Top Tips for Creating an Engaging Website

Top Tips for Creating an Engaging Website

How to make visitors come back but more importantly, how to begin a ‘relationship’ with the visitor

Creating a great website isn’t about flashy graphics, whacky and cutting-edge design or the need to invest thousands of pounds into the development and build of the website.

For me, simple designs coupled with great content will win over complex, over-designed sites that offer an over-whelming amount of choice from the off.

Your website is probably the place where most of your future clients will begin their relationship with you, or not as the case may be, so how do you ensure that you convert more visitors than you lose?

Here are my ‘Top Ten Tips for Creating an Engaging Website’ that brings the visitor back and helps you begin more relationships with more prospects and potential clients.

Top Ten Tips for Creating Great Websites
In no particular order;

1)      Offer something of value to the visitor – This could be free information relating to your product, service or industry such as articles, tips, advice, resource or guides.  Whatever you choose it should make the visitor feel that they walked (surfed) away with something of value, something they never knew before, something that may help them.

2)      Make your site easy to navigate and easy to use – The desire to want a flashy, cutting-edge website with lots to see, interact with and choose from can often lead to an over-designed, complicated website.  Keep it simple and make sure the visitor can find what they want quickly and easily.  Keep the content to the point but offer more for those that like a little more ‘meat on the bone’. 

Use menus, sub headings and headlines; try and help the visitor find what they want in one or two clicks, if they want to read more from there they will click further.  Talk to your web person about dedicated landing pages, optimised pages, anchor links and CSS as these tools may help you.

3)      Avoid large graphics and slow loading video and audio – Whilst these are all great things to include on your site, make sure they are sized correctly or optimised for quick loading.  Slow loading web pages can be a huge turn off so talk to your web person/people and make sure that your website loads quickly.  Only use what you need or have to use and try and balance the look, functionality and content of the site.

4)      Use headlines and sub-menus – OK so I have already mentioned this but it is important; think of you website as a newspaper front page, use headlines and an appropriate number of sections to guide them from the home page deeper into the site.  Businesses often fall into the trap of trying to tell the visitor everything from the home page and we are left feeling confused and over-whelmed with the amount of information being thrown at us.

5)      Begin a relationship with the visitor – Forget about the statistics on how many visitors that visit your site are actual prospects, the fact remains that your website will get hits from prospects and potential clients.  When they get to your site, do they have an opportunity to engage with you, open or begin a relationship with you?  For most this will be done through some form of ‘Content Marketing’, such as e-mail articles, advice, newsletters, blogs, subscriptions, downloads, etc. 

All of these things are effective at opening the door to your visitors, engaging their interest and opening up a line of communication.  Of course you can’t just jump in and sell but more on this in future articles.

6)      Spelling, grammar, broken links and out of date information – All of these are cardinal sins for websites but are so easily left unattended for long periods of time, normally because of the day to day running of the business that gets in the way.  I myself have been guilty, in fact I am currently guilty, of letting my website go for a long period of time without being updated, managed or worked upon.  Thankfully, Bristol IT Company have offered to take care of sorting it out for me so you can expect my new site very soon.   A website that is well written, up to date and accurate will convert more visitors than an out of date, over or under populated site with bad spelling and grammar.

7)      Give the business a personality – In my last article ‘TheBeating Heart of Local Marketing’ I discussed giving the business a personality and through your content, you can.  If you are a local business, give the business a voice and give it a human touch.  With so many online communities, the opportunities for a business to create a community around their own business are sizeable.  Try and engage with your visitors through your blog, articles or downloads; people still buy from people and so give people a chance to share opinion, views or comments and respond to them.  Don’t hide from the prospects!

8)      Track the performance of your website, change and improve it – Free tools like ‘Google Analytics’ are great to give you an overview of the performance of your site.  Whilst it is not an exact science as there are reasons why not every visit will show, it will give you a good enough overview of how people are interacting with your site. 

From this you will be able to see what people like and don’t like, where they come from, where you lose them on the site, how long they spend on the site, what content is of most interest and a whole lot more.  From this you can change, improve and adapt the content on the site until you reach the point that you are engaging and converting an appropriate amount of visitors.

If you are unsure on how to install and use this tool, or you need some help to interpret and analyse the information, then please feel free to drop me a note or pick up the phone and I can talk you through it.

9)      Bring them back – Make sure you have something to bring them back to you or stay in touch with you; this will normally be though your content marketing in the form of blogs, articles, news, events, guides, downloads, etc.  If, what you are writing is compelling and offers something of value to the visitor, chances are they will come back again in the future.  By using an e-mail sign-up box on your website you can capture the e-mail addresses from people who would like to engage with you, now you can control how often you bring them back to your site!  Clearly and as I have already mentioned, you can’t just jump in and sell but more on this in another article.

10)   Invest time and resource into your website – Your website is your most valuable sales tool, it works for you twenty-four hours a day and engages with prospects even whilst you sleep.  Leaving it unattended will soon give the impression that there is nothing of value to come back for and slowly but surely, your visitor numbers will drop off.  Invest some time each week to keep the content fresh, meaning the parts that you can and should update like; articles, blogs, news, events, gigs, promotions, offers, etc. 

If you simply don’t have the time, look to employ the help of an outside Marketing Consultant or Consultancy, or drop me a line.

Bonus Tips

1)      Once your website is live and ready to show off, share it – We all have a network of contacts that would happily post or share the things that you publish or promote on your website; use them where you can and where it is appropriate.  Share links to the free resource on your site through your blog and social media profiles, on your e-mail signatures, on quotes, proposals and wherever it is appropriate; keep them short and to the point and in some cases, subtle.

2)      Promote your site – Get involved in online discussions and through your social media profiles; start with one or two and see how they develop.  Like anything it will take an investment of time and these online relationships will need to be nurtured.

Linked-In is becoming more and more popular and offers a local business an opportunity to get involved with local discussions; regional, national and global discussions as well if this suits the business.  Once again don’t jump in and start to sell, you will need to share views, thoughts and comments and over time build relationships with the people in these groups and online communities.  This topic warrants an entire article so I’ll cover this in a future edition.

3)      Longevity and room for improvement – Once your site is complete and by that I mean it does everything you need it to do, it looks good and it works well, you will probably keep it for two or three years  before wanting to re-develop it.  That said, you may want to continually improve the site, add new features or functions or update some of the content so make sure you have the scope to do this.

Investing in a site with an adequate Content Management System will be a good investment and will pay for itself from the minute the site is live; they also don’t cost as much as you may think.

 

Final Thoughts

My personal over-riding principles for any website are that it is clean, crisp and easy to use.  Offer something of value, engage with the visitor, share something with them, guide them, explain to them and sell to them.  Bring them back.

Your thoughts, comments and criticism are always welcome, after all this is a blog and everything is up for discussion and debate.

Next Article: Monday 30th July

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The 'Beating Heart' of Local Marketing - How to make the right marketing tools work for your particular business

The ‘Beating Heart’ of Local Marketing

How to make the right marketing tools work for your particular business

The question I’m asked most when I first meet people in business is, “what’s the secret to good marketing?”

The truth is there is no secret to marketing; it’s as simple as that.  Creating a marketing strategy that consistently delivers and that continually grows and adapts to the needs of the business isn’t something that happens overnight; that said, with a bit of patience, a basic understanding of the marketing tools that you have at your disposal and a focused and continual effort you will see the payoff a lot sooner than you may think.

But…and it’s a very big but; before you can begin to consider how you will market your business, you need to have a clear and definitive identity, meaning the business has to convey a clear, simple and definitive message through the marketing.

This identity, message, brand, position in your market, whatever you want to call it is what you are, what you offer and how you offer it.  It will lead you to market yourself in a certain way, to market to a particular market; it will influence the message you send out, how you position that message and most importantly it will determine which marketing tools will serve you best.

Your identity should be the beating heart of the business and of the marketing; after all it’s what you are.

Not getting this part right first is probably one of the biggest causes for marketing efforts to under-perform and here’s why; if you consider that your identity will ultimately decide the message you deliver, it will also guide your strategy or plan on how you are going to market your business.

For example; if your identity is best described by quality and expertise then part of your plan or strategy would be a blog or a platform to share free articles with useful and relevant information, something that would position you as an expert in your field.  Your website would represent a quality business, the information would be up-to-date and accurate, there would be lots of free resource for me as a visitor or prospect and my overall experience of being on there would be an enjoyable one.

The point I’m trying to make is that your identity will ultimately guide your marketing and it will help you map out an achievable, successful strategy.  It will also help you identify which tools and which mix of tools will serve you best but more importantly, to identify and stop the ones that don’t.

So How?

Clear your mind and think about your business; for this part forget about the marketing just think about the business.

What do you sell, offer, provide?

You will have probably settled on the key service that you provide or the product that you sell, for example; Recruitment Consultant, Solicitor, Estate Agent, Car Dealer, Retailer, Restaurant, Gym, Spa, etc.

Now take it one step further and pick which of these, currently, best describes your business;

·         Value

·         Expertise

·         Service

·         Quality

·         Choice

·         Location

·         Heritage

·         You have a genuine USP that can’t be copied and is unique only to you.

There may be other key differentials for your particular business or product so keep them in mind.  I’ve selected these as they are probably the most common criteria for the majority of businesses and best represent the point I’m trying to make, for example, if you were a restaurant then ‘Local Produce’ may be one of your key defining features.

Now think about your marketing; look at your website, your brochures and other marketing collateral, your recent written communications to prospects, recent or past advertising campaigns, your social media profiles, e-mail signatures, branding, logos and anything and everything that is used to try and ‘sell’ your business to your prospects.

Does your marketing honestly convey and reflect your real identity, does your marketing ‘currently’ do you justice?

Surely if these are the key defining features of your business then your marketing and everything that you do to attract new customers must reflect this; if these are the main reasons that people buy from you, they need to be the focus of everything you do to market the business.

Now take a look at your competitor’s sites and try to get hold of some of their marketing communications, adverts or brochures.   How do they position themselves and what brand or identity are they portraying, what are your first impressions?

Is the website easy to use?

Is the information on the site clear and accurate?

How much information is on the site, can you find what you want quickly, easily and without having to ‘jump through hoops’?

Are they running any short-terms offers, promotions, initiatives or events?

Are there photos or pictures to look at?

Is there a sign-up box on the site in return for some useful information?

Is there free information available that a prospect may find useful, valuable?

Is it up to date and are the news sections and feeds recent and regular?

Are there links to other business profiles – Social Media?

Did you enjoy the experience of visiting the website or were you left unimpressed?

Are there testimonials or endorsements on the site?

Have they convinced you to go back and have another look in the future? (near future)

What does their other ‘Marketing Collateral’ tell you? (Brochures, leaflets, adverts, letters)

What’s the one clear message being portrayed throughout – Is there one?

If a prospect visited their website, would they be likely to want to open a business relationship with them, meaning would they go back or perhaps stay in touch – or would the prospect leave and never go back?

How to interpret what you see

Let’s say their website was clear, easy to use, had useful or valuable information to share for free, had a sign-up box, posted regular updates in the news/blog/articles section, the information was clear and informative and offered me everything I could need to make a balanced view of what this company is like to deal with - this would make them a company focused on quality and expertise with (hopefully) service levels to match.

This approach is used to gain trust, position the business as experts (leaders) in their respective field and thus attract those looking for a quality product or service.  The sign up box and free content would show me that they collect e-mail addresses from prospects, perhaps for a unique content rich mailing or article that may convince the prospect that this company will give me an exceptional service, they know their stuff and I feel safe buying from them.

This business has a ‘Beating Heart’.

If, on the other hand, the website was difficult and frustrating to use, the information was inaccurate and out of date, the news items were old, there was no offer of information or expertise for free, the website felt cold and stale, your experience was one to forget – this would tell me their service levels are likely to be poor, their attention to detail is also probably poor and so there is a good chance I won’t be looked after; doing business with them may be a chore so I probably won’t go back.

Only once you have evaluated both your market and your business, and only once you have a clear identity that form this ‘Beating Heart’ of your marketing and of your business, can you begin to plan a strategy that has every chance of success.  Only then will you be able to clearly focus your efforts on the tools and platforms that work best for what you want to achieve and be able to lose or ditch the things that don’t.

There may be many individual things that ultimately combine to deliver a particular message in your marketing but remember the little things all add up. 

In coming articles I will share some of the over-riding principles and rules of what to look out for as well as some ideas and tips on how best to use tools such as; your website, social media, e-mail marketing, direct marketing, briefings, events and seminars, content marketing,. PR and others as part of your local marketing strategies.

Final Thoughts

Any business, irrespective of size, turnover, budget, locality or marketing knowledge has the ability to implement strong Marketing Plans that grow to deliver results, all within the confines of any individual budget or resource constraints.

It doesn’t matter whether you are a local, independent shop or business with a local customer base, or a large regional or multi-national with customers stretching the length and breadth of the country, get the basics right and you will see results.

What may start as a seemingly basic idea or strategy can soon grow into something far more robust, something that ultimately forms the backbone of your marketing.

Most importantly don’t keep re-investing in marketing campaigns or in advertising if you continually fail to see a return from your efforts; if what you’re doing isn’t working stop it and go back to basics, in marketing, simplicity is key.

It’s probably worth mentioning that a good dose of patience, persistence and hard work is also required; if you are short on time, in-house resource and the passion to tackle your marketing properly, it may be worth looking to a Marketing Consultant to help you; I’m always happy to have a chat on the phone should you want to chew things over with someone first.

Remember, any change in tact won’t happen overnight, depending on the resource you have at your disposal it may take a few months to really gain momentum.  That said you will see small returns from your efforts even in the first few weeks and you will start to see the potential to be had from following the right strategy.

Any re-think requires an open mind and the thoughts of a few minds are better than one.  If you employ customer facing or sales professionals, get their views; these people will generally tell it like it is and they will prove valuable allies when you come to implementing any new plan.

 

Next Article: Saturday 14^th July

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