Your website, in my opinion, is the single most important marketing tool you have. It’s the online shop front and main point of reference for your current clients, and potential customers. So it’s incredibly important to think about how the website works for the user subjectively, rather than what you think is best for the user. Stepping outside of your own shoes and into your customer’s will be have a really positive impact on the way your website appears, and works. Here’s 5 ways to get your customers to spend more time on your website, leading to more potential enquiries…

• The experience – The whole user journey from entering the website, to leaving the website needs to be considered. Firstly, what do you want from a website visitor? Is it a direct sale? An enquiry? Or just to open up a route of communication? The challenge is to get the right visuals, with the right messages, and the right writing style to hook the user in and grab their attention. Once you have their attention the user then needs to be rewarded, in return for your aim/goal. Want an E-Newsletter sign up? Offer a free guide/advice sheet. Want someone to purchase there and then? Offer a discount for new customers only!
• Content overload – Nowadays, less is more. Although Google loves content that’s relevant for its search engine algorithm, ensure you don’t go overboard. I can’t imagine there’s many people that actually want to read 4 sides of A4 on the history of the business and why you’re so great. Get case studies and testimonials from real customers to prove that you’re awesome, with a nice photo of them to increase the weight of the quote. As a rule of thumb, keep content to roughly 400 words per page.
• Awesome design – People judge on appearances, whether you like it or not. If you’ve got a website that looks 10 years old, chances are your potential customers will think that your business is 10 years behind the times. If you’re happy with that, then great! But if you want to appear as forward thinking and ahead of the game, a nice modern design will go a long way. Do some research into some modern design trends and make a short list of your best competitor websites. Your challenge is to beat them!
• Call to actions (CTAs) – *Marketing buzzword alert!* As a whole, I dislike marketing buzzwords. It inflates the egos of self confessed ‘Marketing Experts’ and alienates everyone else. A call to action is basically a nice button, image or link to get people to do something. That could be simply forwarding them onto another page, or downloading a free goodie! Call to actions allow us to plan and manage how a customer uses and flows through the website. Sometimes it’s worth drawing up site maps to ensure you’re using these in the best possible way.
• Fresh content! – Once someone has been and gone on your website, you need to then give them a reason to drop by again. You can do this by providing fresh pieces of unique content that are quick and easy to read. Try and aim to blog at least twice a month. Not only does it increase your chance of climbing the search engine rankings, but it also gives you nuggets to use in potential email marketing campaigns and social media posts. This really is a huge growth area in marketing recently, ignore it at your peril!

I hope some of the above information is of use to you in some way, even though we’ve barely scratched the surface. There’s so much potential and diversity with website marketing, that it’s worthwhile reviewing it every 4-6 months. Trial new ideas, scrap the ones that don’t work and spend more money on the ones that do!

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