What can you do to get more sales through your website?
If your goal is to increase the amount of sales you are getting through your website then there are a few simple steps you can take. Try looking at your website as if you’re seeing it for the very first time. Is it inviting? Does it encourage you to find out more about the products or services available? Does it look tired and in need of an update?

We’ve put together a helpful list of tips to get the most out of your website and hopefully increase those online sales:

• Homepage - keep it simple and easy to navigate. Don’t be tempted to cram as much as possible on your homepage, this will just overwhelm visitors and could lose you sales.
• Try adding videos for product demonstrations and information - we process visual images much faster than reading text making video a great way to communicate with your audience!
• Call To Action - a simple yet effective ‘Buy Now’ button could be all you need to turn that enquiry into a purchase!
• Marketing - is an integral part of any business. From digital marketing to the more traditional, offline channels, they all have a part to play in helping your business to grow and be successful. For your marketing to be a success you need to have a plan to follow strategically rather than just a knee-jerk reaction to changes in the business climate.

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Once you’ve ticked all those boxes the sales will come flooding in, right? Well no, unfortunately it’s a bit more complex. Once your website is fine-tuned and your marketing plan is updated there's still more work to be done to improve customer engagement to ultimately increase sales. This is where a marketing funnel can really make a difference.
 
What is a Marketing Funnel?
It might surprise you to learn that only a small percentage of sales happen the first time a customer visits your website. Just being aware of your products and services isn’t enough and all customers will go through a personal journey before they finally decide to make a purchase. A marketing funnel is simply a way to analyse this customer journey and understand how and when you can help convert the sale.
 
Your many and varied marketing channels all have the same aim... to lead the customer to your website and bring customers on-board.
 
Every customer or potential customer that visits your website goes through their own unique journey before they engage with you for a service or make a purchase. Understanding that journey is difficult and sometimes the only way to find out is to ask the customer through research eg. feedback questionnaires, emails and speaking to your customers.
 
This marketing funnel infographic gives an example of a typical customer journey.
 
Attracting customers to your website
There are many ways to draw customers to your website, such as email marketing, social media and Google Ads but it’s also important to remember that customers are heavily influenced by other aspects of your website such as design, user experience (make sure it’s easy to navigate), call to actions, relevant content and mobile optimisation.
 
But, as you know, just getting the potential customer to the website isn’t enough, what you want is for the customer to take the next step:

• A phone call
• An enquiry/contact us form
• An order /purchase

 
What you can do to help a potential sale
Get yourself acquainted with the granular details with your print and digital marketing, know your numbers! You can do this through understanding the data in your Google Analytics account or social media insights. To really improve your customer experience you need to put yourself in their shoes, start simple, take a look at your website - what can you change on your home page or a landing page to pull more customers in?
 
Need some support to understand your Google Analytics data or social media insights? Book a FREE Health Check.

Always have the end user in mind:

• What would make the customers journey easier? Think about the design - keep it on brand but simple and easy to navigate. Talk to your designer!
• What can you change to make them book or make that all important purchase? This is where you need to think about Call To Action (CTA). A good CTA can make the difference between making that all important purchase or walking away.
• What quick fixes are there that will help my customers? A great way to keep your customers is to have great customer service, think about your FAQ’s and any help sections - make sure they are top notch. Again, think about the design!

 
Why would you need to do this?
Anything that can help improve user experience, engagement and stop users moving on is going to have a lasting impact on your business. The steps you take now can save you time and money in the long term, boost sales; automate some of your business processes and create a loyal customer base.
 
What is available?
Regardless of what platform your website uses, website automation and functionality is available but not limited to:

• Email newsletter sign-up - an easy way to stay relevant with your customer and keep them updated with changes to your business.
• Contact/registration/sign-up forms - another great way to keep your customers informed and boost engagement.
• Image gallery - such a simple yet effective way to boost engagement. Images are a way for you to really showcase your business with products and services and add a personal touch.
• Booking system - if your business requires customers to book (appointments, events, etc) it must be easy to use. Put yourself in your customers shoes and think about what makes you book (or not) through certain websites.
• Ecommerce - it’s important your visitors have a great shopping experience in order for them to want to return to your online store in the future. Your website needs to be simple, easy to navigate and have great search options so your customer can easily find the product/service they are looking for.
• Social media feed - keeping on top of your social media (regular posts, using hashtags, joining groups and engaging with connections) will really help you get more exposure.
• Landing page - this is different to the rest of your website in that it will have some type of form for your customer to fill in, in exchange for an incentive such as an offer.
• Blog - a regular blog will increase your online presence and connect with your customers.
• Google Analytics/reporting - keep on top of what is working for your website with this fab free tool!
• Mobile friendly/Responsive Website Design (RWD)
• Survey and feedback tools
• Live chat options - there are plenty to choose from such as Zendesk or LiveChat. These are a great way of creating trust with your customer and providing great customer support. Speak with your designer to find what would suit your needs.

 
It’s always a great idea to chat with your designer about your website. They will have some great ideas for how to boost engagement and build a functional web strategy.

Project overview:

• Website refresh
• Home page re-design
• On-going marketing
• Website maintenance
• Marketing advice

What we wanted to achieve:
We wanted bring our website up-to date and to improve on our overall marketing.
Our existing website was built in 2015, technology moves on and it was performing a little slower than we wanted. With Covid-19, Lockdown and moving out entire class schedule online we needed customers to find and join our classes quickly. We wanted to promote our therapies and treatments easily. 

Outcome:
We removed the scrolling image banners and replaced them with static graphics to  promote classes, treatments and therapies. Call to actions 'Book Now', 'Register' and 'Login' has reduced admin time and given customers more control.

Insights from Google Analytics have shown since the refresh the website has received a 65% increase in website visitors, users are staying on the website longer and navigating to more classes, treatments and therapies. The design has consolidated our brand.

Here are 8 ways you can get more out of your website and make it work harder in 2020:

1. It’s all about the “Call to Action”
A call to action (CTA) is a prompt that tells the user to do a specific action such as sign up to newsletter, call or subscribe to content. It’s important to make sure you have a strong, well placed call to action in order to have a good conversion rate. Placement, colour and the design of the CTA are all important points to consider.

2. Create landing pages
A landing page is designed to convert visitors into leads. It’s different from the rest of your website pages because it will have a form that allows you to gain visitor information in exchange for a certain offer or promise.

3. Create more content to ensure customers return
If you neglect to update your content or blogs your customers will soon lose interest. Keeping content up-to-date and relevant and it will give users a reason to come back to your website.

4. Rethink your landing page If you find your landing page isn’t working well for you then look at how you can change it to make it more engaging. Better still come up with several designs or versions, test them all, and see which landing page performs better.

5. Reviews
Reviews are so important to the success of your business, they create brand loyalty and build consumer confidence. Be sure to ask new customers for reviews, contact previous customers, display more reviews and make it easier to find reviews on your website.

6. Get a fresh design
This doesn’t have to be a brand new website, most are template based but speak to your designer about a fresh new look for 2020. Don’t forget to keep up with the maintenance of your website as well, it’s no good making it look amazing if the content isn’t fresh!

7. Get secure
Make sure your website is secure with https, it adds an extra layer of security which is especially important when dealing with sensitive data on your website such as contact forms or purchases. Google puts up a warning (an unlock symbol) when a person navigates to a non secure site which can have a negative impact resulting in loss of traffic and sales etc.

​8. Measure changes with Google Analytics It’s so important to keep track of what is working well (and what is not) and Google Analytics is a great free tool that gives you in depth information about your website and its content and how well it is performing for you.
 
So how is your website looking? Is it going to perform as well as you want it to in 2020?

Why do I need a website?
Think about why you want a website (not just because everyone else has one) and then think about what you want to achieve from it. Everyone wants to sell products or services and inform their customer and attract new ones, but other than these reasons why do you want a website?

The answer to this question will inform all your choices about how to develop your website. Always refer back to this when making every decision, having your target audience in mind.

An example
I would like a website to be able to display my finished designs and it needs to let people sign-up for my newsletter.

Q: What colour should my website be?
A: Who is my target audience and how can I appeal to them through my choice in colour?

A good plan to a website that succeeds is broken down into four parts:

1. Website Research
2. Website Build
3. Planning
4. Marketing

1. Website research

• Your target audience
• Your competitors
• Search engine marketing (SEO)

Before you start any business or even begin to think about your website, take a look at your target audience, your competitors and this is the time to be thinking about your search engine optimisation. Any keywords relevant to your industry and service should feature in the written content of your website.

2. Website build

• Navigation
• Content
• Structure (map/tree)

The website structure form the outline build of your website, this includes your navigation (how many pages to feature on your website). A tree or spider diagram can be drawn up to map out all the pages on your website. Your website content needs to be identified, from text to images and other media such as video.

3. Planning

• Design
• Functionality
• Specific requirements

People often make the mistake of starting with the design and shifting the content around to match. A better way is to collate all your content, develop the structure then think about the design when you know of everything that needs to be included. Functionality is anything that has a function for example email newsletter sign-up or a contact form. Specific requirements covers anything that isn’t strictly off-the-shelf e.g. a message board or a booking facility.

4. Marketing

• Publish
• Promote
• Measure your success

You publish your website and promote it through networking, word of mouth, on your business card, you direct people to it through emails but how do you know what content people are looking at and where they are spending their time? We install Google Analytics on every website we build, it is a FREE tool from Google and helps you find out much more than you will ever need to know!

Have you found any useful tools that could help others, plan, organise or build their website? Share your finds here: