Spring Clean Your Website Today!

by Kieran on January 4, 2010

Take a long hard look at your existing web site and ask yourself the following 5 questions and implement actions if you are not happy with the answers

Can People Find My Contact Details Quickly?

People go around the internet aggressively these days they are less and less patient and hit tht back button faster than you can imagine.  You may say of course they can I have a contact page.  This is not the right answer – sorry – read on.

You want people to find the information that they are looking for quickly and make contact with you.  Sometimes this  may only be a phone number that they can call you on.  If I were to pick 10 websites at random today and went to them I bet you that it would take you 20-30 seconds to find their contact details.  This is too long.  Don’t hide them in a lower level page called Contact.  It drives me bonkers when I see that this click is needed and if you look at your page stats you will see people probably don’t go there too often.

There is a web term called bounce rate which defines how long people spend on your web page after actually landing on it.  High bounce rate means that they pretty quickly hit the back button.  This may mean they have found what they are looking for but it more often mean they they could not find what they were looking for and just went on to the next site.  Place an e-mail and contact number prominently.  Keep the contact page but have it for more detailed contact information.

What do you want your customers to do?

You may not want to take multiple phone calls so often a simple e-mail contact form or a link to an e-mail will help.

I have never seen someone put in a statement along the lines of ” Please do call my number but due to work pressures I may not always answer straight away. I prefer to get e-mails in place of phone calls but will generally answer your e-mail within 12-24 hours. “. 

No matter what you need some call to action.  If you are having a sale of product or a special offer make sure it stands out and that it makes the person who lands on the page want to act whetehr it be purchase an item or read more and again contact you?

A Map


View Larger Map
It is so simple to have a map to your business.  Do you get a lot of calls asking where your business is?  You can point people to a Google Map that is on your site to help them find you.  Write the step by step directions on the same page and people will appreciate it.  Put a picture of your business in as well or some landmarks along the way so people can print them and understand the location.

Last 5 Questions
Think of the last 5 Questions that people asked you about your product and business and put that information on your site.  I know what the most frequent questions for my business are an I have put this information on my blog.

  • What features do I get for a basic website
  • How much will this cost me
  • How do I get my website on the first page of Google
  • Can you make me a website like www.example.com
  • Can you make some updates to my existing website and how much will it cost?

Do You Know Your Most Popular Pages?

If you don’t know what the most popular pages are on your website then you should be taken outside and shot.  These are the pages that customers are interested in.  you may have written a fascinating biographical article on how you climbed Mount Everest without Oxygen and then started the mountain climbing supplies store, but I bet that people are most probably clicking on the products page.  Sorry send me the link to the article I will definitely read it.

Related posts:

  1. Questions About Website Design
  2. Who Touched My Phone?
  3. How Much Does a Website Cost?
  4. The School of Website Design
  5. Tracking Calls

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