Your website is your storefront. In many cases, it provides a prospect’s first impression of your company. You know what they say about first impressions; you can only make one and it better count. The good news is that if you simply keep in mind a few fundamentals and make a few simple tweaks to your website, you can take it from bland to brilliant. You can create a website that attracts visitors, converts clients, and helps you build a prosperous and exciting business.
Invitation To Friend/Follow On Social Media
Social media is more than a trend or a tactic that you can use to build an audience. It’s as essential for most industries as a website itself. And merely having a social media “presence” isn’t enough; you have to let people know you’re active on social media by inviting them to interact.
There are many ways to accomplish this; one of the simplest is to extend an invitation – “Follow me on Facebook,” for example, and include a link to your page.
Professional Quality Logo/Header
The world of Internet marketing is vast and competitive. While you can be the one to create your blog header, you should probably leave it to the professionals unless you happen to be a design whiz. Make an investment in your brand and your business by creating a robust and relevant header and logo to represent your business.
Easy To Navigate
Make sure your visitors can find their way around your website quickly and easily. If you’re uncertain about how to accomplish this, then study sites that you visit often. Notice how they guide you through the site. Do they provide relevant and easy to recognize navigation tabs? Does the flow of the site seem logical? Is there a search function so you can head directly to the page or information you’re looking for?
Interaction / Comments
Does your website invite visitors to comment on your articles and blog posts? One of the best ways to not only measure engagement but to also create it is to take a look at the level of interaction on your site. With WordPress, you can turn comments on and off and you can allow comments for a specific period of time.
Some business owners choose to not allow comments, but if you don’t then you may be selling your visitors short. Engage them in conversation and invite interaction and comments. You’ll not only learn a lot about your audience, but you’ll also help build a loyal community of customers.
Another option is to include Facebook comments. That way the conversation on your blog is continued on Facebook, where more people are likely to see and interact.
Social Bookmarking
Social bookmarking not only adds value to your visitors and prospects, it also helps boost your traffic and brand awareness. By adding a social bookmarking function to your site, your visitors can bookmark using the bookmarking service of their choice. There are several top quality WordPress plugins that make social bookmarking easy. You can add buttons for the primary sites like Reddit and Pinterest. When someone bookmarks your site it’s added to their account, where other users can browse and share. Be sure you’re featuring the bookmarking sites that appeal most to your audience. You can read more about this here: Social Bookmarking.
Great advice, as usual, Paul.
Our website has been an HTML creation forever. (OK, between this and it’s forebear, for 20 years.) But, now, it’s about to be a WordPress based site. (Mostly so I don’t have to be the only one who can update it….)
When the team comes in to help, the workloads become more manageable! Good luck with that, Roy! As you make the transition, let me know if you have any questions!
I like the idea of social bookmarking and think that this is important. Thank you for a reminder of 5 great tips.
You are welcome, Ava! Try it and let me know what you think!
Thank you for this information Paul. I’m going to review my website again based on this. Have a great day!
There are more suggestions coming, Emily! Stay tuned!
Some things I knew, some I didn’t. You have some great info here and some great reminders, too. I had to take about two years off (for various reasons) so my blog/website suffered. I’m getting that back up-to-date, so this is very timely for me. Thank you.
No better time than the present to get back into things, Jen! Welcome!
I don’t think I’ve ever heard of social bookmarking. Interesting idea! And I definitely need to compare my website to some of the standards you have just suggested. I don’t even know if it’s easy to navigate, so thanks!
Glad I could share something new for you, Jeanine!
Loved your tips especially “easy navigation”. I have left many sites because they were not easy to navigate.
If I get lost, I leave… Simple! I am just like you, Sharron!
These are great tips, Paul! Thanks for these! Question: How do I subscribe to receive your blog post in my inbox?
You can’t! LOL.
I do not have that feature set up! Instead, I send out snippets of blog posts via email. If you are interested, I can add you to my list. Let me know!
Good tips. Years ago when I came up with my design it was awful. I did what you suggested and visited sites I liked and tried to emulate what it was that I liked. This led me to my tabs with links to easily find older posts. I find it frustrating when I can’t find what I’m looking for, so I tried to make it easy on my site. I like the advice about the header, but my budget is low. I tried to work with what I have and I only spend about $12 per year to have a personal site name. For my current blog, I don’t want to spend more than that. I have another one in the works that I may put more time, money and effort into. My current blog is fun, easy and cheap! That didn’t sound good, HA! Either way, it’s a great creative outlet.
That is fine, Jill! It is all about the REASON for your website. No need to spend a lot if you are doing this for fun! If it was a business, your website would be an advertising expense! And you would certainly want to look different than a personal site!
Thanks for the great tips Paul. I’ll have to check outnthe bookmark feature.
Sure thing, Martha! Let me know if you have questions!
Great ideas, Paul. I especially liked the tip about including a plug in for Facebook comments. That’s where I get more comments from other vision-impaired individuals. I also love how your headings are dark. It’s very easy to read for a vision-impaired reader. 🙂
Thank you.
Amy
Thanks, Amy! The font on my site used to be smaller… I think now that I have increased the size, it is easier overall. This is a good tip for anyone’s website – know your audience! If you are attracting the 40+ year-old market, make it easy to read! 🙂
These are great tips Paul. Pretty much essential to put them all into action these days. Yet I’m amazed at the sites I visit that still have comments turned off and no social media buttons. How do they expect to grow an audience like that?
I think that people just get overwhelmed with all the options out there. Instead of just working on one thing and getting good at it before adding a second thing, and then a third, etc., people just ‘give up’ and don’t do anything. Oh Well.
Thanks Paul. Social, social, social is the location, location, location of the day! You are so right on!
I like that, Anne! Social, Social, Social…. I am going to have to use that!
Great tips Paul! I know that when I began my first blog years ago, your tips on which WordPress plugins to use was a great benefit.
I personally, never understand blogs that do not accept comments and am grateful you posted that there. I believe any good business is based on making deep connections and super-duper customer service. How can one do that if they are not accepting comments?
No comment = less than stellar customer service in my opinion. It is like asking someone to be a friend on Facebook and not allowing anyone to post on your wall! The communication is all one-sided. That is not very fair.
Now you tell me to use a professional on my logo! LOL I do need to check out bookmarking though.
He He He…
Paul great advice as always. For those who think that it may cost a lot of money there are some great artist on Fiverr.
Fiverr is always a great option that is affordable. Keep in mind, there may a difference between a $5 gig and that done by a full consultation with a professional. It all depends on what you need at that time.