Stanford Web Credibility Guideline #2 says that “Showing that your web site is connected to a legitimate organization will boost the site’s credibility.” It adds that photos of your facility, team, and other evidence of a physical organization existing behind the web site will build credibility in the eyes of visitors.

In addition to photos of the team, the Portland web design firm added a map and directions button on the main page along with their physical address and their office phone number in large print. These are both tactics that work emphasize that Synotac is legitimate, has a connection to the physical world, and isn’t a scam site set up to steal your money.

There are other things you can do to add credibility to your site as well, adding the logos of organizations (especially local ones if possible) that your business or website belongs to and adding a link to show you are registered with a chamber of commerce or other business organization.

Trust is everything and if you do a lot of business online or your website is a major part of the sales process like it is for Synotac web design, visitors that scope your site have to see things that make them feel comfortable and creates a feel of legitimacy.

Try out this tip and look for other ‘How to’s” based on the Stanford Web Credibility Guidelines as well as Synotac’s webinars coming soon on the topic!

Back in 2003, when I was pretending to have a plan for my life, my Dad, my Mom and I were all sitting around the dining room table talking about possible company names. I don’t remember what my Dad suggested, but my Mom wanted names that were very “Oregon,” such as Big Green Tree Design, or Sustainable Rushing Water that Contains Happy Salmon Web Development. (She’s very sweet, so she won’t mind me writing this. Plus, she does amazing art. Actually, she often makes comments about being in labor with me for 48 hours.) Anyway, I wasn’t really happy with these names, because I felt like they were too limiting.

A brilliant idea

Brilliant, that is, if you like our company name. I decided to look up “father” and “son” in a bunch of different languages and paste them together in as many different ways as I could think of to see what we would come up with. After struggling to figure out how to do this for a while, I found the solution in a great website that will look up any word in English in hundreds of other languages: Logos Language Services. After coming up with such memorable combinations as Wawabab (Quechua and Romansch), Fizzupie (Sardinian and Galician), and Buwafi (Nepali and Wallon, whatever that is), we settled on Synotac, which comes from the Polish word for son (syn) and the Croatian word for father (otac). What do you think – how’d we do?