5 Mistakes You Could Be Making On Your Website

You could be making some common mistakes with your business website and not even realize it. Here are some common ones – and what to do about them.

Your website marketing is feeling neglected.

Does the copyright at the bottom of your site still say 2009? Do you still show the bio of an employee who left three years ago? Are there old broken links on the site?  Was your last calendar update last year? All of these are symptoms of simple neglect – and they’re typically easy to miss. How to fix this mistake:

• Do you have a staff member (possibly yourself) charged with the task of reviewing your site periodically? If not, schedule some time once per month, or even once per quarter, to check your site.
• Are you unable to add or edit the site without the help of your designer, who’s always too busy? Consider moving to a content management system (CMS) like WordPress. You’ll be able to very easily change and add content whenever you need to.

Your website marketing isn’t helping your business’s credibility.

Those broken links and old content aren’t just inconvenient – they can make your business look bad. Consider that your website may be the first experience a potential customer has with your company. Don’t make a bad first impression!  How to gain credibility using your website:

• Fix broken links and keep content up to date.
• Don’t use a free site that forces your URL to be something like ‘mycompany.myfreehost.com.’ Invest in a domain of your own: ‘www.mycompany.com.’
• Use the email accounts that come with your hosting services – instead of ‘john@aol.com,’ send your business correspondence using ‘john@mycompany.com.’

Your website marketing doesn’t help people get in touch with you as much as it could.

Sure, you might have an email address link posted on your site. But some potential customers might be using a public computer or prefer an online email service like Gmail – you could end up just frustrating the visitor when they’re unable to easily contact you. You can remedy this mistake by adding a contact form to your site, which has several benefits:

• A contact form allows anyone to contact you from any computer – they won’t be hampered by the email program (or lack of one) on the computer they’re using.
• A contact form can help guide the customer who’s unsure of what they need – for example, you can provide a checklist of your services and a place for questions.
• A contact form lets you collect additional information from each potential customer.
• Finally, a contact form lets you hide your email address from spammers.

Your website marketing is talking to the wrong people.

When you’re first writing content for your new website, it’s easy to get caught up in the idea of showing off what your company does best. But who is your website for? Is it for yourself, or your customers? Content needs to answer the question that led visitors to your site in the first place.

• Your content shouldn’t focus so much on what you do. Instead, for your visitors, it should answer the question ‘what can you do for me?’
• Consider your audience when finding your ‘voice.’ This includes technical savvy, sex and age, where they live, potential experience with the types of products/services you offer and what they’re expecting to find when they come to your site.

Your website’s hard to find.

You own a small niche bookstore. When someone in your city Googles local bookstores, does your site show up? An investment in professional SEO (search engine optimization) and web-based marketing can help you:

• Improve your site’s ranking in search results.
• Get found on local search (the map that often appears in a search results page).
• Learn how to make your content more relevant for your audience.
• Learn how to use social media to get more exposure for your business.
• Learn how to measure improvements.

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A website is a serious investment for any business. Use these tips to improve your site’s value, credibility and usefulness – show your website some love! And in return you should begin to see more success with your business site.

– Debbie