Is your website losing you business?

14 October 2020

It’s a question often overlooked by many website owners. If your website doesn’t generate much business – or even worse, generates no business – it’s easy to slip into the mindset that your website isn’t an important sales tool.

But what about those prospects who visit your site, then decide NOT to do business with you or those prospects who don’t even find your site and instead use a competitor? In this case, your site isn’t working for you. It’s working against you.

This article is the second in our series of Brand Bites. Short reads with a high impact to get the grey matter working. Through this series, we aim to give you some insight into how branding should be helping – and certainly not hindering – your business growth as well as asking some thought-provoking questions to ask of yourself and of your business. Check out the previous article in this series: Could your brand be costing you money?

Back to the question asked in the headline… There are many reasons why your website may be losing you business. Here are the common causes we spot on the websites we review.

• Your business has changed. Your website doesn’t reflect who you are now, it reflects who you were when it was launched. It’s like using a photo from 10 years ago on a dating site profile – not likely to get the results you’re looking for!
• Your site doesn’t communicate what you do. This might sound simple, but you would be surprised to know the amount of sites we see which leave us none the wiser as to what the business actually does. Get to the point quickly and communicate the benefits you provide to your customers.
• Your site doesn’t make a connection. A collection of images and text isn’t enough, it needs to resonate with your audience. If it doesn’t, you’re just one click away from being a distant memory and losing out on business to a competitor.
• Your competitors have a better website. When did you last visit your competitors’ websites? With most buying journeys starting online, it’s now more important than ever that your online presence is surpassing or, at least, keeping up with the competition.
• Can people actually find your site? Open a private browsing window and Google what you do, adding your location to the search phrase. If your site doesn’t appear close to the top of the first page, you are missing out on A LOT of business. Put simply, potential customers searching for what you sell aren’t reaching your site.
• How easy is it for people to contact you? Different people engage in different ways. Some like to call, some prefer filling in a form and others will email. Is it easy for your site visitors to contact you? Is your number clearly displayed at all times, on all pages? Is there a compelling call to action – ‘call to get a quote’, ‘book a table’, ‘email to book your visit’? Whatever action you want someone to take, spell it out to them!

This is just the tip of the iceberg – we’ve stumbled across many, many other obstacles to success when reviewing an existing website. Our processes ensure that these issues (and a full checklist of others) are addressed at the planning stage of all our sites, making sure no tricks are missed.

What now?

Becoming aware that your site could be costing you money is the first step. The next step is to work out the best way to rectify this, maybe even by hiring a digital agency or a service that can offer the best ideas to enhance your web profit. But our advice to you is that you don’t try to work this out for yourself. It’s vital that you get input from the professionals, and that’s where we come in.

If you think your website could be losing money, we’d love to help, please call 020 8662 6030, email us or request a quote.