As you look ahead to 2017, now’s the time to take stock of your website and make it work better for you. After all, it’s always better to work smarter not harder. But, if this is the first time you’ve assessed your website, it may be that you don’t know what is needed to make it stand out. The following 7 actions are a great place to begin.
1. Be Graphic – There is more to a website than pictures and words. Sure, these are vital to any website, but don’t be afraid to use features such as video where you can quickly and easily communicate your points and offerings. Better yet, once the video is created, you can also use it on sites such as Vimeo or YouTube and increase your reach even more!
2. Be Visual – Tools such as Google Maps and Street View can be used to help visitors interact with what you have to say about your products or services. You can use them to customize the look and feel of site maps so that they work with your brand.
3. Be Informative – One of the latest elements in use today is the infographic. These informative visuals allow you to share data, do comparison/contrast, make statistics easier to understand, and much more. Better yet, you do not have to be an artist or graphic designer to use an infograph. Check out tools such as Visual.ly, Pictochart and Infogr.am which make it simple to create and share your company’s data.
4. Be Active – You know about social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and others, but what are you doing with them? Make time to build a following and engage with your followers by sharing posts that are informative, educational, and entertaining. Be sure to have social share buttons on your website, so that guests can show off their purchase or let others know when they read a blog post they connect with.
5. Be Inviting – Ask others in your field to write blog posts for you. This not only opens more time in your schedule, but it often brings new readers to your site. Just be sure that guest’s blog post do not contain spammy links, and is original, high-quality writing.
6. Be Responsive – Today’s consumers now accesses the Web through more than just the laptop. Now, we surf the Web via tablets, smartphones and more. Be sure that your website is responsive (i.e. mobile device friendly) so that guests are able to keep up with you, regardless of how they look you up.
7. Be Fast –The average consumer will not wait more than 10 seconds for a website to load. Be certain that your site loads quickly, else your bounce rate will be much higher than you would ever wish. To ensure a quick load time, pay attention to the size of graphics, sound files, and the functionality of third-party plugins. Using a service like https://www.hostiserver.com/ will help you manage your website by offering CDN which will help with boosting your servers performance and speed on your website, therefore a better experience for your customers. If your website still fails to load quickly and consistently, you may wish to look at performance testing services in order to identify the issue and rectify it as quickly as possible, to ensure you’re not losing customers due to a poorly optimized site or application. Companies like Apica Systems that provide these testing solutions are in abundance, so you’ll be able to find the service that’s correct for your IT systems requirements with a little online research.
These seven tips are a great way to rock your website in 2017 and beyond. Take a few minutes now to make it work better and more efficiently next year. After all, when your website rocks, more people want to visit you and your business will grow. If you have questions about your website, give the team at Alpine Communications a call today. We would love to be a part of your success.