Lead generation with your website might be a whole new concept to you, especially if you’re a new business owner. The first step of a good lead-generation website is to get that new visitor to feel comfortable enough to stay and read your first message or click that video play button. That’s your foot in the door. If you’re old enough to remember the door-to-door salesman who came knocking at your front door to sell you a vacuum cleaner then you’ll remember that, if your parents allowed him to set foot inside, that was it: the sale was made. Your parents become the owners of a new vacuum cleaner. The same concept applies to a lead generation website: get your foot in the door so you can start establishing trust and credibility. Read more of our blog post: Website Design for Lead Generation – Get Your Foot In the Door.
If you’re not getting any new clients from your website then these three scenarios are probably causing that:
- People simply aren’t finding your website, which means your site was never made Search-friendly to begin with. You need to hire a reputable Search Optimization expert – one who has a long track record of actual page-one rankings in Google and Bing for several hundred or several thousand search results for a wide variety of clients – and also knows the world of social media marketing. Nowadays, you can’t have effective SEO without combining it with strategic social networking.
- If you ARE getting a good number of website visitors every day (you know this because you’re consistently reviewing your web metrics) and they are landing on your site but leaving without exploring or taking any action, then they are suffering from an uncomfortable feeling while in your website. Sort of like Eddie Murphy’s character, Donkey, in the movie “Shrek”: “Hey, man, this don’t feel right. My donkey senses are tingling all over.” Don’t let your new visitors’ donkey senses tingle. One major thing people look for now are those social plugin icons. If you don’t have any visible on your homepage, that means you aren’t doing any social networking. And if you’re not doing any social networking, people will wonder “why not?” and make assumptions about your character. They’ll think “What has he got to hide? Why isn’t she sharing herself in conversations in the Twittersphere? Why can’t I find a LinkedIn profile for this person?”
- Another thing that could be causing your website visitors to leave your site (if they find it in Google) is that you don’t have a photo of you on the homepage. To make your visitor feel comfortable enough to stay, and thus, get one step closer to converting into a lead, be sure to place your picture (or a video with your image as a still-shot) in the upper fold of your homepage.
This is really going to blow your mind: a recent eye-tracking study by Missouri S & T proved that your new website visitors spend only two tenths of ONE SECOND to form an impression of your site and 2.6 seconds for their eyes to focus in on something on your web page that will influence them to stay or go. How can you possibly keep someone in your website with that tiny amount of time? Make sure your website is TRUST-worthy.
Converting visitors into clients is a subtle art involving psychology, content and design
You’re trying to attract clients to stay in your website and take action such as subscribing to your eZine or purchase products from your site and/or call you or fill out your contact form. The design part of your website project is the really fun part, right? But hold on there….before we talk about design, be sure you define who your customers are and what their biggest challenges are. Without clearly knowing their problems, how can you begin to talk about solutions? Save yourself some time and go read this post I wrote called “Do You Know Who Your Personas Are” to get a good understanding of how important this is. In fact, don’t bother designing a new homepage until you’ve done your homework on defining your client avatar, also known as a persona.
Your client’s problems are opportunities for YOU to solve them with your services
After you have a list of your client’s typical problems, you can then write what YOUR solutions to their problems are. Example: let’s say you’re the owner of a skin care company. Your ideal clients are mostly women, probably 40-60 years old, with an annual income of $75,000 or more, who want to look younger, have dramatically better looking skin and are ready to invest a good amount of money into whatever line of products they find are trustworthy. (Though we’re using a skin care company as an example, you could apply this to practically any company because what we’re really talking about here is getting people to trust you enough to spend money on your products and services).
The obvious elements to include on your homepage, besides your logo in the upper left corner and social plugins for visitors see how you come across and interact with people in Twitter, Facebook, etc., are before and after photos of real women and men whose skin has been dramatically improved, thanks to your products and services.
If you have an image in the top half of your homepage, such as a slideshow image, be sure that it’s carefully chosen. The eye-tracking study mentioned “You must choose your main picture very carefully… An inappropriate image can lead to an unfavorable response from viewers.”
Social Plugins, Testimonials and a Blog Establish Credibility With Your Website Visitors
What other “clues” can you give your new website visitor when they land in your site so they’ll think to themselves: “Hmmmm…..maybe this is the right company for me”? Writing a weekly blog post is another way to establish credibility and allow potential clients to see just how smart you are about your subject matter. Writing a weekly or monthly eZine is another way to establish credibility. Your list subscribers are your hottest group of potential clients because they’ve actually signed up to receive your knowledge on a regular basis. Eventually, some of these fans will actually hire you or buy your products because you’ve proven to them, over and over, that you are TRUST-worthy and knowledgeable about what you do. Always include testimonials with first and last names and links to their websites. Even better, are video testimonials from excited clients who talk about you and your services in a passionate, down-to-earth way.
Here’s how to turn your website into a lead-generation website
Apply all of my advice I’ve just shared with you but be sure you also do this: capture that new visitor’s email address. That new visitor has just begun to get smitten with you. Not quite a full-blown Social Crush yet but maybe they’ll give you a chance. THAT is what you need. Just one chance. Your foot in the door. Once they’ve given you permission to send them your valuable information – the kind of information that will help them in some way – then you’re in. Give them that valuable information, not just one time but again and again and again. Prove you are TRUST-worthy to your list subscribers (especially them) and, eventually, many of them will get to the point of investing in products and services you offer for purchase. That’s how people are attracting clients and keeping them. That’s part of how you can have a lead-generation website. If you’re an entrepreneur or business professional and you’re not doing any of this, then you are probably struggling to get clients and feeling frustrated. Am I right? Stop the frustration. Start growing your business. Make your website work for you, not against you.
