Back in pre-Internet days, businesses marketed just fine with media advertising, the United States Postal Service, and a telephone.
Those tools are still valuable, but the online revolution has upended their monopoly in marketing. An increasing number of businesses now depend on online avenues to reach customers more than traditional ones.
At the heart of this new marketing paradigm is the business website. For a lot of businesses, it’s the pathway for turning prospects into customers. All roads—email and social media, in particular—should lead to it.
Many businesses understand this—which is why they pay a princely sum to develop their sites with slick, professional graphics and other bells and whistles.
But as stunning as its website may be, a business can’t put it on auto-pilot and expect it to magically draw eyeballs. Nor does it do any good to attract visitors from social platforms if they don’t have a reason to stay and—hopefully—find their way to conversion.
Ideally, your website should be a lead and sales generator, not a static digital billboard. If it’s the latter, it’s nearly impossible for it to deliver a decent ROI, especially if you paid dearly for the “I.”
To get the most bang for website buck, here are 3 practices you should be doing continually to attract people to your site and increase your conversion rate.
Regularly Add More Content
Your new (or refurbished) site has just gone live. It has everything you think visitors need: information about you and your team; product or service details; methods for contact; mission or vision statements. A whole lotta 411 about you and your business.
At this point, there’s really nothing more you can add, right?
Wrong. Hitting “Publish” for the first time is just the beginning: to truly boost your online marketing you’ll do well to continually add useful content.
A huge reason why revolves around the nature of search engines. “The Big G” (you know who) and other indexing engines constantly crawl the Web for relevant and authoritative content to align with users’ search queries. You thus improve your chances for higher SERP rankings if you publish relevant content on your site on a regular basis.
Adding content—blog posts, white papers, case studies, infographics, etc.—can also serve as social proof. The more examples visitors can see of your business expertise, reliability, and customer satisfaction, the more trust you can garner with them.
And, regular content can help you build a stronger connection with your audience by providing something of value, i.e. content that informs, entertains, or inspires. Consider it a little something extra to show your appreciation and interest in them—as our friends in Louisiana would say, a little lagniappe.
Keep it Current
As Heraclitus the Greek reportedly said, “Change is the only constant in life.” Your business is no exception: team members come and go, facilities open or close, products and services are added, modified, or deleted.
Imagine your business changing in all these ways, except one: your website. It still highlights team members who’ve departed—and not a whiff about those newly on board—or offerings you no longer offer. At best it might confuse visitors who go on to try to interact with you further . At worst, your out-of-date website might give them the impression you’re not bringing your A game.
It pays to regularly audit your site for anything no longer relevant, or for missing information on what’s new. This might be quarterly, monthly, or even daily, depending on the pace of change in your business.
Expand Its Capabilities
Once you see your business website as a dynamic marketing hub—and giving it the ongoing attention it deserves—it might be a good time to ask, “Can our website do more?”
The answer might mean starting a regular blog, revising page structures to encourage visitor interaction, or perhaps a/b tests to see if certain changes increase traffic. It might even mean adding something major like an e-commerce portal.
All of this requires a significant investment of your time and attention. But a more dynamic website could open the door to new business opportunities. It could even challenge your overall marketing to new forms of outreach.
In short, a dynamic, thriving website could help you obtain what you want most: more engaged customers—and ultimately more business.
David Webster is a copywriter and consultant who creates online marketing content for clients.
You can learn more about David’s services at webstercreative.com
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