What to do if you’re not sure your website is working for you

Do any of these scenarios feel familiar?

• Your website has been around for a few years and you think its time for a refresh
• You’re not sure how your website stacks up against the competition
• Your website isn’t generating leads or sales
• You’re being charged for work on the website or SEO and not convinced you’re getting value for money
• You’re embarrassed about the state of your website and think it may be putting off potential clients
• You think it’s time for an update, but are not sure what to prioritise or where to start

If any of the above rings true, you’re in good company – the majority of people who come to us wanting a new website fit in one or more of these categories. So how do you move forward? It all depends on which area you fit into, so we’ll go through each one-by-one in the following post.

You could also get a free website review, and we’ll give you our top 5 recommendations based on your website and your goals. Even better, it only takes 5 minutes to fill in the form, so it’s a quick way to get a second opinion on where to focus your attention.

Your website has been around for a few years and you think it’s time for a refresh

It can be difficult to know where to begin with this because rather than having a defined business objective, you may just be experiencing a general feeling of dissatisfaction with your website.  A good place to start is by thinking about what are you hoping to achieve with a refresh.  Do you feel the website no longer reflects the brand for your company and this has a knock-on effect on leads and sales? Is the information simply out of date and its just a case of a factual update? It’s a lot easier to move forward with a website update and measure success if you have a clearer idea of what you really want to achieve, so get clear on this first.

You’re not sure how your website stacks up against the competition

Who are your competition? What are they doing well?

It’s useful to know how rivals are showing in search engines for the keywords that you’d like to rank well for too, but it’s hard to do this without specialist skills and software. However, this is something that we can do for you – just give us an idea of the keywords you think that your ideal clients will be using and we’ll do the rest.

Your website isn’t generating leads or sales

This is often about the user journey for someone visiting your website. Have you tried using your website as if you’re a brand new visitor with a specific objective in mind? Do this for all of the different types of customers you have and you may well find some interesting barriers. It can also be helpful to set the same task to a friend who has no prior knowledge of the website to see how they find your online user experience.

If you have tracking software like Google Analytics you can get some really helpful data on where people are leaving your site (exit pages), how your site search is being used and where your conversions are coming from. However, this is only possible if you have your goals set up. We’ve got a great step by step guide on getting the most from Google Analytics in this blog post.

You’re being charged for work on the website or SEO and not convinced you’re getting value for money

Finding out the answer to this really is as simple as filling out a quick form for us as we carry out your free website review. We’ll give you the information you need to go back to your supplier in order to make an informed decision about the necessary next steps to take.

You’re embarrassed by the state of your website

‘Website shame’ is.the.worst – and it usually happens when you keep running out of time or budget, or you have goals that feel too big to achieve, so you never get started. We work with a lot of clients to build their website in phases, so they’re happy that their website represents them. Then, as they begin to build momentum we work on the next priorities in stages. As a first step, it’s useful to prioritise what you want to achieve with your update. Remember, you don’t have to do it all at once.

You think it’s time for an update, but are not sure what to prioritise or where to start

In this situation, we’d suggest by starting with a marketing review. This is because a website can often feel like it represents all of the marketing for a company, so unless objectives are aligned with your business goals, it’s hard to plan an update that positively impacts your business. Claim your free marketing review here.