Do you experience a dull, aching feeling when you look at your website? Does the term web traffic analytics make you nauseous? Are you experiencing any signs of Acute Onset Online Marketing Burnout, symptoms of which may include fatigue, dizziness, headache, and increased alcohol consumption?
If you answered yes to any or all of these questions, there’s a chance your web presence and your online marketing strategy is, I’m afraid, crap. We recommend fully reevaluating your web presence at least once a year to be sure your online marketing strategies are helping to propel your business forward rather than holding you back.
To figure out where your website stands, ask yourself these 7 questions:
1. Are Your Website’s Visuals Crap?
Every few years, our cultural design aesthetics change. At around the 3 year mark, we could look back at movies and magazines and feel that they are somehow dated, if even slightly. The digital world moves even faster. I could spot a 2011-built website from a giga-mile away. To convey a sense of professionalism, your website needs a modern user interface and a fresh coat of graphic design paint. Without modern website visuals, your web presence is crap.
2. Is Your Website Conversion Strategy Crap?
If you think of your website as an online brochure, you are missing a major opportunity. Think of your website as your storefront. Everything about your store should have a purpose. Would you hide the cash register in the back behind the bathroom? Would you play deafening death metal if you’re running a jewelry boutique? Would you tell your customers about the fantastic services you offer but never give them an easy way to take action if they’re interested? If each page of your website does not have an optimized call to action, you’re doing just that. Without a solid website conversion strategy, your web presence is crap.
3. Is Your Mobile Website Crap?
Google’s latest algorithm change on August 21, 2015, dubbed by us SEO nerds as “mobilegeddon” or “SEOpocalypse”, punishes websites that are not responsive. That means that unless your website is built to automatically adapt to all platforms, screen sizes, and devices including smartphones and tablets, your website will plummet in the search rankings when your prospects do a search for the services you have to offer them. If you do not have a responsive website, your web presence is crap.
4. Is Your Analytics Strategy Crap?
The real beauty of online marketing is that there is a world of data we are afforded that we never had with traditional marketing. By installing simple analytics software, you could track and measure invaluable metrics like how many visitors come to your website, where they came from, how long they spend on your website, how they move around your website, where they clicked, and which page, if any, made them leave. This gives you incredible insight into who your website’s visitors are and how they’re responding to the way you’ve laid your website out for them. Serious money left on the table if you aren’t at least taking a monthly peek at your analytics data. Without a solid analytics strategy, your web presence is crap.
5. Is Your Blog Crap?
Your website is the hub of your online marketing strategy and at the center of it all is your blog. It is the easiest and most effective way to position yourself as a thought leader in your industry and it is the ultimate platform to advance your search engine optimization. If you don’t have a blog and a strategic plan behind it, you aren’t just leaving money on the table, you’re throwing it down the drain. Identify your target audience, establish a crystal clear buyer persona, and develop a strong and consistent brand voice first. Then create an editorial and publication calendar you can stick to driven by your SEO keywords to build your business up with content your next great customer will love. Without a solid blogging strategy, your web presence is crap.
6. Is Your SEO Strategy Crap?
Did you know that 75% of web users do not click past the first page of search results? Without a strong search engine optimization (SEO) strategy, you will never make it to page 1. Google is constantly tweaking its algorithm to provide us all with better and better search results, so to make it out there, you need to focus on quality by doing careful keyword research, following industry best practices for website optimization, and creating excellent, fresh content on a regular basis. Without a solid SEO strategy, your web presence is crap.
7. Is Your Social Media Strategy Crap?
I know what you’re thinking. Your business, your company, your industry is above tweeting and pinning and liking and tumbling and the whole plague of these kids today. But it turns out no matter what industry you’re in, your prospects are looking for you from many different channels. If integrated well with your website, a solid social media presence allows you to build trust with your prospects. Social media provides a level of transparency we didn’t have with traditional marketing. Stop hiding from this truth and put yourself out there for your customers. Without a solid social media strategy, your web presence is crap.
To capture more leads and stay ahead of your competition, use this blog’s checklist to identify what your website is missing. Then strategize how you will fill these gaps. Or, if you need help from a few professionals from a digital marketing agency, we encourage you to reach out to us—we’re always here to talk shop.