It all starts with your website. Before you start planning any site traffic generation, there are a few things you should really take action on first if you want a success right out of the gate. That’s about custom tailoring your website and making it as good as it can possibly be.
Points to consider:
#1. Choose The Right Platform
Everything that you’re about to do will rest on this. Everything from improving looks to functionality and user interface will be based on the platform you’re using.
WordPress is overwhelmingly the most popular platform for user-friendly administration and authoring of content. With as many good looking themes, plugins, and a really easy-to-use backend, if you’re comparing this to other platforms it tends to stands alone.
Other platforms available for the build could include a personal favorite, Laravel, or Magento. You might also consider going with a packaged hosting solution like SquareSpace, Wix or Weebly.
Of course, the extent to which you can improve the overall look and feel of the website is dependent upon the required level of expertise for the platform to install and maintain it.
Alternately, you might benefit more from a quick online search for web development experts who can administer your website on either an hourly or fixed rate basis for maintenance and updates.
#2. Define Your Website’s Goal.
What’s your website about? Are you trying convert visitors to customers for your own product or service, or is it strictly informational, educational, or for a non-profit? Some common website goals include:
- Email Opt-in
- Webform Submissions Online
- Sales with Revenue
- Phone Call from Website
- Calls from Ads
- Offline Sales
If your intended purpose includes trying to entice someone to perform an action, turn visitors into subscribers, or create repeat visitors, the ultimate goal is to attract visitors. You want to keep this in mind when you’re designing the front and back end of your website, content marketing strategy and sales funnel setup .
#3. Define Your Sales Funnel
When you are attempting to turn visitors into paying customers, there are multiple avenues to consider when it comes time to monetize.
You might want a series of upsells and downsells so the visitor has many options to purchase on your website. Or, maybe you are selling ad space. Either way, you will need a professional, fast loading site to better optimize conversion rates.
The sales sequence should include everything from great headlines, to well thought out content using the right fonts, to high-quality images and placing trust symbols where needed.
#4. Set Up The Framework To Create Future Sales
One of the most popular themes and plugins out there has been made specifically for WordPress and it’s called OptimizePress. It’s a tool that helps you with marketing site creation, and easily allows you to find cutting edge ways to create high conversion landers, sales pages, and membership sites. They include templates that you can use to build highly professional and slick looking pages.
There’s also LeadPages – another great all-around service with just about every sales page template you can think of. What’s great is they’re already proven converters in terms of design.
Using such services you’ll be a step ahead of the game when spending money on testing as well as tracking profitable campaigns.
#5. Focus on Your Design
This is one of the areas you’ll likely need to spend some of your initial budget. That is unless you have fine-tuned your own design skills.
The more professional the better. Also, remember you get what you pay for so if you’re looking for the best deal, note the average industry standards so you know what to expect in terms of quality.
#6. Use the Right Tools For Your Platform
As mentioned, there are plenty of platforms with customized solutions, so research is very important. Sometimes you’ll want to reverse engineer your site purpose to figure out the best tools and resources for building the website in advance.
For a full list of tools that will help you expand from here, check out the following infographic which charts out 42 great online marketing and
You might also come across many third-party apps designed specifically for use with landing pages, squeeze pages, or long-form sales pages … but just a few extra tool tips to keep in mind.
- Make sure you’re paying a monthly subscription only when necessary. Determine your needs and at what point during the site’s development they might be needed.
- You may find that paying a ‘lifetime’ cost is worth it for the savings… if you know you will be using the tool often. It also helps to test out demos in your local environment first. This way you can test for bugs or anything unexpected without effect the sites when they go live.
- Often times a free trial period serves the above purpose, so prepare your other steps in advance so that no time is wasted once you begin the trial.
- If you do end up purchasing … then make sure to look for the money-back guarantee before your purchase in the event something goes wrong.
#7. Make The Finishing Touches
Before going live, here are a few ways to ensure a leading edge. The idea is that your website should project an air of authority, trust, and professionalism.
Try to cover all the bases listed below, though you’re probably in a hurry to get the site up at this point. It’s alright if you don’t get to everything. You can continue tweaking later.
- Pick the right colors. Carefully chosen colors will have complementary appeal. Amateur looking sites will turn off potential customers with contrasting, mismatched colors.
- Images need to be of the highest quality possible and make sure they’re sized correctly and preferably hosted on a Content Delivery Network (CDN).
- If you’re using Wordpress, then WP Smush It is highly recommended for compressing and optimizing existing and new images you add to your site.
- Check for grammar, punctuation, and flow of your overall web copy. Was it professionally written? Is a reader able to skim the headings as they read down the page … or is it one big wall of text? Makes a difference. After this, flip the switch – you’re ready to roll!
Webmasters often spend a great deal of time and money getting traffic to a website, so let’s make your efforts count. Don’t be one of those marketers who fail to correct for conversion and bounce rates. This will ultimately be dependent on your user experience and web design.
Image: Traffic generation key on a computer keyboard for increasing website visitors
