Now pay attention to this part as it’s probably the most important thing about your whole site. If you get this part right it papers right over any mistakes you might make with the SEO and look of the site.

Web conversion isn’t as sexy as getting loads of visitors to your site. It’s more work, takes more brain power and is frankly just not understood by most people.

When somebody visits your site you usually want them to do something when they’re there, such as opt-in to your email newsletter or buy something from you. The more people you can get to do that the better. Web conversion is working on all the factors to increase the number of people doing what you want them to.

The first thing you need to get right is making sure that you are clear in what you want people to do. Each page, or maybe even the whole site, should be focussed on getting the visitor to do one thing and one thing only – taking that next step, whatever that may be.

If you want people to opt-in, only go for the opt-in. If you want them to buy, focus only on getting them to do this, if you want them to contact you, direct them only to contact you, and make it very clear how you want them to do this.

When you are clear in what you want people to do you can set about testing different approaches. Of course in doing this you need to be able to track each different approach so you can get accurate information and make decisions on what to test next. You will need to install some some good tracking and analytics software to get this information.

Depending on what you’re trying to do and how many visitors you’re getting to your site, you can either test one factor at a time, or else us use multivariate testing to test different combinations all at the same time.

Some things that you may wish to test include different headlines, images, body copy, offers and prices. This is where you really need to be skilled in direct response marketing and copywriting techniques, which have been proven to improve response over decades of use. If you’re relying solely on your branding and some wishy-washy corporate speak on your site to convince people prepare to be disappointed.

So, why is your conversion rate so important? Put simply, it means more money for you. Higher conversions means more profit for you. More profit means that you can pay for more traffic, or outbid your competitors for the existing traffic, which in turn means more profit for you, which means you can buy even more traffic… and so on.

You get the picture.

If you can see the power in this but don’t know where to begin you can contact me to see if I have the time free to help you. Please get in touch to arrange a consulting session and possible project work.

Believe it or not what a site looks like is not always that important. I’ve seen some sites that on first glance look absolutely stunning, yet when I examine them more closely it’s clear they do an incredibly bad job at actually promoting the business they’re supposed to.

When I see this, part of me feels a little sad, knowing that the business owner has no doubt paid out a large sum of money for something that looks great but isn’t going to perform. They’ll probably think that online marketing is a load of rubbish that doesn’t work for their business. Another part of me is actually rather pleased about it for the same reasons, because I know that if I wanted to compete against them in this market I’d likely be able to blow them out of the water.

Most people just don’t get it, which is very good news for those of us who do.

I’m not saying that a site shouldn’t look good, although it’s amazing how often ugly looking sites outperform pretty sites.

More important than how a site looks is how it’s set up and how easy it is to find what you want on it. A clean, crisp, simple site that’s easy to navigate and doesn’t make the visitor confused is a thousand times better than a pretty one that is difficult and frustrating to use.

Add into this the fact that often a web designer will sacrifice clean code and SEO factors to what a site looks like and it’s clear that what glitters isn’t always gold.

Think of your website as a salesman going out to speak to your prospects – would you prefer to send a slick and handsome fellow who looked the part but can’t answer even simple questions clearly, or someone who was presentable in an ordinary way, yet was friendly, knowledgable and could seal the deal?

That’s not to say you can’t have both (you definitely can) – just make sure you’re clear on what’s more important for you.

In Part 3 we’re going to talk about conversion, which is so, so important but is often completely overlooked by web designers and business owners.

What makes a website great?

Well, there are many factors that go into this and it’s really a case of it being horses for courses. It all depends on why you created the site in the first place and what you want it to do for you.

In this mini-series of posts I’m going to identify the 3 key things you need to consider when designing and creating a website. Of course there’s more to it than these considerations, but if you get these 3 right chances are you’ll be on to a winner.

The first step to get right when designing a website is the SEO.

The code that makes up the site needs to be lean and clean – make sure it’s all necessary and not too bulky and broken. Give the search engines what they want.

Next, make sure that you are fully optimizing the on-page SEO factors of each individual post and page. These include using the appropriate keywords in your title tags, meta tags, site description, image alt tags, etc. The main content on your page should also be about these keywords, although the focus here should be on writing naturally, rather than keyword stuffing.

By getting the basics right here you are clearly telling the search engines what your site is about and presenting it to them in the best way possible.

This isn’t difficult but it is often brushed aside by web designers who don’t fully understand this. They are often more concerned with making a site look nice, which is not always a good thing, as we’ll discover in Part 2.

If you want to see your profits soar you need to commit to continual testing of every element of your business. The chances that you have magically stumbled upon the best possible combination at the first time of asking are very, very low.

Test your offers, your products, your prices, your headlines, your calls to action, the places you advertise, the people you market to…

Then go test a whole lot more.

When you’ve done that start again and test everything over and over. Remember that your control is there to be beaten, and that good is the enemy of great.

Of course, some things are more important to test than others. Do those first and do those the most. Then further tweak things by testing the less vital stuff.

It goes without saying that you need to be able to track the effects of your testing too – it’s no use guessing what works, you need to know for sure. Tracking stuff is easier on the web than online so if you can start there. Make sure you have some good tracking and analytics software installed so you can make sense of what’s going on.

One more thing – if you have lots of (targeted) traffic you can test a lot of things. If you only have a small amount of traffic don’t try and do too much at once. You need to make sure your results are statistically significant before you can see what’s really going on.

Now is a fantastic time for local businesses to set up a website and establish a strong online presence.

It used to be that when you were looking for a local service or business you’d open up the Yellow Pages and get dialing. Not so much any more, nowadays you’re more likely to turn on your computer and head over to Google or the Search Engine of your choice.

This provides forward-thinking local businesses with a great opportunity to step ahead of their competitors and dominate the listings for their area.

No matter how competitive the niche your business operates in, it is highly likely that you can become the dominant force in your local area by targeting relevant keywords along with the name of your town or city. The chances are that nobody else will be targeting these exact phrases with any real conviction.

Whether you’re planning on using paid, social or organic traffic there are tweaks you can make to get your business noticed above others in your town.

If you are going to do this it’s worth doing it right. Don’t just throw up a half-arsed cheapo site thinking it’ll do the job. It may very well be okay short term but it leaves you incredibly vulnerable long term if other more savvy competitors decide to move in. If you do it right from the start you can make it incredibly difficult for anyone else to muscle in on your turf, allowing you to fight them off and protect your business.

If you want help designing your marketing strategy and setting up your site you can contact me. I’ll warn you now that I won’t be the cheapest option (at least up front) but long term getting me on board could be the best business investment you ever make.

In my opinion, cutting corners on your website and marketing strategy today just to save a few quid is false economy that will cost you a lot, lot more later on.

“Wow!”

“That’s a nice logo!”

“I’ve just GOT to buy from these guys!”

When did you last think that?

Exactly.

Are you sure there’s not some better way you could be spending your time and money right now? Do you really need to do that expensive re-branding?