How People View Websites

How People View Websites

by William Lulow

It has slowly come to my attention that most folks don’t really delve very deeply into websites. I just looked at some “insights” for my website and found that the average visit lasted 22 seconds! (Just checked again the other day and it was up to 23 seconds).  If they are anything like my daughter, who scours websites in search of various  products for her home and children, vacations and other things she aims her sights on, some will almost attack a website with a vengeance, looking for something. But others will only look at a website’s home page. So, it seems that unless someone is actively searching for something in which they are highly interested, most everything else becomes just extraneous and really not remembered at all. Google has called these kinds of searches “nano searches,” referring to the amazingly short period of time spent on them. 

Like many photographers, I spend a good deal of time and effort putting my website together and keeping it up to date. I have most of my important portraits on the HOME page and that’s what most people would see when they are looking at the website in cellphone mode. I’m not so sure they would bother to look at some of the other pages though. If someone wanted to find out about me, my approach to photography or even some of my personal projects over the years, they would have to take the time to click on some of my other pages. People don’t always do this. I am constantly amazed at folks who say that they’ve never bothered to look at any of the other pages on my site other than the HOME page. I think that my experience as a teacher of photography has added to my wanting to put more information on my home page. 

So probably your most famous or what you would consider your most typical and best images should go on the HOME page. Someone who really wants to know who you are and exactly the kind of work you are capable of, would spend time looking at your other pages, but not everyone who is just surfing the web at random. When I look at someone’s web site, I’m always trying to get a sense of who they are and what they do. It is one reason I put a sidebar on my HOME page. The images are most important of course, but in order to stand out a bit from the crowd, I have some choice words I have put on my landing page.  I often spend quite a bit of time on other people’s sites looking at the images, reading the copy and determining if I like the over all layout and quality of the work they are showing. Most people don’t do this. If they don’t find exactly what they are looking for on page one and in the first few seconds of their search, they are gone to another site. I would think that much of the text that photographers put on their sites is generally not read very carefully. 

With all that said, I still put text on my first page, as you can see below. Maybe it’s a mistake, but I have received many comments on the quality of the images I post there. Also, because I am a photography teacher as well, I like people to know exactly where I’m coming from with regards to the industry as a whole and the teaching of photography technique. After all, I have had a long career in this business that spans over 40 years!

I wanted my site to really be a way for folks to get to know me a bit more. There are many photographers out there who certainly know how to use their equipment well and have studied the same “masters” of the art form I have, but each one brings a different set of qualifications, abilities and personalities to each assignment.  I want to showcase my particular points-of-view and explain how I work to achieve the results I do. So, I’m very forthright about my techniques, why I set up lighting in a certain way, what effects it achieves and how to gain some consistency in whatever field of photography you prefer. 

I have said many times that many photographers can photograph the same subjects, but each one will be different given the fact that we are all individuals and have our own unique take on whatever it is we are shooting. That’s another reason I like to teach my personal techniques. No other photographer will go about it with exactly the same method or achieve exactly the same results. But, in the process, I will have elevated people’s understanding of the art form through my teachings.