Evaluate your website with these six questions
July 7, 2020 | By Kelly Hulin
Your website is the first impression you make with customers. Fundamental to all of your marketing efforts, your website is the foundation that enables you to build a strong relationship and ongoing communication with them. Following are six questions to think about when evaluating your website.
- Is your site fast enough?
You have 10 seconds to leave an impression and tell customers what they’ll get out of your website and company. Your site’s loading time is one of the most important factors in ensuring you make that first impression a good one. Forty-seven percent of consumers expect a web page to load in two seconds or fewer.* Many consumers simply move on to another site if your site is too slow.
- Are you optimized across platforms?
The customer experience should be equal across all platforms. Consumers expect to be able to find the same information from your site whether using a desktop, tablet or mobile. Worldwide, over 50% of site traffic is from mobile devices (excluding tablets). Review your site on each platform through your consumer’s eyes to determine if all your key information is easily accessible.
- Are key navigation elements always accessible?
Think of the thumb! Having a mobile-ready format is no longer sufficient when trying to operate a successful website. Now, your website must be mobile effective. Key information regarding your business needs to be readily available, easy to find and easy to interact with. The following information should remain anchored at the top of your page at all times:
- Call to action items always visible
- Active phone dialer
- Active forms
- Active maps/location finder
- Are you optimized?
Search engine optimization is an ongoing effort and builds over time. By optimizing your site, your company’s website will appear higher in search results, driving more customers to your place of business. Google accounts for many different factors in determining how your site ranks. At a minimum, regularly evaluate the following for your site:
- Perform keyword research on your best products and services. Make sure you are optimized for these terms. One caution, make sure this is an authentic evaluation. Keyword stuffing can negatively impact your search presence.
- Insert relevant keywords on title pages and throughout content. Optimize the home page and all interior pages.
- Keep your site map current.
- Make sure you have an SSL certificate.
- Does your site support customer communication and e-commerce efforts?
Businesses have different forms of communicating with their customers. From basic elements such as chat functionality or online reservation capabilities, to full e-commerce, these tools are more and more important for every type of business. Make sure your site is able to handle your growing customer communication and e-commerce needs. Examine your site through the eyes of your customer. Does it easily move customers from leads through conversions? This becomes more important as transactions continue to move online.
- Can you quickly and easily make changes?
Having the ability to communicate with your customers quickly and easily is very important. Customers rely on your website to provide up-to-date information on products and services, hours of operation and safety precautions. You should have the ability to make changes to your site when needed without having to incur unnecessary fees or a long lead time.
Put your best foot forward with an updated and professional website. Free site analysis is provided by Seattle Time Media Solutions. Contact your account representative for more information.
Source: Blue Corona, 2018
Kelly Hulin is a Sales Director for Seattle Times Media Solutions, representing The Seattle Times, seattletimes.com and Seattle Times Media Solutions, our in-house digital agency. She can be contacted at khulin@seattletimes.com
