Question #3

Different Variation of Images

I realized that St. Clair has the basic places where images usually are placed on a website, such as a large pano across the top of a page. The only issue is that some of the images don’t make the right connection between the reader and the webpage. For example, in their “Start in September” tab, they just have a pano image of the clock outside of the south campus, which doesn’t evoke much emotion, and it’s not a very amazing picture. Images are meant to trigger certain cues in a reader’s brain, making them more likely to receive and digest information with a positive tone, and be more ready to make a decision regarding a purchase. For example, if St. Clair were to change the image to a picture of students working together in one of the newer settings of the building, smiling and laughing, with bright summer sunlight shining down upon them, it would help evoke more emotions and make impressions more meaningful. People appreciate high-quality images, and that image would make them more excited to start with a more positive attitude, as everybody is a little nervous when first signing up for college. Being able to immediately see students their age working together in an advanced-looking building is a motivational and emotional trigger that will work in St. Clair’s favor.

More Images Paired with Information

On the “start in September” tab of St. Clair’s website, they show very little effort in using tools to guide the audience into a call-to-action, or having meaningful copy paired with visual cues. For example, in this image you can see that all they have is 4 block paragraphs on the page, and that won’t motivate new students looking to join a program. What they could do is add more images of people working around the campus to encourage teamwork and extroverted students, ready to collaborate and learn, which pulls the same emotional aspect as mentioned above. They could also include images of graduates in their cap and gowns, or with their St. Clair diploma at a workplace, smiling proud. This will help to motivate readers as well, and make them more accepting of the copy, taking it into account. In adding these images, they should do it in a way that utilizes an F-pattern, so there isn’t room for error in the actual flow of the webpage. In making the images work with the words in paragraph structure, they could keep the same copy they have there, and make the page much longer and more interesting to read, with more visual examples for motivation.

Student Services Page Automation

The St. Clair Student Services page uses imagery well, although they could use more meaningful images, pulling more of an emotional toll on a reader. That isn’t the main point though, as there’s a small portion of this page that makes it annoying to a reader. It lies under the images, where they have a category in green, and then subcategories under it in white. The only issue is that because the subcategories don’t all have the same number for each main topic, it messes up the flow of the page and creates strange white gaps. As a new student looking for student services, this comes up as too much information for an already stressed applicant and could draw them away or make them feel overwhelmed by the information. To combat this, I suggest automating the main green categories to have a drop-down menu. This makes the user interact with the page when they find something they genuinely want to learn more about, so it’s less overwhelming, and it makes sure the reader isn’t getting bored with the page; they’re consciously using it, helping their brain feel more comfortable with the website, which makes them more comfortable with St. Clair College as a whole. This paired up with more meaningful imagery will increase conversions when a future student is browsing from this page and make it a more inclusive experience for every reader.

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