Your Company’s Website Strategy Part 1
It’s difficult to break through the misconception held by many advertising agencies and their clients: That the function of a company’s website should be to reinforce “the brand”. This is an important goal but for most firms it is less important than gaining a following and increasing sales. If your brand is a household word, building brand buzz may be the best tactic.
Most companies don’t have that luxury and they are hoping for some way to beat the competition and get sales. Unfortunately, conventional wisdom fails to see the website as a powerful tool for accomplishing these goals. Actually it is. Over the space of the next few blogs, I’ll explain how this strategy works and some ways to implement it. Let’s start with the fundamentals.
A Call To Action
Contrary to what many web marketers say, getting a list of followers is not your first move. Your first move should be to decide what you want visors who land on your site to do. If you say you want them to pick up the phone and call you, chances are you won’t get too far. The reason? That’s what a business card or a billboard is for. A website is for engaging the customer. It takes action for them to click on your site in the first place. If you want your site to be more than just an online business card you need to know what you want, and ask the visitor to start moving toward your desired response. Notice I said “moving toward”.
The fact is, web visitors are more jumpy than humming birds. If they don’t find something to do immediately, they are gone. And anything can scare them away. But the NUMBER ONE REASON for leaving your site, is that you seem to be wasting their time, telling them over and over how great you are. Your visitors always want something. Sometimes they don’t know what it is. It’s your job to offer them something that’s attractive. Hence, the free service or download you find on so many sites. Smart web strategists know they have to make an offer, and a free offer that promises value is the best kind. Why, because people expect it. That’s the way things work on the internet.
Why Give Something Away, For Free?
That’s no way to make money, right? Before my wife got hip to how the net works, she used to ask me,”How does anybody make money that way?” My answer is that some companies don’t. But if you do it right, you gain trust, and loyalty and leads that translate into profit. So let’s get a little more specific here before we end this first installment.
How It Works
- Before you design or redesign your company’s website decide what you want visitors to do when they get there.
- Know your customer well enough so that what you’re asking them to do will be relatively painless and provide a reward.
- Understand that this “call to act”; sometimes called a “call to action”, is the first step in building a relationship with this client.
- Because you’re building a relationship, it is absolutely critical that you provide an incentive that is valuable and that your delivery and service is impeccable. Every future aspect of your relationship is built on the integrity of this first interaction.
- In a typical case, you visit my site, I offer you an e-book on a topic you value in return for you name and email address. The e-book I offer you is well written and useful and contains an invitation to subscribe to my newsletter or podcast. You will either subscribe or move on, depending on your satisfaction with my free gift.
- Out of this simple interaction, a relationship is born –– one that will lead to more interactions and ultimately sales. This is the dating stage. The customer and I have agreed to go for coffee. Whether we have a date for the dance requires more offers and an evolving conversation.
- Many web consultants call this the top of the “sales funnel” and we will discuss that in more detail in my next installment.
Stay tuned and let me know what you think.
