One of the biggest and brightest internet technologies in the works is delivered right through your television with Google TV.  Not only does Google TV allow you to view every channel that you would normally receive, but you can also view websites, utilize apps, and control all of that with the click of your phone!  Overall, this is a fully customizable technology that is soon to be available to Google’s followers, and it will be a fantastic way for you to leap ahead of your competition if you are able to adapt your site for Google TV now.  Here’s a few great tips on how you can accomplish this:

  • Content Is Still The Key — Instead of having a completely graphic homepage and no content, you want to get your visitors to your content as quickly as possible and keep them there with more engaging information.  However, when you create your content, make sure that you utilize larger texts (21 point) which can be viewed from a distance, create paragraphs that span no more than 90 words, and incorporate a wider design (with less bright colors) which will be readily and easily viewed by televisions.  As a quick design/development note, be sure to design your site to give at least a 10 percent margin for the television’s “safe zone”.
  • Ease Is The Way To The User’s Heart — Television has achieved its success primarily due to the ease of use and overall ability to adapt to their consumer’s needs/wants.  Your website must do the same; keep it simple and adapt to what your users want.  In other words, make the navigation simple and easy to find (maintain only one navigational bar to make things even easier), discard anything that may not be essential to your website, limit any vertical scrolling the user might have to do to view your content, and make general page navigation (forward and backward) as clear-cut and accessible as possible.
  • Directional Navigation Is The Future — We have all gotten used to the way of the directional pads on remote controls; this is going to be critical for you to remember as you design your site navigation for Google TV as those directional arrows (up, down, left, and right) are the easiest way that you will be able to let your user navigate around your site.  Make sure you allow the users interaction quickly and easily as well as providing them with enough room between the navigational buttons so there are no errors when they click a link/button.
  • Sound Is Now An Option — Unlike a computer, sound is almost a necessity for television so think about how you can incorporate music or audio within your website.  Some sites that are being used as demos for Google TV automatically start podcasts or audio blogs when the site is being loaded.  However, if you are going to include audio into your site please make sure that you include an easy way to mute your site just in case your user doesn’t want that streaming through at that point in time.
  • Testing 1, 2, 3 — I cannot stress this enough, but since Google TV is a new technology it is extraordinarily important that you test your website in as many situations as possible.  For example, televisions have various ways to run (game mode, vivid, etc) which you should try to test prior to the launch of your site with Google TV.  The bottom line here is that you want the user to get the best experience possible when they visit your site in their living room with their family and friends around; give that experience to them by testing everything first.

Overall, this is an extremely exciting time for Google and all the web developers out there as the launch of Google TV can significantly IMPACT the way of the web as we know it right now.  So, instead of waiting to jump on the bandwagon get a jump-start on your competition and start talking with us today on how you can accomplish a Google TV compatible website.

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Sources:
“The Essential Step-by-Step Guide to Internet Marketing”-E-Book
SlideShare.net
Image Source: HubSpot, “The 2011 State of Inbound Marketing”, E-Marketer.com