Do you get a sinking feeling every time you look at your website? Are you not seeing the results you were promised and keep reading about? It’s time to accept that your website sucks. Acceptance is the first step—but now what?
Today’s digital marketing strategies are rapidly evolving, and, just like any evolution, there will be those who respond to this progress, and those who will drag their knuckles into extinction. To keep up with the e-Joneses, you really need to evaluate your website every 18–24 months. Is your website boosting your business like it should be, or is it failing, falling short and costing you leads?
To know where your website stands, make sure you’re not making any of these 10 website mistakes that cost even the best businesses.
1. You Don’t Have a Blog
Blog—what a boring, blah(g)-of-a-word, right? Maybe so, but you have to have one to properly format, post and archive your content. Anything you write, photograph, shoot video of or whip up in an infographic holds value to your visitors, and having a blog is the fastest, cheapest and most effective way to distribute your work so your visitors can celebrate (and share) it. This is your platform to advance SEO, become a thought leader and add substance to your social media presence.
2. Your Content Strategy is Non-Existent
Your content lives in your blog, but are you creating this content with a fully-focused, repeatable approach? Posting is one thing, but consistently posting with a purpose is another. You need to know your target audience, buyer persona, your brand’s voice, your SEO objectives and your distribution channels in order to craft compelling, fresh and accessible content that visitors will crave. Remember, when carefully choreographed, “content is king.”
3. You’re Missing an SEO Strategy
75% of Internet users do not click past the first page of search results—and without a search engine optimization (SEO) strategy, you’ll never get there. Ever. You can’t just keyword-stuff either. Google’s algorithm is smarter than that now. Today, an effective SEO strategy is a complex, ongoing process, structured around quality. You need careful keyword research, detailed linking and tagging strategies, focused social media approaches, well-executed conversion stratagems and dedicated distribution methods.
4. Your Social Media Strategy is Crap
I can feel you resisting this one—“Psh, my business isn’t about tweeting and liking.” But seriously, every business can benefit from a social media presence that is integrated into the brand’s website. This attracts followers and invites them to share your content. Done correctly, a robust social media strategy will feature: a feed from your social media networks to your website, social media share buttons in your content, a repeatable process in place for sharing content from your website to social media and an established method for having your team share content from your website to their social media networks, too.
5. You Don’t Have a Conversion Strategy
Every website should serve a purpose beyond being brochureware. Your website needs to be a welcoming environment where visitors are encouraged to evaluate you, become informed and then naturally “convert” into a lead. To do this, your website needs integrated calls-to-action (CTAs) to drive the right conversions in the right places. You need to know when an on-page action (or micro-conversion) should be solicited, and when a revenue-driving conversion (or cha-ching conversion) should be offered. This is how the conversion funnel functions, turning visitors into leads.
