When your website’s not pulling the results you expect, it’s easy to feel like smashing it all and starting over. But hold up — before you light the fuse on that total redesign, let’s figure out if that’s even necessary. Sometimes, a site with solid bones just needs a facelift, not a full-on demo. But if your site’s ancient, doesn’t reel in leads, or makes you want to pull your hair out every time you touch it, you might be better off torching it and building from scratch.
So how do you make sure your next site doesn’t end up as another failure? Let’s break it down.
Light Up a Lead Generation Strategy
If you want results online, you need a lead generation strategy that sizzles. It’s not enough to look pretty. You need a game plan for pulling in visitors and turning them into loyal customers once they’ve landed.
Here’s what a lead-gen strategy should have:
- Create killer content: High-quality content is like throwing more bait into the water. The more you have out there, the more chances people have to find you. And when they do, they’ll see you know your stuff. That’s when they reach out.
- Guide your visitors through your site: Don’t just throw all your content into the nav bar and call it good. Your visitors will land on different pages — a product page, a blog post, your homepage — and they’re going to be looking for different things. Use clear calls to action to nudge them toward what you want them to do next.
- Follow up even if they bounce: Most people aren’t ready to buy the first time they visit your site. Offer them a freebie (like an eBook or cheat sheet) in exchange for their email so you can follow up later. It’s all about staying on their radar until they’re ready to pull the trigger.
Prioritize User Experience (UX) or Go Up in Flames
All the content in the world won’t help if your website is a confusing mess. Don’t get so caught up in the technical stuff that you forget the big picture: if your site isn’t user-friendly, it’s useless.
Here’s how to know if your UX is up to snuff:
- Design: Does your website look sharp and professional, or like a hot mess straight out of 2003?
- Organization: Can your users find what they need without getting lost? Is your navigation intuitive? Can they get the info they need without going down a rabbit hole of endless clicks?
- Contact Info: If someone’s ready to buy, can they easily find how to contact you? Make your phone number or email easy to spot.
- Mobile Experience: Does your site look good on a phone, or does it break and glitch when you shrink it down? Your site needs to be responsive.
- Clear Messaging: Do people instantly know what you do? Don’t make them guess — spell it out clearly on your homepage.
SEO: Set Your Website on the Map
SEO is how you get Google’s attention, and getting found online is the whole point, right? You don’t need to be an SEO guru, but there are a few quick wins that’ll help you out.
Here’s how to spark your SEO:
- Keywords Above the Fold: “Above the fold” is the first part of your site people see before they scroll. Google gives this area more weight, so make sure you’ve got a strong description of what your business does and your main service right there.
- Responsive Design: Google is all about mobile-first, so if your site flows smoothly on any device, you’re golden.
- Unique Meta Descriptions and Titles: Each page should have its own unique meta description and title that includes your top keywords. These are what show up in Google search results, so make them count.
Need Backup?
Sure, we all love the idea of going it alone and saying, “I fixed this myself.” But sometimes a fresh set of eyes is exactly what you need. At Pyromaniac Digital, we’re here to give your site a professional once-over. We’ll point out those blind spots you didn’t even know existed and help you create a site that actually converts.
Follow these tips, and you’ll be on your way to a website that finally delivers the results you deserve. And don’t stop tweaking — the more you refine, the hotter your site’s going to get.
