a comprehensive guide to maximize website impact

A COMPREHENSIVE GUIDE TO

MAXIMIZE WEBSITE IMPACT

http://www.splashmatic.com/

AUTHOR THE

Paul McOwen

Paul is the Director of Digital Innovation at Splashmatic and has more than 12 years of Business Development and Marketing experience. With a hybrid blend of skills in communication, strategy and analysis, he leverages technology to help clients strengthen the online presence of their brands, deliver measurable results and grow their business. In the fast-paced digital world, his insatiable appetite for learning serves him well, allowing him to stay on top of the latest trends in web design, inbound marketing, content strategy, social media, search engine optimization, marketing automation and emerging technology. Paul is a long-time champion of the power of developing and distributing relevant content across a number of digital channels to attract new prospects and engage existing customers.


A COMPREHENSIVE GUIDE TO MAXIMIZE WEBSITE IMPACT

INTRO TRANSFORM YOUR WEBSITE INTO A MARKETING TOOL PAGES 01 – 03

Chapter

01 IS A WEBSITE REDESIGN NECESSARY? PAGES 04 – 08

Chapter

02

PLAN FOR SUCCESS PAGES 09 – 14

Chapter

03

DESIGN FOR IMPACT & CONVERSION PAGES 15 – 22

Chapter

04

APPLY CONTENT STRATEGY PAGES 23 – 30

Chapter

05

OPTIMIZE TO GET FOUND PAGES 31 – 36

Chapter

06

MEASURE SUCCESS PAGES 37 – 42

FIN CONCLUSION & ADDITIONAL RESOURCES PAGES 43 – 45


TRANSFORM YOUR WEBSITE INTO A

MARKETING TOOL

INTRODUCTION: Transform Your Website Into A Marketing Tool

TRANSFORM YOUR WEBSITE INTO A MARKETING TOOL

The rules of marketing and sales have fundamentally

changed, arguably making your company’s website

your most valuable marketing asset.

In the past, people depended on ads, brochures and sales

people for information related to products and services.

Whether Business-to-Business or Business-to-Consumer,

people now flock to search engines and visit websites seeking

information about everything. Needless to say, being found by

people looking for what you do or sell and turning those

website visitors into paying customers is one of today’s top

marketing priorities for any company.

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of consumers use the Internet to find

information on products, services or

companies prior to making a purchase

decision.


INTRODUCTION: Transform Your Website Into A Marketing Tool

YOUR WEBSITE IS THE FACE OF YOUR BUSINESS

Often the first – and sometimes only – impression you’ll make on a potential customer is your website. It’s the front door of your business and it’s always open. In a split second, it conveys something about your brand. It is attracting visitors and making the right first impression? Is it organized and easy to navigate? And, most importantly, does it help you convert visitors into leads and leads into customers?

YOUR WEBSITE IS THE HUB OF YOUR ONLINE MARKETING

All of your marketing activities whether inbound or outbound, point people to your website. So it should be more than just an online brochure. It’s an extension of your company and a virtual member of your sales and business development team.

RE-DESIGNING YOUR WEBSITE FOR MAXIMUM IMPACT

This book will help you understand the important considerations and steps to take when re-designing your company’s website for maximum impact.

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IS A WESITE REDESIGN

NECESSARY?

CHAPTER 01: Is a Website Redesign Necessary

NECESSARY IS A WEBSITE REDESIGN

A website redesign involves investment of time, resources, budget and energy. And, like any marketing investment, it shouldn’t be decided on a whim. What are your marketing objectives and what is the bottom-line impact you are hoping to achieve?

Not aligned with your current business strategy

Your website, as well as all of your marketing efforts, should be in sync with your company’s business strategy. Are your key offerings that are valued most by the market placed front and center? Do you have expertise in specific market segments, and is that evident on your website? Is your site optimized to help you reach your company’s business goals for the next 18-36 months?

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Not a good reflection of your brand Your website should be engaging, pleasing to the eye and putting your brand’s best foot forward. Remember, your website is often a prospect’s first impression. Some questions to consider:

Does it look and feel outdated?

Is it generic or is it memorable?

Does it tell a story about your company and the compelling reasons why someone should do business with you?

Is it copy-heavy? Does it look like a brochure?

Is it appealing with engaging images of your people, your product and your offerings?

Not generating enough traffic The first step in the process of online lead generation is generating more web traffic. The more people that find your website through searches, the more opportunities you have to generate leads and ultimately new business. Google’s algorithms have changed dramatically over the last few years, so everything from code to content can have a dramatic impact on your search rankings and the amount of traffic your website generates.

Difficult to navigate Are your visitors able to find what they need in two clicks or less? Is your menu simple and straightforward or confusing? As the web has evolved, so have people’s expectations for user experience and functionality. Web users today demand a pleasant, efficient experience. If your menu and navigation are based on last decade’s best practices, you’re losing web traffic and sales opportunities.

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Not mobile-friendly Smartphones and tablets are quickly becoming the primary Internet viewing device for many people. If your website doesn’t work well for mobile users, you could be missing out on opportunities.

Uses Flash There was a time when entire websites were built using Flash or had a Flash intro or slideshow—but those days have quietly ended. In fact, Adobe, the company that makes Flash doesn’t even use it on their website. Flash sites are slow to load, bad for SEO, limited on mobile phones and not even viewable on iPhones and iPads. Also, they can be difficult or confusing to navigate.

Not generating or converting enough leads into customers Attracting traffic to your website is only the first step. The next step is to convert visitors into qualified leads through effective strategies that prompt action. Many websites were never designed with a lead generation strategy in mind, but rather an online collection of marketing materials. To be fully optimized for lead generation your site must contain premium content and landing pages that contain compelling calls-to-action, so you can capture leads that ultimately convert to customers.

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of first time visitors are ready to make a purchase at that time. Source: HubSpot What is your site doing for the other 97% of visitors?



Lacks an integrated blog The average company receives 55% more visitors by blogging, which is a great way to provide content, increase traffic and generate leads. If you are blogging, but it is a standalone that is not integrated into your website (companyblogname.com or company.blogger.com), you are not reaping the SEO benefits from traffic and inbound links.

Disappointing web analytics Website analytics are a great way to benchmark the effectiveness of your website—it’s not just page views and visitors with which you should be concerned. Does your website have a high bounce rate? Is the visitors’ average time on site extremely short? Do you have a low average page views per visit? These can all be indicators

that your website and content need refreshing.

If you’ve determined that your company needs a new website, it’s important for you to take the time to thoroughly evaluate, plan and execute your website redesign project. When done correctly you can save valuable time and money. But more importantly, you can realize a positive return on your investment.

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PLAN FOR

SUCCESS

―By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.‖

– Benjamin Franklin

CHAPTER 02: Plan For Success

SUCCESS PLAN FOR

Redesigning a website requires a lot more time and planning than many anticipate, especially to do it right and get results. So commit the time and resources needed to ensure that every aspect of your website is strategically and meticulously planned and executed.

EVALUATE YOUR CURRENT WEBSITE ANALYTICS

Before you even begin to think about redesigning your website, it’s necessary to spend a great deal of time evaluating your current website’s traffic and analytics history. In fact, your analytics should drive many decisions about your website as you move forward.

Some of the metrics you should analyze include:

• Number of leads • Conversion rate • Number of visitors • Pages/Visit • Average time on site • Bounce rate • Most visited pages • Traffic sources • Current SEO rankings for important keywords • In-page analytics/click tracking • Form submissions and downloads (if applicable)

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COMPETITION ASSESS YOUR

You don’t need to be obsessive about your competition, but you should spend some time reviewing their websites. What do you like about their websites? What could you do better or

differently?

SET SPECIFIC GOALS FOR THE WEBSITE

Your website serves a purpose – to attract prospects and drive new business. Part of your goal setting should involve incorporating effective lead generation components throughout your website and putting conversion goals in place.

Here are few questions to consider:

What does success look like? What problems or issues are you trying to fix with a new site? What do you want visitors to know about the company? What do you want visitors to do when they visit the site? How can you attract visitors and convert them into leads? What can the website do to help shorten the sales cycle?

ACCURATE BUDGET ESTABLISH AN

Making sure the website that you want to buy and the website that you can afford are aligned is a critical part of the planning process. No one wants to find out late in the process that their website project is way beyond the budget available. To help prevent this, compile a list of all the pages, features and any other important aspects that you want your website to have BEFORE requesting a proposal from an agency or web development company.

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INTEGRATION POINTS IDENTIFY

In the process of planning your redesign, it’s important for both you and your web development partner to be aware of and plan for all the applications (i.e. analytics tools, databases, other websites, etc.) that need to be integrated with your new website. Integrations can have an impact on both design and development. Some of the more common website integrations

include:

• CRM systems (e.g. Salesforce) • HR/recruiting systems (e.g. Bullhorn) • ERP systems (e.g. Netsuite) • Project management softwares (e.g. Sharepoint) • Email marketing services (e.g. Mailchimp) • Marketing automation softwares (e.g. Act-On) • Customer service platforms (e.g. Zendesk) • Billing/online bill pay • Company intranets

• Client portals

CONSIDER ADDING MARKETING AUTOMATION

You can get more from your website by investing in marketing automation software. A good automation platform, such as Act-On or HubSpot, will enhance your website with valuable tools like visitor tracking, landing pages, lead capture forms, lead management, conversion optimization, advanced analytics and much more. Knowing upfront that you’re integrating marketing automation with your new website would be highly beneficial when planning the redesign.

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WEBSITE’S ASSETS INVENTORY YOUR

Based on a close examination of your current website analytics, you will uncover valuable assets that should be incorporated into your redesign. These assets are the page, blog posts and content that are driving traffic and contributing to your search engine rankings. So before you start from scratch, be sure to secure valuable assets and transfer them to your new website

before launch. (See Chapter 5)

CHOOSE THE RIGHT WEB DEVELOPMENT PARTNER

Who you select can have a tremendous impact (positive or negative) not only on your redesign project, but also on the success of your online marketing efforts. Because your website is a marketing tool, it’s important to choose a web development partner that understands marketing. Strategy, branding, messaging, content marketing, lead generation and online marketing savvy are boxes to check off in your evaluation. Remember, your website should be the hub of an online marketing strategy designed to attract visitors, generate leads and drive growth.

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15 QUESTIONS TO ASK A POTENTIAL WEB DEVELOPMENT PARTNER

Do you have marketing expertise? What is the full breadth of your capabilities? Have you worked on any projects similar to mine? Do you have any experience in my industry? How do you measure results? How will my website be optimized for organic search? Do you adhere to web standards and best practices? How will you optimize my site for mobile users? Do you test for multi-browser and cross-platform compatibility? How long will the project take? What will I need to provide and how involved will I need to be? What are the project deliverables and what does the scope NOT include? Can you support a long-term relationship? Can you work within my budget? How do you price your services?

.

A solid plan can ensure you get the website you want in the time frame and budget parameters you define.

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DESIGN FOR IMPACT & CONVERSION

―The design of the site is the first test of its credibility.‖

– Beau Brendler

CHAPTER 03: Design for Impact and Conversion

GREAT DESIGN THE VALUE OF

Successful websites have a balance of intuitive navigation and beautiful, engaging design. Web design and development (programming) are two unique skill sets – make sure the

partner you choose is skilled in both.

FIRST IMPRESSION MAKE A GOOD

Having an aesthetically pleasing website design will not only make a positive first impression, but it will also help your company look more credible. Your website is the face of your business and represents who you are and what you offer. When people land on your website for the first time, in a few brief seconds, they will decide:

Is this company credible and trustworthy?

Is this someone I want to do business with?

Does this website make me feel welcome?

SIMPLE KEEP THINGS

Having a clean and easy-to-navigate website is critical. It should be as effortless as humanly possible for your visitors to find what they are looking for. Less is more. Organize your content in “buckets” to avoid clutter and confusion. Also, avoid any unnecessary features such as complex animations, background music or auto-play videos. These can be distracting for the visitor and make them leave the site quickly. Studies show, more than anything else, website visitors value simplicity when it comes to design.

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WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR IN THE DESIGN OF A WEBSITE?

56% The website makes it easy for me to find what I want.

22% The website offers a cutting-edge interactive experience.

18% The website has a beautiful appearance.

5% Other

READABILITY FORMAT FOR

Make your website easy on the eyes. Choose fonts that are easy to read and make sure the font size and color are suitable for your audience. It’s always helpful to break up your paragraphs with headings and subheadings and use lists and

graphics to make the copy easier to read and more engaging.

―What separates design from art is that design is meant to be functional.‖

– Cameron Moll

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MOBILE IN MIND DESIGN WITH

Smartphones and tablets are quickly becoming the primary way people use the Internet, and as people spend more time on mobile devices, your website has to be mobile-friendly. Some companies are solving the multi-screen dilemma by creating mobile versions of their websites. This has two major downsides: maintaining two sites is twice the work, and it’s not SEO-friendly to split your traffic this way. The best solution to the multi-screen, multi-device problem (in most cases) is to build a responsive website that works equally well on nearly any device. Responsive design is now recommended by Google, and has lost its status as a novelty item on the website wish list. If you don’t want to invest in the additional cost, at least make sure your new website will show well on mobile devices

or develop a simplified standalone mobile site.

RESPONSIVE WEB DESIGN? WHAT IS

In simple terms, responsive websites respond to their environment or device with the most appropriate view. They use “media queries” to figure out the screen size of the device on which the website’s content is being displayed. Flexible images, fluid grids and the site navigation are automatically adjusted to fit the screen. If you view the website on a device with a smaller browser window, the design changes; different parts are shifted to make it easier to view on a smaller screen. As Mashable puts it, “You build a website once, and it works seamlessly across thousands of different screens.”

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COST MORE?DO RESPONSIVE WEBSITES

The nature of responsive design necessitates additional planning, design, development and testing to ensure that the user experience is consistent and optimized on every device. For this reason, responsive-designed websites generally have a higher price tag (around 35 – 45% more) than non-responsive ones. However, keep in mind that having a responsive website replaces the need to build and maintain a separate, standalone mobile site.

“MUST HAVE” DESIGN ELEMENTS LEAD GENERATIONFOR

A company’s website should serve a purpose: driving traffic, generating leads and converting leads into customers, but it takes more than simply having a website. Here are several key components your web development partner should review with you to get results.

―People don’t buy what you do; but why you do it.‖ — Simon Sinek

ENGAGING HOMEPAGE WITH UPFRONT VALUE PROPOSITION Remember, visitors are only going to give you a few brief seconds before they form an impression of your company and decide if they will stay or leave your site. It’s important to create an engaging homepage that clearly states your core

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value proposition in a way that grabs their attention and compels them to visit other sections of your website.

Here are some other important elements to consider including:

• Compelling Headline – Who You Are • Sub Headline – What You Do/Sell • Features – Details About What You Do/Sell • Benefits – Why It Matters • Eye-catching Visuals (graphics, photos, video) • Calls-to-Action (Learn More, Request a Quote) • Customer Proof (quotes and testimonials) • Content Offers (eBooks, webinars, demos)

• Social Media/Blog Feed

INTUITIVE NAVIGATION Make your website as intuitive and easy to use as possible. If people are confused or overwhelmed when they come to your site, they will probably leave. Make sure the sitemap is logical. Link pages to other internal pages to help further guide visitors to important information. Here are some important navigation factors to consider:

• Keep your primary navigation near the top of the page. • Include basic navigation in the footer of your site. • Don’t use Flash for your navigation. • Don’t offer too many navigation options on a page. • Don’t complicate secondary menus. • Include a search box so visitors can search by keywords. • Include internal links to other relevant pages on your

website.

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IMPACTFUL GRAPHICS Graphics can make a big impact on the look and feel of a website, but they can also lead to higher conversion rates. Avoid generic, clichéd images, and, when possible, use photos of actual employees, clients and locations. Illustrations, infographics and icons are also popular on sites today.

MULTIPLE FORMS OF CONTACT Contact information such as phone and email should be visible and accessible on every page of your site. Your website should provide at least 2 different ways to contact your company.

INTEGRATED BLOG

Blogs are a great way to provide content, increase traffic and generate leads. They should be integrated into your overall website design and menu. You should also provide a feed of

your latest blog posts on your homepage or even in the footer.

CALLS-TO-ACTION A call-to-action button or link should be on almost every page of your website to guide visitors. Do you want them to download a whitepaper? Subscribe to your blog? Call you for more information? Register for a webinar or event? View a case study? A clearly defined path will lead to more conversions.

LANDING PAGES Landing pages are an essential component of content marketing and lead generation. Creating landing pages for each campaign or premium content offer allows you to more effectively convert website visitors into leads by simplifying the offer process and eliminating distractions. And the design of your landing pages is key to converting those visitors into your

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next potential customers. When visitors land on your page, you want them to be able to quickly understand your offer and how it will be valuable to them.

SOCIAL MEDIA INTEGRATION Providing social share buttons makes it easy for your visitors to share information and content about your company with people they know.

SIGN-UP / SUBSCRIBE Your website and blog should include a simple subscribe form to capture “fans” that you’ve engaged with your content. Be sure to promote subscribing to your blog and signing up for your newsletter using intentionally placed calls-to-action.

VIDEO Video is a great way to bring some interactivity to your website and engage visitors. Create a brief, compelling video that explains who you are and what you do, but also why you do it. Instead of just publishing case studies, try creating video case studies telling a story of success using client testimonials. Motion graphic videos are also a creative way to communicate your value proposition.

Great design is about much more than just having a great looking website. It creates a positive user experience that also affects usability, navigation, engagement and conversion.

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APPLY CONTENT STRATEGY

CHAPTER 04: Apply Content Strategy

Content is the magnet of your website and a key tool in helping to reach your company’s business and marketing objectives. A content strategy will guide your plans for the what, where and when of content creation. Your content strategy should include the following considerations:

IDENTIFY YOUR UNIQUE VALUE PROPOSITION

Use your unique value proposition as a basis for your website content. You need to answer your prospects’ question of whether your company is a good fit for them and their needs.

CONTENT AUDIT CONDUCT A

Before you invest in creating new content, you’ll need to first examine what you currently have in place, review it for quality and analyze it for usefulness. Content audits are also helpful to see how well you are covering the topics that are most important to your target audience and identify gaps that need to be filled with new content. Then create a list of new content needs, recommendations for repurposing existing content and

guidelines for moving forward in the future.

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DEVELOP CONTENT AROUND BUYER PERSONAS

Personas are a way to define your audience by their interests, concerns, questions, motivations, problems, needs and pain points. Build pages and sections that speak to your personas, or

offer premium content that is relevant to them.

MAP CONTENT TO THE CUSTOMER LIFECYCLE

It’s important to create the right type of content for every stage of the lifecycle by considering your buyer personas and identifying the key information needed for each stage:

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WEB COPYWRITE COMPELLING

Take the time to create copy that informs, educates and guides your audience. The length of your copy should be determined by the purpose of the page and your overall message, but a minimum of 300 words is a good rule of thumb. Statistics, research and quotes are effective ways to add substance to your copy.

THOROUGHLYPROOFREAD

Nothing can derail compelling copy and make a bad first impression like misspellings or punctuation errors.

ESSENTIALSINCLUDE THE

Remember, people use the Internet to conduct research and discover information, so be sure to use your website content as an opportunity to educate prospects about your company, your process and your products or services. Some of the content essentials to include in your website are:

• Company Blog • Premium Content • Service/Product Information • Case Studies and Testimonials • Portfolio/Product Gallery • Compelling “About” Page • Your People/Team • Your Process

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BLOGCOMPANY

Blogging is one of the cornerstones of content marketing and should be a focal point of your online marketing and website strategy. By providing valuable, relevant content, your blog attracts prospects and starts a relationship with them. Blogging gives you something to talk about online and promote on your social media channels, and it provides you the best forum to create keyword-rich content and lots of it. Each blog post increases your chances of being found online through search engines, ultimately driving more traffic to your website.

The average company that blogs has:

55% more visitors

97% more inbound links(important for SEO)

434% more indexed pages

(important for SEO)

The ROI of blogging:

43%of companies who blog have

acquired customers from their blog.

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CONTENTPREMIUM

Premium content such as whitepapers, eBooks and webinars are effective for helping to turn visitors into leads, while providing them with valuable information. Premium content should be featured on custom landing pages with lead capture forms and promoted in multiple places on your website and blog using engaging calls-to-action.

INFORMATIONSERVICE / PRODUCT

Your services or products pages are an opportunity to sell the “what” of your company and provide as much information about your products and/or services that a prospect might need. But don’t overwhelm them with too much content; instead, consider organizing them into categorized sections or pages and offer a fact sheet for download if they want to know more information than you have provided.

TESTIMONIALS CASE STUDIES AND

Case studies and client testimonials are a great way to demonstrate your company’s results and show your worth. If you can provide specific numbers, such as a percentage of increase in sales or ROI, this would be even more valuable.

GALLERY PORTFOLIO / PRODUCT

If you work in an industry where your work is visual, such as construction, cosmetic surgery or photography, showing examples of the work you have performed is going to provide additional proof to prospects. If you’re a products company,

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you should invest a great deal of effort making sure that your products are shown in a visually compelling way.

“ABOUT” PAGE COMPELLING

Your “about” page is often one of the most visited pages of a website, especially for service and B2B companies. It’s a critical piece of content for the consideration and evaluation phases of the buying cycle. This is your opportunity to tell your story, history and culture and explain how you’re different. In addition to telling the who of your business, this is also an opportunity to talk about the why. Why do you do what you do? Sharing what makes your company so passionate about what you do can be a real differentiator.

PEOPLE / TEAMYOUR

Prospects want to know who they would be working with, so it’s important for them to see the names and faces that represent your company and learn more about each person’s skills, experience and unique qualities. Showing your people is also a great way to show more of your brand personality and culture by putting more emphasis on the people that make up your organization.

PROCESSYOUR

Prospects that are seriously considering your company want to dig deeper than the who, what and why of your business, they are also interested in the how. This could be your project approach, your customer service process or your on-boarding

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process. People want to know how you do what you do and what it will be like to become your customer or client.

CREATE AN ONGOING CONTENT STRATEGY

Keep your website fresh and relevant with a defined strategy for creating new content moving forward. The goal is to continue to look for additional ways to achieve your marketing goals and meet the needs of your audience with new content.

Content that attracts prospects, generates leads and engages customers is persona-based and customer-centric.

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OPTIMIZE TO

GET FOUND

―Optimize your website for people, not search engines.‖

CHAPTER 05: Optimize to Get Found

REMARKABLE CONTENTCREATE

In the past, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) was a very technical exercise—focused on essentially finding ways to manipulate or take advantage of search engine algorithms, putting the focus on robots, not on people. But search engines have evolved, and Google’s latest search algorithm (Hummingbird) continues to place the emphasis on the end user and providing the searcher with the best and most relevant results (content) possible.

So today, the real key to SEO is focusing your resources on creating remarkable content that people find useful and will want to share with others. It will ultimately help you earn search engine visibility, while also building a relationship with your audience and helping to achieve your marketing goals.

―A lot of SEO has been focused on technical matters and very highly specific ways to configure your website and stuff like that. There are best practices, and you need to make sure you get the basics right, but it is true that a lot of SEO is now circling back around to good old fashioned marketing.‖

— Matt Cutts, Google Webspam Team Head

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EMPLOY TECHNICAL SEO BEST PRACTICES

What good is a great website and remarkable content if no one can find it? Failing to optimize your redesigned website using technical best practices can have a disastrous effect on your marketing. So be sure you and your agency have a good grasp of SEO best practices to ensure that your website and all the quality content it contains gets found online by prospects.

Inventory Existing Pages Your existing website contains a lot of pages with keywords and inbound links that have built up over time. Deleting or changing those during a redesign project can damage your search results and online marketing efforts. Be sure to stick with the same naming convention, or set up 301 redirects.

Set up 301 Redirects Nothing can be worse than for a prospect to click on a link in a search result only to land on a “404 message” or “Page Not Found.” This will happen if you don’t create a permanent 301 Redirect that automatically redirects visitors from your old URL to your new one. For example, if you get rid of or change the file name of a page that has a high number of inbound links and fail to put a 301 redirect in place, you could lose a lot of SEO credit and website traffic.

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Optimize Each Page for Search On-page SEO is a critical component of your overall SEO efforts and consists of placing the most important targeted keywords within the elements of your actual website pages. Pick one main keyword or search phrase for each page of your website and make sure that the URL, page title, meta description, header tags and images are optimized with those keywords and include them several times in your copy. But be careful not to over-saturate the page—remember, you are writing copy for people first, and search engines second, so never use keywords more than necessary.

ON-PAGE SEO CHECKLIST

• SEO-friendly URLs • Accurate and descriptive title tags • Unique meta descriptions for each page • Keywords in H1 & H2 tags (Headers & Subheaders) • Target keyword focus in copy • Optimized ALT tags and image file names • Internal links with optimized anchor text • Social media sharing

ADDITIONAL TECHNICAL CONSIDERATIONS TO ASK YOUR WEB DEVELOPMENT PARTNER ABOUT:

• Setting up canonical URLs • Sitemap.xml and Robots.txt files • Minimizing website loading time • Using clean and validated code • Setting up Google Authorship/Publisher • Breadcrumbs

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EARN ATTENTION AND GROW YOUR REACH

―Don’t build links. Build relationships.‖

— Rand Fishkin, Founder & CEO of Moz

Building inbound links has always been a focal point of traditional SEO practices to help build credibility and increase a website’s search ranking. But Google’s recent Penguin update cracked down on external links since people were manipulating the system by having a large number of external links from poor quality websites to drive up their rankings. Now, quality is better than quantity. It’s best to earn backlinks from reputable websites to derive SEO value from Google.

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In order to optimize your SEO, you need to build relationships with other quality websites to obtain and encourage the creation of links to your site. Earning attention and getting inbound links can be accomplished in several ways:

• Creating high-quality, informative and valuable content that: • People want to read, share, comment on and link to • Online media outlets will want to link to and cite • Influencers and thought leaders will want to share, link to and cite

• Distributing and promoting your content on social media • Guest blogging/authoring on reputable sites • Searching for mentions of your brand and asking to be linked

when it’s warranted

Don’t ever use Black Hat SEO Tactics Black Hat SEO tactics use keyword stuffing, link schemes and other techniques that are designed to benefit the website in pursuit of higher search rankings rather than users. Black Hat not only won’t work, but search engines will also penalize you. Google’s release of its Penguin web spam algorithm continues to target Black Hat web spam aggressively.

Putting your audience first by creating quality content will not only improve search engine visibility, but it will also help you achieve your online marketing goals.

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MEASURE SUCCESS

―If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.‖

-Peter Drucker

CHAPTER 06: Measure Success

What good is a website if you can’t measure its success? Analytical tools allow you to track activity in real-time, using the key performance indicators (KPIs) and dashboard of metrics you established during the planning phase. Understanding what works and what doesn’t and being able to make changes as you go along will have a dramatic impact on the success of your online marketing program.

SET UP WEBSITE ANALYTICS

It is important to incorporate an analytics solution into your website to be able to track the number of visits and other important metrics for better insight into its performance. Google Analytics is a tracking tool that many companies use because it is free, easy to set up and gives you tons of information about visitors.

USE ADVANCED WEBSITE VISITOR TRACKING

While Google Analytics and other standard website analytics tools primarily focus on web traffic reports, website visitor tracking focuses on the actual unique visitors. Marketing automation tools such as Act-On, Hubspot, Marketo and others can generate real-time visitor intelligence from individual leads visiting your website. Marketing and sales will know exactly who is visiting your site and what brought them there.

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MONITOR AND MEASURE WHAT MATTERS

In order to get the most from analytics tools, and to truly measure the effectiveness of your website, you have to understand what you are looking at and know what to measure in the first place. Here are some of the primary metrics to keep an eye on:

VISITORS: KNOW WHO IS VISITING YOUR SITE

Companies visiting – This is a list of companies whose employees have visited your website. By using an unknown visitor’s IP address, website visitor tracking can usually provide the name of the organization that owns it. It’s helpful to identify potential prospects and targets for your sales team.

People visiting – Once unknown visitors are identified by submitting a form, you’ll see who is visiting your website, what company they’re from, what pages they’re reviewing and how they got there.

Unique visitors – The number of unduplicated visitors to your website (each person only counted once). Look for an upward trend over time and see if any spike in visitors correlates with a particular campaign or marketing effort.

Average visit duration – The average length of time a visitor spends on your website within a specified period of time. This is a key metric for measuring the effectiveness and quality of your website. Obviously, the longer a visitor spends on your website, the more informative and interactive your site is.

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Pages per visit – The average number of pages viewed during one visit. Normally, the more pages a visitor views, the more interested they are in your company or product.

Bounce rate – This is the percentage of single-page visits, usually people who visit your homepage and then leave the site quickly. A high bounce rate generally indicates that your page(s) are not relevant to what visitors are looking for. You want this number to be as low as possible, but if you have an integrated blog that generates a lot of organic traffic, your bounce rate is likely to be higher.

% New visits – This is the percentage of visitors that have not previously visited your website. Typically you would want a balance of returning and new visitors to show both outreach and engagement.

TRAFFIC SOURCES: SEE WHERE VISITORS ARE COMING FROM

Direct traffic – Visitors that came directly to your site by typing your company website’s URL into their browser’s address bar. Direct traffic indicates how many visitors already know your company and URL.

Organic traffic – Visitors that came to your website from natural (or unpaid) search engine results.

Search terms – Tells you which search terms people used to find your website. Google is no longer providing this data.

Referral traffic – Visitors that came to your website through a link on another website, such as Facebook or LinkedIn.

Referral sites – Know where your website traffic came from and measure the success of guest blog posts, inbound links or online press releases.

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Social media referrals – Shows the impact your social media activity has had on your website traffic by identifying the networks and content that generate the most engagement and activity.

Inbound links – A hyperlink on a third-party website that points to a particular page on your website. Inbound links are important for SEO and should be measured.

CONTENT: KNOW WHICH WEB PAGES INTEREST YOUR VISITORS

Knowing the top 5 to 10 pages on your website that are being viewed is very important. Is your team page visited often? If so, you’ll want to make sure your team bios are up to date. Are there any pages that should be in the top 5 but aren’t (e.g., pricing, contact, resources, etc.)? Maybe you need to change the link structure on your website to direct visitors where you want or develop new and improved content to replace what you currently have. Keep track of your landing pages and content downloads as well.

CONVERSIONS: GO BEYOND PAGE VIEWS AND VISITOR COUNTS

It’s critically important to know whether or not your online marketing efforts are working by setting specific lead generation goals for your website and measuring the success of those goals. Conversion metrics allow you to go beyond the basic visitor metrics by:

• Tracking how many visitors are converted to leads • Measuring how effective your landing pages are at keeping

track of the visitor-to-lead conversion rate (Conversion rate = conversions/views)

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• Learning what content led to conversions • Setting up conversion goals and measuring important visitor

activities • Knowing how many leads converted to sales

Metrics are essential part of measuring the success of your website. Every aspect of your website should be constantly analyzed, measured and tweaked to maximize traffic and lead generation.

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CONCLUSION &

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

FIN: Conclusion & Additional Resources

RIGOROUSLY TEST BEFORE LAUNCH

New websites need to be tested extensively—there are many browsers and versions, as well as multiple devices, and each supports code differently. Keep in mind that responsive websites, websites with complex databases or portals, e-commerce websites and websites using third party integrations all require more testing than a typical website. But no implementation is perfect, so it’s important to work out the kinks and bugs and test every single link, integration, device, browser and form before the website goes live. It is better to catch glitches yourself rather than your clients or prospects.

“REDESIGN” DON’T WAIT FOR THE NEXT TO MAKE IMPROVEMENTS

Your website is a living, breathing, active, lead generating machine. You can’t have a “launch it and forget it” attitude—there is always room for improvements or additions. We recommend the mentality of iterative design, which looks at your website on an ongoing basis, continually looking for ways to refine and improve it as you go along. Your marketing budget should include ongoing improvements each year for your website.

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