How effective is your website?

In a telegraph article* it was reported that businesses with high digital capability are five times more likely to save costs than businesses that have failed to evolve digitally, and two-and-a-half times more likely to report an increase in turnover. It also reported that around 1.6 million businesses and more than 100,000 charities in Britain are in the “digital slow lane” and lack basic digital skills.

 The internet has literally transformed our lives and how we buy products and services in the last 10 years. Even if we don’t buy online, we all probably do our research first online and have a look at a company’s products and services on their website before we decide to buy. The purchasing process for consumers and increasingly for businesses often begins with a website, so as businesses we shouldn’t underestimate the power of our websites as a marketing tool.

As a marketing company we’ve definitely seen an increase in businesses having a website but it never ceases to amaze me sometimes how little effort is given to their online presence and how many business websites I see that are out of date and no longer reflect the business they are today.

Here are FIG’s top tips to make sure your website is working hard for your business.

1. Stand out from the crowd

The design of your website is vital. You may have relevant content and offer brilliant products or services but if your site is not appealing and looks amateurish, no-one is going to stay around long enough to find out.

The look of your website should reflect the type of industry you work in and appeal to your target audience. If you offer a professional service your website should look professional, clean and organised. If you own a beauty salon your site should look more fashionable and informal. You also need to keep your design consistent with the look and feel of the rest of your marketing material so you are protecting your brand.

If you are looking to develop your website in the near future, make sure you choose a designer who produces bespoke web designs. Take a look at their portfolio. Do their websites all look very similar? They are probably using off the shelf templates. You want a website that is unique to your business.

But, don’t make it overly fussy or complicated. You need to make a website engaging but not confusing to navigate. At FIG, we will usually design your website first based on your requirements, producing a mock up before any web development takes place. It means you get to approve the look of your site and you know what to expect. We spend a lot of time redesigning websites that have been left in decline and not working for a business. We can bring your website design to life; make it reflect your vibrant business, to showcase your products and services.

2. Make sure you are talking to the right people

As well as the look of your website you need to think about the content. Web content is something a lot of businesses do not get right. The biggest mistake is to write what you want to say about your business and its products and services, rather than what your customers want to know. As a professional in your industry it is so easy to fill your website with technical terminology and buzz words that probably don’t mean anything to your customer.

Take a look at your website from your customer’s point of view. Does it make sense; can you clearly understand what is being offered? Is it compelling and encourage you to pick up the telephone or to buy? Or are you left confused, or worse still, a little bit cold, with no desire to get in touch?

If you have the budget, ask a copywriter to write your web content for you, it’s well worth it. They will find out the key messages that you should include in your website and produce copy that will engage your customers and please the main search engines. They will talk about your products and services in a way that sells the benefits of your company, rather than just list the features.

Make sure your home page is clear and to the point but very succinctly tells people what you are offering and how they can find out more information. You should have main landing pages for each of your products and services but make sure the content is full of benefits. You can add further links to product details for those people who want more information. Websites that are rich in relevant content are also popular with the main search engines. It’s no longer a matter of making sure all the relevant key words are included in a site. This is important, but search engines such as Google are far more sophisticated these days and they want lots of content that is relevant to the subject of the website. The more up to date, relevant content you use on your website will help your rankings on the main search engines. That’s why a blog is such a good idea.

3. Think about the user experience

Websites that are difficult to navigate become overly complicated and will lose visitors very quickly. In fact, it is said that it only takes 3 seconds to lose a customer from your website because of poor navigation. We all work very hard to get visitors to our sites so don’t lose them because of poor navigation. You know yourself when you go on a website, if you can’t find what you are looking for very quickly you get frustrated and will go looking elsewhere. Technology has made us all very impatient, so it is a very important factor to consider. If a potential customer lands on your website you need to make sure that they will be able to find what they are looking for in just a few clicks.

Make sure your key products and services are clearly stated in the main navigation bar so it is obvious to your customer where they need to go next. And more importantly make sure there is a clear call to action on every page. Once your customer has found what they are looking for you need to tell them very clearly how they can buy, how to book or how to find out more! Sounds common sense doesn’t it, but you’ll be amazed how many times these things are missed. And that means missed business. At FIG we will analyse your current site to research how users are currently using your website and you can see where visitors are dropping off and what business is being missed. It helps us to design a better user experience for the new website.

4. How are visitors going to find you?

OK, so now you’ve got a great looking website that is jam packed with useful content, that’s easy to navigate. All you need now are potential customers to look at it! Just because you have a website does not mean it will get found. There are billions of websites out there all competing for business, so you need to promote your site if it’s going to get found.

It’s easy to promote a new site to your existing contacts and customers, put it on your email signature and print it on your business cards and leaflets, use social media to great advantage, particularly LinkedIn and blog regularly, linking back to different parts of your website. Send email marketing campaigns out and drive customers to pages on your website. But most importantly you need to consider Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and/or Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns.

Your website isn’t going to magically appear at the top of Google just because it looks good. Search Engines are complicated things and they will rank your page based on a number of different things, including:

• Age of your website
• Visibility of content
• Structure of your website
• Page, image and title tags
• New and relevant content
• Site loading speed
• Inbound links to your website
• Compelling tools such as blogs, UTube videos, calculators etc
• Connections to social media

Search Engine Optimisation can take time, so Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns can be a great way of achieving some quick wins. Located at the top and right hand side of the screen when you do a Google search, advertisers pay for their adverts to be displayed when certain words or phrases are searched for.

A website is a living, breathing marketing tool for your business that needs effort to keep it fresh and relevant like your business and you’ll find it will really work hard for you 24/7 and we haven’t even talked about the benefits of selling online via an eCommerce websites …that’s another big subject for another time.

FIG can help you through every stage of writing content, designing, developing and building a new website and promoting it with SEO and PPC campaigns, connecting to a blog, to social media and email marketing campaigns. We’ve got the experience, an excellent track record and we’re cost effective for the service you receive.

Call us now to talk through your new website or website redesign project on 01457 857111 or contact us on hello@fig.agency