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Are You Embarrassed to Share Your Company Website With Prospects??

Embarrassed to Share Your Company Website With Prospects

 

Recently I spoke to one of our favorite customers, Life Coach Jamie Lightner, about how the new responsive WordPress website we designed for her was working. We were in a group of other women business owners when I asked the question. Jamie’s response to my question actually made most of the women laugh out loud. She said she loved it and mostly she was happy not to have a website she was embarrassed by anymore! Jamie has an authentic sense of humor that is never lost on the crowd.

However, she explained further that the statement was sadly all too accurate. The free DIY website she built when she started her coaching business over 6 years prior really was embarrassing to her. Her experience, her services and programs, and the technology had all outgrown that initial DIY website solution. Of course, as the chosen website design firm I was happy to know how much our new website design has helped her in such a short amount of time. I knew when we started the new website design, organization and updating of content would help her prospecting and for her current clients. What I didn’t consider was the emotional impact the newly branded website would have.

Some of the reasons you may be embarrassed to share  your company website:

 

  1. Life coach, Jamie Lightner responsive website designOutdated design that looks like it is from another decade
  2.  Broken links that prompt 404-page errors
  3.  Confusing navigation that doesn’t lead the visitor where they intend
  4. The website isn’t responsive and is hard to read on mobile devices
  5. No clear calls to action
  6. Outdated services, products, or promotions
  7. Staff members listed who are no longer with the company
  8. No clear brand messaging or visuals
  9. Competitiors websites are modern and have valuable content
  10. The information doesn’t present current level of expertise
  11. …more…

It was rewarding for me to hear Jamie express that her decision to update her DIY website to a professional website design was the best business decision she has made. She now confidently shares her website URL with prospects and customers and she has quickly realized a return on her investments.

 

Want to Love Your Website Again?

Schedule a 100% free, no-obligation 15-minute consultation.

We’ll visit your website while on the call, talk about your goals and offer some insight. Even if your website is embarrassing right now, we can make it shine again – we promise. Let’s Connect

 

I’d like to say the conversation about being embarrassed to share your company website ended there.

It didn’t. Total transparency, I had to share my true confession that Connection Group also found ourselves in that same predicament.  (Obviously, I was feeling pretty safe with this particular group of women business owners!) My confession didn’t receive a laugh like Jamie’s did. The reaction was more surprise, “You? But your company excels at website design and development!”

After being in business for over 20 years our website has experienced many iterations, much revamping, some re-dos. Remember Flash websites? Yes, as cool as all the moving text and dancing graphics were, there was little to no ROI on that website design technology – and we did it in-house!  But, I digress from the point of my story…

Although we have over 20 years of experience in website design and have one of the most talented responsive WordPress developers leading our team our website was sadly outdated. It wasn’t because we didn’t have the talent, or the desire, or the budget, our reason was we didn’t have the time. We were living the proverbial ‘the cobbler’s children have no shoes’ saying. If you are a small business owner you may relate to our position. Basic business principles taught us customer orders, customer service, and billable hours come first.

We now liken our marketing to putting our own oxygen masks on first – before we save others.

Although we were allocating time for brainstorming, re-branding, targeting key audiences, and content planning, the new website was not given the priority it deserved. In the midst of the planning, COVID hit and our existing and new customers needed us even more. Of course, along with the rush of orders, there was the unknown. In addition to the customer projects we were also being proactive and responding to RFPs that we felt were a good fit.

I will never forget the late night preparingto post our RFP response to a web portal. I made the mistake of checking how many other branding firms had submitted responses. To my dismay, that particular RFP had 64 submissions, 64! To further add insult to injury I decided to check out my competition. I definitely needed to put my oxygen mask on after that! For over an hour I perused modern, sleek, contemporary websites that shone bright like diamonds. Talk about being embarrassed to share your company website with prospects! Ugh! It was too late (literally and figuratively) to do anything about it at that point, so I submitted the RFP and went to bed.

In the end, we did rank pretty high in the selection – because our credentials, experience, and cost were competitive and our proposal rocked. However, what I gained was the insight that taking care of our brand needed to be a higher priority. Never, ever may we make excuses or neglect imprtant components of our branding and prospecting ability.

Today, I am proud to see our new website doing its job. Like Jamie, I too appreciate the ease in updating it with the new front-end editor, the clear brand focus, and imagery we have developed. We took our time to hone in on the services that we do best and we have simplified the navigation and content to make it clear to our customers and prospects. Would we have won that RFP if this new website design was in place earleir? I’ll never know, either way, I know I always want to honor our brand, our abilities, and show our expertise. I want to proudly post our website everywhere and know the information is up to date, attractive, and fully functional on all screens.

So, that’s our story. What about you? Are you embarrassed to share your company website? If so, don’t wait any longer, I promise you, your competition isn’t waiting. Connect today, we’re happy to craft a professional, responsive website you will be proud to share and update for years to come. 

Stay connected!

Hurry and reserve your 15-minute slot today!

Commit to starting the new year strong. All of our websites come with step-by-step training. You and your team will know exactly what to do to keep your website up-to-date.  Let’s Connect

Authentic Website Content and Blogs – The Tao of Enlightened Story Telling

authentic website content and blog posts - June image
Content, content, content. What Google wants, Google gets.  The best part of feeding Google accurate, credible, relevant and authentic website content is that search engine inquiries return fairly accurate results. Local companies can compete with national chains, customers can find you quicker and they keep coming back because your information is current and is trustworthy.

Blogs

One of the most powerful ways to drive traffic to your website are blogs. Rich with keywords, when updated regularly search bots love to crawl and index blogs. What topics are of interest to your customers that also highlight company products and services? Make sure your blog is part of your website and is not a separate blog with a completely different domain name. Share industry information and make sure you have the same voice each post. Add some personal anecdotes in there – personal to youauthentic website content categories or situations your company has encountered. People want to read stories, not just statistics. Truthful, authentic website content will resonate with your audience.

List a few blog topics of interest to your customers. Can you cover multiple categories (products, local news, upcoming releases, etc.)?

Page Content

Let your website work for you. Websites should also serve to help your visitor make a decision. Be proactive and consider what questions your customers typically ask and answer them on your site!
Do some research. What do people call and ask you most often? Can you include these answers on your website? Do you offer a unique service or go the extra mile with customer service or off referral discounts. Share this information on the pages of your company website – blogs are not the only parts of your website that get crawled by search engines. Having clear, authentic website content that answers your website visitors questions will get you further ahead.

What website information can you expand on?

Keywords

Still powerful generators for standing out in search engines, keywords perform best in search results when they are included in paragraphs such as articles, bios, descriptions, etc. What are known as key phrases are the best for search results these days.
For instance instead of saying we provide content writing and use content writing as the keyword the suggested approach is we write a longer phrase.  For example: we develop authentic website content for Lansing area businesses. Note website content for Lansing area businesses is more targeted than just blog writing. By adding a targeted phrase to our local market we reduce the amount of websites we are competing against when people search for content writing for Lansing area businesses.
Consider how you would search in Google for your product or service. Choose words and phrases that are relevant to your product or service for a higher return. For example since we design responsive websites for small businesses, we could use mobile friendly website designs for Lansing area small businesses as a relevant keyphrase. Writing about my vacation in St. Petersburg Florida or penning a how-to on business networking is not relevant to our responsive website design service.  Google will not return our website in results when people search responsive website design for small business in Lansing, MI if we only write about the fabulous sunsets in St. Pete . Remember to feed the keyword and keyphrases in your blog and the pages of your website. You can also use Google’s Keyword Tool to get some ideas on search volumes for particular words and phrases.

What are some keywords and key phrases to start with?

graphic54d91c52c35e6-800x800.jpgPhotos / Graphics

Looking for attention? Want to stand out from the millions of website content shared each day? Post a photo or create a graphic. Product photos, image and text slides in a moving slideshow can help with promotions, or services. Sharing statistics in visual formats keep visitors on your website twice as long. Can you add professional custom photos of your building, staff, products or even stock art that represents your product or service? Can you create a graphic with an inspiring quote to post to Facebook, Instagram or Twitter and include your company logo on it? How about adding interaction with an automated slide show?  Authentic website content is not just copy, website content includes images, moving or static, photographic or illustrative.

Make a list of photos you have to use on the website and a wish list of photos that would add relevancy and visual interest.

Now search your harddrive, get out your smart phone or search Google for a local photographer in your area.

Videos / Animations

Google owns YouTube. Need we say more? Post videos on your YouTube, channel and link them to your website. Share them on other social media sites and increase your search result returns. Videos increase your search ranking and get higher page feeds in Facebook’s current algorithm. Create instructional videos, product videos, video tips, video testimonials, compile photos for products or your your office and stream them together in a video app.. There are so many options these days, you don’t have to be a professional videographer – although a professional quality video with good sound and story boarding is always best!

Which type of video will benefit your customers and your business?

Social-Media-Infograph.jpgCustom Infographic Creation:

Everyone loves a well designed infographic! Why? Because they are visual and pack a ton of information in a clear, concise manner. Design some infographics just for fun and see how far they travel in social media when people share them. What industry or local statistics of interest to your customers could be converted to
an infographic? Make sure if you are sharing stats that they are accurate and cite your sources!

Do you have stats for your company or industry stats that are impactful? What types of stats are of interest to your customer?

 
Now you have a lot of ideas for website content to drive searches and answer client questions. No time to develop all of this important content? Connect with us today. We will meet with you to discuss best options for your company website content and develop copy and visuals to increase your credibility and drive  targeted web traffic.
God luck and stay connected!