If it takes more than 5 seconds for your visitors to figure out what is it that your company does, I believe that it is high time to reconsider the layout of your website.
Your website should have proper hosting and it should be set up so that it can clearly “communicate” with your audience and tell them what your company does and how and why you do it.
If your bounce rate is high, then your problems probably lie in the key elements of your website.
A high bounce rate on your website is a warning sign that something is not right with it, one possible answer being that you are not sending the right message or that this message is not quite in line with the services or products you are providing.
Here are some simple and effective tips you need to follow to make sure that your website is going in the right direction.
Create a Plan
The most important thing is to first create a plan. Don’t just immediately do a redesign of your website.
You need to make sure that it meets the needs of your visitors, so recreate a customer’s journey from them first visiting your site to them becoming a customer.
What are the pages they are viewing, what content are they reading and what are the things they are going to pay attention to. All of this will help you in designing your website in such a way that it effectively turns a good deal of your visitors into customers.
Clear Out All the Clutter
Some elements that are on your website may be distracting the visitors from the message you are trying to get across. Consider removing any complicated animations you might have on your website, because they can be causing it to load slower.
Visitors have a short attention span, so don’t give them a reason to leave your website. Media and animations on your website should be there only to support your well-written content.
Another important element that should not find its place on your website is unnecessary jargon and too many buzzwords with no real meaning. No one likes it and it makes the visitors roll their eyes, so avoid the words like, cutting edge, next gen, mission critical, because those words are out there on thousands of other websites.
Sharing
You should include social sharing and follow buttons on your website so that it would be easy for your visitors and audience to share and follow the content you have displayed.
Include this on every page of your website – landing pages, homepage, blog and even on your newsletter and marketing emails.
Good Photos
The photos that you are going to use on your website often do not go with the message you are trying to convey to your visitors, and even though this has been said too many times before – do not use stock photos.
These photos will not look professional, as the photos on your website are supposed to be representing the people that are employed in your company and your corporate spirit.
Make photos of your office and your employees, capture them when they are doing their everyday tasks, like talking on the phone or working on something at their desks.
Work On Improving Navigation
Your website should be able to facilitate a positive user experience, so simple and intuitive navigation plays a key role in good website design.
First, identify how long the visitors stay on your website. Make it easy for your visitors to find what they are looking for. Your visitors can easily switch to your competitor’s website, if they need a map to get around yours.
All in all, it is all about being found, and your site should be SEO friendly, so that you can improve your online presence.
Develop an SEO strategy and take into consideration all the search keywords that your potential customers will type in when searching for the services or products your company offers. Also, develop a strategy for creating quality content that will be relevant to your visitor’s needs, like blog articles and videos. You should ensure that your website is backed up with a good hosting solution with excellent up times, so that you don’t find yourself losing traffic because your website is down.
I hope that you will find these tips useful and that they will help you when improving the overall design of your website.
The author is highly qualified and writes blog posts weekly.
