When Was the Last Time You Read Your Own Website?

Here’s a problem: your content may be outdated and doesn’t say the right things anymore. Before creating new content, take a step back to identify your brand, audiences, and goals. Companies change – who are you now? What are your audiences are looking for (hint – they’re looking to have their challenges met, not to “buy a product or service”). And finally, what results you want from the website?

Does Your Website’s Content Represent Your Brand?

Start with the home page. You offer high quality products or services. Images should be high quality and not tiny. They shouldn’t look like stock images either. Ideally, they help tell your message and work with the copy, not repeat it. Copy should be direct, on-brand, and on-message. Headlines can further your message in a branded way. A contact page that says “How can we help you?” says more than one that just says “Contact” on top. When all of your copy is written, consider looking at the tone of it. Decide if you want to be super-friendly, or quick and factual. Do you want to offer advice and teach with it, or keep it short and brief?

Who Are You Talking To?

With very little effort, you can identify the main audiences who are looking at your home page, and other pages of your site. If you can give the customer what they want, without making them look around for it, you’ll convert faster. So how do you talk to specific types of customers on the home page where everyone is going?  With content funnels. Keep your high-level messaging brief and to the point, but have areas of the home page that attract specific groups of people and compel them to click into that sub-page. You can address more specific pain points on those pages to aid in a quicker conversion. Keeping in mind a customer’s journey map, you can determine if they are ready to buy or still doing research. Do they have a need that desperately needs a solution or are they looking for a longer-term solution?

What Are Your Website’s Goals?

At this point, you understand your audience’s needs, and you have figured out how to position your product or services as the obvious solution to them. Now merge that with your goals and create the headlines and calls-to-action. For example, if they need their research lab to run more efficiently, your headline could be “Our product does the work so you can do more.” vs. “About our product.” CTAs should be leading, like “Learn how we can save you money” vs “Learn more”. Don’r forget the secondary goals if they’re not ready to buy right now. Those include lead-capture forms in front of gated resources, watching a product demo video, or just signing up for your e-newsletter “to be informed of our newest and latest offerings!”

At this point, you can take a look at your current content and see what you can re-use. Let your needs and your customer’s needs drive the content. This creates a customized targeted approach that will keep prospects on your site longer, gives them a positive brand experience, and compels them to make that final purchasing decision.