Today your Internet Marketing Consultant is here to help you understand the important role your website plays in how you get more clients as well as how to maximize its ability to do so.
- List four major characteristics of a good website for Internet marketing.
- Give at least one reason why each one is important.
Let's get started...
Your Website
Your website is often the first face of your company to your potential new client. It is out there 24/7/365 and you want to make sure that it is helping you to get more clients, not preventing you. A solid internet marketing strategy starts with a well-designed website that helps your clients understand who you are and what you have to offer. The fact is that most web surfers are pretty impatient people, and if you want to keep them on your site then they need to be able to find what their looking for quickly and easily.
The four things you want to pay attention to right now are:
- Your site's navigation
- Clear content delivered well
- Good use of design and space
- Understanding your audience
1. Your Site's Navigation
Navigation is simply the way your visitors move from page to page to find your content. That makes it pretty important and worthy of paying attention to, wouldn’t you agree? While we care a lot about content and we’ll get to that in a minute, even sites with great content will be abandoned quickly if the navigation isn’t what it should be. Sometimes it is tempting to try to be different, but if different causes confusion for your users then different is not your friend. The goal of your website is to get more clients, or followers, so your job is to engage your visitors in a simple interchange of information that they don’t have to work hard to understand. A website should not be a puzzle! Here are a few important suggestions when it comes to navigation:
- Use conventional icons
- Be consistent on every page
- Home - Always have a home button
- Use clear names for things- Getting creative can just cause confusion.
2. Clear Content Delivered Well
I’m not sure we can overemphasize this in your website. We are passionate about content, and the importance of having clear and relevant content on your website that matters to your audience cannot be overstated. We have moved into a time on the internet where users are seeking information. They want to be informed consumers and they want to know that you know your industry well before they will buy services or products from you. Stephen Covey Jr. in The Speed of Trust wrote that trust is a combination of competence and character. What you know makes up your competence and how you write it demonstrates your character. If people don’t trust that you know what you are doing then they will go elsewhere. You don’t want that now, do you?
3. Good Use of Design and Space
Lest you think that navigation and content are all we care about, you would be wrong! Design matters and we love to design websites that tell the story our clients are trying to tell. Design is all about using the space you have and using it well. There are some crazy websites out there that are just visually overwhelming, where they are trying to cram way too much information in a small space and the user is visually assaulted all at once. Here is my favorite example of too much on so many levels:
4. Understanding Your Audience
Sometimes we make the mistake of believing that everyone who visits our website thinks and sees the world pretty much the same way we do. Not true! Essentially you are “selling” to four basic types of people, the Competitive, the Spontaneous, the Methodical and the Humanist. Your website and content need to be designed and written with each of these personalities in mind. Read the book, Waiting for the Cat to Bark to learn more about these terms.
Conclusion
These four characteristics are important pieces to the success of your website. If you pay attention to them and apply these foundational rules to your website then you will get more customers. I’ve seen it over and over again. If you are looking for an Internet marketing consultant to help you then be careful. Not every Internet marketer understands how to do this well. We have one client for whom we are still repairing the damage an Internet marketing company did to his website.
If you’re looking for an Internet marketing consultant to help you with your Internet marketing then download our paper on The Ultimate Guide to Hiring an Inbound Agency. It will give you 11 essential questions you want to ask before you sign on the bottom line. We hope it will help you make a wise decision with something as important as your website and your business.
