Maximizing Conversions: Designing a Squarespace Website with Results in Mind
Your website is a powerful marketing tool
More than ever before, web design and digital marketing are intertwined. Your website is one of your most powerful marketing tools. When building or optimizing your website, you'll want to consider your website goals, visitor needs, how people will find you, and how you will drive traffic.
Effective digital marketing and web design remove friction. Whether you are ready to revise your current website or are considering building a new one, a key focus should be creating a website that meets visitor needs and business goals.
What are your Squarespace website goals?
There are a lot of excellent website builder options out there that provide beautiful, mobile-friendly templates.
While there is a lot to love, even the best templates can't guarantee "out of the box" success.
A great website finds the intersection between user needs and business goals. Before you set out to build a webpage or rework your current one, you'll want to consider the phrases someone might use to find you, the purpose of the page, the value of the content, and the action you want someone to take.
Conversion focused Squarespace design
What is a conversion? Simply put, a conversion is when someone completes a desired action - this could be subscribing to a newsletter, purchasing a product, filling out a form, or contacting you via email/phone.
Conversion-focused web design requires you to think carefully about your goals, how people will arrive on your website, and the actions you want them to take. It is important to think about your website's user experience and how you will illustrate that you are the best product to meet their needs.
Here are seven website practices that can help drive conversion for your small business:
1) Make sure your website is mobile-friendly
This sounds like a given, but it can't be stressed enough. A good chunk of website traffic will come from mobile, and your website needs to be designed to provide a solid mobile user experience. A poor mobile experience can hurt you in search rankings and will prohibit website visitors from taking desired actions.
2) Clearly define & communicate your value proposition & services
People should understand what your business offers within the blink of an eye. You have a tiny window of time to convey what you do and why someone should consider doing business with you. Visual design aside, a great way to do this is through an informative headline. This headline should be both clear and concise. Nailing your value proposition and communicating your core services is a great place to start (we will cover that in later chapters).
3) Create valuable content
Google is focusing on the individual making a search query. They want to help them solve their problem as quickly and accurately as possible.
Your company's lengthy and long-winded history may feel necessary to us, but is it valuable to someone trying to solve a problem or decide if we can assist them? People can often fall into the trap of creating a lot of thin content - content with little value. Take a moment to consider your potential customers and how you can expand on and improve your content to provide valuable information. Would they benefit from something like a video tutorial, infographic, or detailed blog post?
Next up, you need to optimize your content.
For more on content strategy and planning, visit this how-to guide.
4) Use headings to organize your content
Headings can help improve user experience - people skim content, and headings allow them to find the information they are trying to access more efficiently. Additionally, heading tags can provide some hierarchical information to Google around the importance of your website content.
Using headings doesn't simply mean creating bold titles. Headings tags (h1, h2, h3, and so on) help Google spiders better understand your page's purpose. It is important to note headings should be used to improve user experience and not as a black hat SEO technique.
For more on how to make your website visible in search engines, visit this article.
5) Write clearly, research keywords, & avoid jargon
Often we know so much about a topic or subject that we write for other experts. If your customer base is other experts, this makes a lot of sense. If they aren't, it can leave you and potential clients feeling lost.
When people make a search query, they may not have the technical vocabulary to explain your precise service. Ensure the words you use to describe your services are something a prospective client would use to make a search query. In doing so, you are more likely to show up in search engines, and secondly, you can provide a better user experience.
To learn how to communicate your product and establish your value proposition, visit this article.
6) Embrace landing pages
Landing pages are action-oriented pages with a single goal. Often websites can get bloated with a lot of information. Landing pages help create a clear path to conversion. Rather than trying to solve a bunch of problems, they guide the website visitor to one solution.
Landing pages pair well with paid ad campaigns because they allow you to create a singular focus, remove distraction, and are more likely to meet a website visitor's expectations. When a web page is more tightly linked to a visitor's search intent, your chance of conversion (form fill, quote request, telephone call) is higher.
7) Consider the look & feel of your website
While this is last, it is certainly not least. You only have a limited amount of time to make a great first impression on a potential customer. You’ve no doubt put a great deal of care and consideration into your business product and services.
Your website is part of your brand ethos, and it deserves that same attention. It is often the first point of contact a potential client or customer will have with your brand, and you'll want to take this opportunity to shine. Potential clients and customers need to see you as a trusted and competent service provider. A key way to help convey that message is through a modern and well-designed website.
Related Web Design Articles
