Imagine a ship stranded on a frozen ocean in the middle of nowhere – interesting image isn't it? Well, this ship is essentially a metaphor for a strong, competitive business that finds itself stranded because their B2B website is failing to generate new customer enquiries!
Your business website is the modern day equivalent of your shop front window: it's how your customers find out about your products and services! For this reason, your website must be informative and fully functional. Some businesses make the mistake of thinking a website just has to be “pretty” and highlight your contact details – but this couldn't be further from the truth! In this article I'll be discussing 7 vital elements your website must include in order to be successful! Let's begin!
Point 1 – Check Your Copy!
Have you ever read something online which doesn't quite read right – or maybe it just doesn't make sense? Have you ever read an entire paragraph and at the end you're left thinking the writer could have summarised their point in two sentences?
Making sure your copy is concise and well-written is absolutely essential. Poor writing skills will only diminish the quality and credibility of your website. This is especially important when you consider the fact that customers will only buy or contact you if they trust the information you are telling them! We recommend asking one or two people to check every inch of your copy (from the main body text, to your picture captions, to your footer / header links) to ensure no minor mistakes slip under the radar!
Point 2 – Visual Appearance
Always remember that first impressions count! When meeting someone in person there is a seven second window where both parties will formulate an opinion of the other person. This concept can also be applied to your website, as people will automatically judge your business' credibility according to how your website looks and performs when navigating through the different pages.
Things to consider:
- Make sure you adhere to a consistent theme throughout. Make sure the type of font you use and the font sizes are consistent – the same applies if you are using bold text or italics for certain keywords
- Your brand colours and logo should also be a consistent theme on all website pages
- Any visuals such as images and videos must look crisp and professional. Furthermore, any visuals you use on the website must be relevant to your content, for example, if your business specialises in outdoor construction, then your images need to reflect your expertise in this industry.
- Visuals doesn't necessarily mean pictures and videos – you may also consider using animation sequences, charts and graphs or infographics to add character to your website.
Point 3 – Functionality
Creating a visually appealing website is the easy part, now you have to make sure that the entire website functions correctly. We recommend you look out for the following things:
- Is your website easy to navigate? By nature humans are impatient - we like to get answers to our questions quickly! As such, your business' most common services and products should be incredibly easy to find to avoid confusion. The best place to have them listed is either in the top navigation bar, as buttons on the homepage, or include a search bar.
- We also recommend checking every hyperlink on your website because there is nothing more frustrating than dead-end links, or clicking on a link which takes you to the wrong area of the website!
Point 4 - Mobile Responsive & Speed Testing
It's simple really – if your website isn't mobile friendly your business will inevitably miss out on countless customer opportunities! Mobile responsiveness is a growing trend in the world of digital marketing, simply because nearly everyone uses the Internet on their phones to quickly find information. If your business page doesn't load correctly and quickly on a mobile device or tablet then your customers are likely going to get bored and click off the page.
For further details check out these article on the importance of mobile responsiveness:
Point 5 – SEO & Meta Information
Meta information is how Google's algorithm ranks the importance of your website. Meta descriptions / tags / titles are basically a small snippet of HTML that shows up in the search engine results when someone types in a sentence or keyword on Google. If your Meta information isn't up-to-date and reflective of what your page is about, then your page won't be found by the keywords you have selected as part of your online campaign.
Incorrect SEO Meta data has the power to render your entire website useless. For further information on Meta descriptions check out this article - How To Write A Great Meta Description To Improve Organic Click-Throughs!
Point 6 – News / Blogs / Testimonials
Have you ever scrolled through a website (or a business' social media profiles) only to find they haven't posted anything in months? If you saw the last time they posted news or a blog was 9 months ago would you be confident that you could leave a review or email and expect to receive a timely reply? The answer is no, probably not. If your website features a news or blog page it's vitally important that the information posted here is updated regularly – otherwise your business looks like a one trick pony that fails to keep up with their content creation.
In addition to this, recent research has shown that the psychological influence of online reviews is rapidly growing. People will buy from sources they know and trust. It's therefore a brilliant idea to ask your customers to write reviews on how you perform, and if the results are positive, then you should post this on your page to help persuade other customers to invest in your business. Check out this article on how to get more online reviews - How To Get Online Reviews To Make Your Business Stand Out From The Crowd!
Point 7 - Call To Action
Another feature you must consider when creating an interactive B2B website is adding frequent Calls-To-Action on multiple pages. This is to encourage your customers to actually contact you either in person, via telephone or through email and actually get the ball rolling!
We also recommend adding links to landing pages with free downloadable content such as ebooks or a newsletter to keep your customers engaged with your business. Check out our article with 4 quick tips to create effective CTAs.
Final Thoughts
Many of the things listed in this checklist are fairly obvious, however each of them are vitally important and they all play a role in how your customers interact with your website. You must combine all of the tips listed above to ensure your website is correctly optimised for lead generation. The JDR Group specialise in B2B website design, if you have any questions please get in touch today for a FREE review of your website to see how we can help boost your conversion rates!
