 2.0 | Blog Suicide: Top 7 Title & Meta Tag Mistakes that Kill Your Blog

Usability

• UX Magazine – Conversion Rate Optimization – Part 1
• UX Magazine – Conversion Rate Optimization – Part 2
• Usability Post » Does Your Website Suffer From These 7 Usability Mistakes?
• Findability, Orphan of the Web Design Industry
• 30 Ways to Increase Readability Online
• 50 Web Usability Tips that Help You Attract and Retain Web Visitors
• Social Proof Optimization: How to Make Your Website Appealing to the Masses

Website optimization

• The Best Damn Web Marketing Checklist, Period! – Search Engine Guide Blog
• 14 free tools that reveal why people abandon your website | Conversion Rate Experts
• How To Diagnose Your Site with Google Advanced Search
• The SEO Guide to Information Architecture | AudetteMedia
• Search engine marketing blog – Reseo: Ten steps to higher conversions using Google’s Website Optimiser
• 50 Ways Your Web Site Is Discouraging Conversions — and How to Fix It – Inside CRM
• The Internet Marketing Unlist: 49 Things You Probably Are Doing But Shouldn’t | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
• 21 Factors that Influence the First Impression of Your Website’s Visitors | Vandelay Website Design
• 10 Easy Steps to Great Website Optimization. | The Wojo Group
• Internal Links – Are You Making the Most of Yours? | SEO Design Solutions

Content

• Reading on the Web (Alertbox)
• How Little Do Users Read? (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)
• Use Words on Your Site Correctly: The Complete Guide | Improve the Web
• Headline Writing for Google, Social Media and Profit : Condomunity
• 10 SEO and Marketing-Friendly Title Tag Formulas | Internet Marketing Strategy: Conversation Marketing
• Your Content Development Strategy | Datadial Blog

URLs

• adaptive path » user-centered url design
• SEO 2.0 | Top 10 Fatal URL Design Mistakes
• Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Dynamic URLs vs. static URLs

Misc. web design

• SEOmoz | How to Ruin a Web Design – The Design Curve
• 25 Beautiful Minimalistic Website Designs – Part 4 | Vandelay Website Design
• CSS Typography: Contrast Techniques, Tutorials and Best Practices | Noupe

This list is not meant to be all encompassing but it is meant to collect indispensable know how in what I tend to call ROI web design. I’m quite sure I forgot some must read resources so feel to add them in the comment section.

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