| < back to index Top Tips: simple things you can do to improve your website.
Welcome to the first in a series of advice articles from Stafford Website Company aimed at helping you make the most of your online presence. Hopefully you will find them useful and they will inspire you to make the most out of your business website...
1. Welcome message
This message needs to work hard for you; it is likely to be the first thing your visitor reads and it is the one sentence that Google really sits up and pays attention to as well.
Rather than 'Welcome to our website’- which tells your visitor & Google nothing - how about writing 'Stafford’s online marketing specialist'(for example). As the old saying goes, first impressions count!
2. Check your navigation
If visitors to your website can’t find the information they’re looking for quickly and easily they’re likely to go elsewhere. Take a step back and look carefully at your navigation - can customers really find the page they want easily? Does your website have any broken links?
3. Check your page titles
There may only be room for a few words, but do they give an accurate depiction of the page in question?
Our next email will go into more detail on the use of the page title and its relevance to your Google ranking.
4. Internal links
These are a great way of directing visitors around your site, so consider whether you can add any extra internal links to your pages. A common method is to repeat your navigation at the foot of each page; this is especially useful if your main navigation is image based.
5. Check your content
What do you want your website to say?
Does your existing web copy get this across cleanly while encouraging visitors to take the next step?
A review is especially important if your company’s ethos or product offering has changed since your website was first developed.
6. Are you consistent?
Your website is the ‘online shop window’ for your business, and professional presentation is essential. Take time to check that the page styles, writing styles and the words used in your site are consistent.
7. Are you making the most of social media to communicate with your customers?
Twitter and Facebook are free and easy to do once your accounts are set up - they can even be linked together so you only have to update your status once. Check out our presence on Twitter and Facebook.
If you’ve got an active community of customers, blogs and forums are also good ways to get topical discussions started which can help raise your online profiles – but you need to be prepared to commit the time to keeping them up-to-date and managed.
8. Monitor your website statistics to pick up trends
Your website statistics tell you how many visitors you’ve had, which pages they have viewed and how they found your site. They also tell you which pages visitors aren't visiting – all invaluable information for deciding how to improve your website.
We will be sending out an email all about website statistics and how to use them later in this series - so watch this space!
9. Check for broken links
Over time page names can change and external links can become outdated. Use a link checker such as this one to check your sites' links http://linkchecker.submitexpress.com
10. Benchmark your site against that of your competitors
With forethought and regular updating your website will be one your competitors will watch. Either way, keeping abreast with changes on your competitors’ websites will give you inspiration and help you keep one step ahead.
If you would like to discuss any of these topics please email penny; for more tips, ideas and news from our office follow us on Twitter or join us on Facebook!
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For further information on the range of website design and development and online marketing services provided by the Stafford Website Company, browse this site or call 01902 851 933.
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