Learn six ways to improve website content and boost website conversions, grow your email list, make new sales, and increase your bottom line.
Once a visitor reaches your website, your job is to keep them on the site as long as possible, help them progress in their buyer journey, and encourage them to take action. Content that is optimized for conversion delivers value, builds trust, and gets visitors to take action faster.
When evaluating your website content, there are six main opportunities to make small changes that result in big increases in conversions.
1. Clear Value Proposition
Consumers today are constantly bombarded with sales messages, marketing campaigns, and in-your-face calls to action, and with social media, multiple screens, and normal everyday distractions it can be very difficult to capture and hold their attention.
When someone visits your website, you only have a few seconds to grab their attention. The easiest way to do that is with a crystal clear unique value proposition. An effective unique value proposition communicates the benefits of your offer, tells the visitors why your offer is the best, and answers the question they care most about: “What’s in it for me?” It differentiates you from your competitors while hooking ideal fit clients, customers, and subscribers and piquing their curiosity.
TAKE ACTION: Review your primary website entry points. Is your value proposition displayed? If it is, is it easy to find, obvious, and clear? If it’s missing, add it.
2. Get To The Point
When creating website content, always put the audience first and consider what they are interested in, what they want, and what information they need at each stage of the buyer journey. Remember, they are distracted and in a hurry, so get to the point quickly and clearly.
To engage your visitors right away, begin with the most important content — the most interesting and attention-grabbing information. Then follow it up with, supporting content like facts, benefits, features, samples, and testimonials.
TAKE ACTION: Review the sales pages, landing pages, and web pages that are part of your sales funnels. Do you get to the point quickly and communicate the most critical information at the top of the page? Are there opportunities to improve the content?
3. Jargon-Free Language
Using complex words or shopping the thesaurus to sound smarter isn’t going to impress your audience. Instead aim to write at a seventh or eighth-grade reading level. This will ensure your content is easy to read, easy to understand, and easy to connect with.
With that said, there is one time it is acceptable to use jargon on your website and in sales and marketing content: Industry-specific, trade-specific, and niche websites can use common jargon and abbreviations to connect deeper with their audience, making visitors who understand the terms feel like they’re in the know. Jargon can be a sign to other professionals that you understand the industry and have a specific level of expertise or that they are in the right place.
TAKE ACTION: Read through all website content associated with your sales funnels and marketing campaigns and eliminate or explain any jargon used.
4. Strong Headlines
David Ogilvy famously said, “Five times as many people read the headline as they read the body copy.” In today’s technology-dominated world, headline skimming is more prevalent than ever and links are shared across social media based solely on the headline. Writing powerful, attention-getting headlines is more important than ever. The headline is your opportunity to make a first impression, garner attention, establish a connection, and earn a click or a share.
All headlines need to address one of the most basic human interests:
- To be entertained
- To be informed
- To be part of a community
- To solve a problem
If you want people to click your link in a search engine results page list, or leave Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Instagram to visit your website or ecommerce store, your headlines need to be about your audience not about you.
When writing headlines:
- Use numbers: Headlines with numbers perform better than those without.
- Ask a question: Question headlines earn almost five times the number of clicks non-question headlines do.
- Communicate a threat or risk: This style headline plays into the natural need humans have to protect themselves and their loved ones.
- Make it time sensitive: A time sensitive headline gets readers to take immediate action.
- Use social proof: This headline shows other people are already experiencing the results you’re looking for.
Just make sure to avoid click-bait headlines or misleading headlines, as headlines that trick people into clicking tend to make people angry and resentful.
TAKE ACTION: Set aside time to revise and/or refine your headlines to make them more powerful, compelling, and attention-getting.
5. Benefits Over Features
Yes, consumers need to know about the features of a product, but it’s even more important to communicate the benefits the product will deliver. Why? Consider this:
- Do you get excited to read the owner’s manual for anything you buy? Doubt it.
- Do you always read the instructions for assemble-it-yourself toys or furniture? Rarely.
Consumer buying decisions are based on emotions (the heart) and justified by logic (the brain). This means that buying decisions are made based on the perceived benefits and justified by the features.
When leading with benefits, ask yourself, will it:
- Save them time or money?
- Make things faster or easier?
- Create more opportunities or grow a business?
- Make them feel smarter, more confident, or position them as an expert?
- Provide more freedom or eliminate fear?
- Eliminate frustration or reduce stress?
When you only market with features, you’re making your audience do all the work to figure out how it will benefit and help them. When your prospects have to work at making a buying decision, your conversions will be fairly low. Your customers, clients, and prospects want an easy, no-brainer buying process. They want you to do all the work for them and show them the answer to their biggest question, “What’s in it for me?”
E-Commerce Product Descriptions:
A product description is the marketing copy displayed on the product page that explains what a product is and why someone should buy it — the idea is to provide visitors the benefits and features in a compelling way so they decide to make a purchase.
Well written, descriptive product descriptions matter. Provide a short and a long description for each product available in your store:
- A simple, benefit-focused summary for the scanner or window shopper that communicates who the product is for, the value the product delivers, and the benefits a shopper will experience if they make a purchase.
- A longer, information-focused description for those serious about buying with specific details, features, and answers to common questions.
The most effective product descriptions speak to your ideal buyer directly and personally, so think about what you would say if you were selling your product to someone in person.
TAKE ACTION: Review your product descriptions, sales pages, opt-in pages, and landing pages. Are you leading with emotional benefits to connect with your audience’s heart and following up with features that speak to their logical brain? Are you crafting product descriptions that are tailored to your ideal customer?
6. Publish New Content
Blogging and publishing new, valuable content is the fastest way to expand your online real estate and build brand equity you can tap into later for more sales and more money.
- Every time a new blog post is published, a new searchable URL is added to your website.
- Publishing a new blog post just once each week for a year, will add 52 new indexable, searchable URLs to your website. Twice a week will add 104, and three times will add 156. Increasing your publishing cadence will add that many more opportunities for a potential customer or client to find you online in a single year.
The bottom line is that publishing new blog posts on a regular and consistent basis keeps your brand in front of your audience, keeps your brand top of mind, and provides your audience, search engines, and social media new reasons to send traffic to your website.
TAKE ACTION: Review your blog. Are you publishing regularly? Do you have a set schedule? Is your content valuable and helpful?
