Web design should be part of your digital marketing strategy
Marketing has changed a lot in the last ten years. Billboards are now old news and come second to digital ads. Websites, once a nice-to-have, are now a must-have. And any old website will not suffice.
As digital marketing has risen to be front and centre, businesses and marketers have become obsessed with measuring effective campaigns.
Ten years ago, you could put up a billboard, and if you saw an uptick in sales, you could quite literally make up an attribution story.
Maybe you sold more because of the billboard. Or perhaps it was because of the weather or the economy.
Today, marketers rely on analytics, heat maps, and snippets of tracking code to understand how their marketing efforts drive business growth. Much like marketing has moved away from billboards, it is continuing to shift and change once again.
With the emergence of a cookieless web, NFTs, and Web3 marketing will only continue to evolve.
More than ever before, a holistic marketing experience is required
When creating a website today, you want to think about your marketing strategy. You want to consider your target market and how you will drive sales.
Ten years ago, you were likely under the impression you could put a website online with a little info about your business, and that would be that. Today, digital transformation is about much more. It requires looking at your website as your most powerful marketing tool.
Every element of your website, including paragraphs, headings, and buttons (calls to action), should be thought about carefully. Your website today is a place to earn trust, build credibility and resonate with your audience.
When creating a web page, you'll first want to consider:
1) What is the goal of this page?
2) How might people find this page?
3) What action do I want people to take on this page?
Considering these elements, you can see the relationship between web design and digital marketing.
As we move towards a cookieless web, it is increasingly important to think about how you will drive quality traffic to your website.
You are not just adding a product or writing a paragraph about your services. You are very carefully considering your keywords, the length of your page (will this experience work well on mobile?), the channels through which your audience will find you, and so forth.
To learn more about conversion-focused web design, visit this article.
Creating a holistic marketing experience means removing friction
As discussed above, you want to consider the purpose of every page on your website. If you have several services, make sure to map out how people will find them.
It will be increasingly important to empathize with your audience, build community and create quality content if you want to win in a saturated and competitive environment. If you are unclear on who exactly your audience is, get started with this guide.
Let's say you have four services at your business. How will people learn about them? If you answered “my website, take it a step further. Perhaps your second answer was “a google search.”
If your industry is competitive, the likelihood of arriving on page 1 of Google may be slim to none.
Is a google search still your answer?
Perhaps your next answer is “a Google ad.” Take a moment to think about a website page with four services clumped together with a few sentences about each. With many businesses, each service can vary slightly in its target audience. Now imagine owning a bakery and sending people who are only interested in "birthday cake", to a page about scones, muffins, organic coffee, and so on.
Digital marketing and web design need to consider how to create the simplest experience for potential customers
Continuing with our birthday cake example, how might that page be improved? And what keywords would you bid on for people to effectively arrive on your website?
You will likely want to create a page that is specifically about birthday cakes. From there you want to demonstrate why you are the best choice for birthday cakes. Maybe you offer free delivery, vegan options, or have received awards for your icing skills.
You can find a how-to guide along with worksheets for communicating your benefits here.
Birthday cake specific web page
You can see how someone landing on the web page above would have a much clearer path to conversion than someone who arrived on a homepage that had an assortment of baked goods, drip coffee and so on.
Adding certain landing page elements, such as your value and benefits (as discussed above) and social proof, can help move the potential customer from consideration to purchase.
Adding social proof, for example, can also help to build trust and credibility and encourage potential customers to purchase from you. For more information on landing page best practices, visit this article.
Creating a cohesive marketing experience
A huge part of creating a holistic experience is by using cohesive visual identity and messaging across all marketing channels. For example, if you are driving people from Instagram to a cake-related landing page, you’ll want to use the same visuals, colour palette, fonts, and key messaging in both ecosystems.
If you are driving traffic using google search campaigns, you’ll want to have the same, or similar copy in both the ads and landing pages. If your copy and creative differ too much from the ad creative and copy in your marketing channels, potential customers will likely be confused and more likely to leave the page. This article from dribbbe provides a great breakdown on creating a visual identity.
The worksheets below illustrate the properties of an effective landing page.
For more information on using landing pages and google ads to drive traffic to your website, this is a good place to start.
landing page worksheet
landing page example
Effective digital marketing and web design is about continually iterating to improve every touchpoint
Digital marketing and web design require continuous effort and iteration. While you are in the weeds optimizing every touchpoint, you also don’t want to lose sight of your larger marketing goals and overall strategy. You don’t have to pick one tactic and stick with it.
The digital landscape is continually changing. While you may use paid channels such as Instagram, and Google Ads to drive traffic to landing pages with a narrow focus (like birthday cake delivery), you also want to consider other tactics. For example, you may find that the cost of acquisition through paid channels isn’t sustainable and eating into your margins for each product.
If you are feeling unclear as to where you should put your energy and effort when it comes to marketing, a digital marketing SWOT is a good place to start. By conducting a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats), you may learn you don't rank well in search engines and that you have an excellent following on LinkedIn or TikTok that you can capitalize on while you slowly grow your organic search ranking. To access a free worksheet for conducting your own digital marketing SWOT, visit this article.
Expanding your marketing mix to include new tactics and technologies
As marketers, entrepreneurs and business founders strive to connect with their audience in an increasingly noisy landscape, they will be looking for innovative and creative ways to connect with their audience and build community.
More recently I wrote an article outlining the use of “collectibles “in 90’s era marketing and dug a bit deeper into the emergence of NFTs and the future of marketing. What I find most fascinating is how NFTs are being tied alongside tangible products to provide some sort of exclusivity. From startups to major brands like Gucci, NFTs are making a big appearance.
Even if you haven’t seen everyday applications of NFTs in marketing, Web3 and NFT enthusiasm very much come with an aesthetic that is influencing web design trends in 2022.
While NFTs may not be on the horizon for your brand, it is important to consider the way marketing is evolving and how that will play into a holistic experience.
