Top 5 Best Practices of Successful Websites
What is a High-Converting Website?
A website that successfully converts achieves its desired goals, like generating leads or making a purchase.
While there are many things that contribute to the success of a website, these are the top 5 elements I have seen throughout my years as a designer and developer!
A Clear Value Proposition
How do you provide value for your customers?
They desire a specific result from what you offer, now it’s your website’s job to help you communicate that. The more effectively you do this, the more successful you will be in achieving your website’s goals.
For example… instead of having a headline that says “Services” write a headline that showcases the solution you offer. Like “Double Your Sales with Our Proven Marketing Strategies”.
Focused CTAs
One thing I have seen happen with a lot clients before I work with them is a lack of clarity on their website goals.
Maybe this sounds familiar to you…They spend so much time and effort on their marketing and content creation, and then lose out of potential sales because their website isn’t optimized or clear.
Without a clear call to action on each page, your website is just a place that takes up space on the internet. This is important! Before building your website, write down each of your website’s goals.
This could be:
generating leads and building your email list
Selling your products
Booking a service
Increase membership enrollments
Scheduling appointments
Or a combination of these.
When you are clear on what your goals are for your website, it can do so much heavy lifting for you in completing your customer’s journey.
Social Proof
With AI everywhere and a never-ending supply of scams circling the internet, it’s hard for people to take information at face value.
The number one thing that helps customers make an informed purchase is seeing that others had a positive experience before them.
Make sure that you collect reviews from previous customers on products or services they purchased.
More than that? Make sure that you provide the best experience you possibly can. At the end of the day, the best way to have a successful business with integrity is to focus on what you are giving rather than what you will get.
Do that, and your business and bank account will be rewarded.
Intentional UX/UI with a Clear Navigation
Does the design of your website follow intuitive behavior? Are customers guided through the experience in a way that makes sense?
A helpful way to make sure your website is intuitive, is to take yourself through your own user journey. Do you end up where you expect to?
You can also have a friend help you by going through your website. Do they get confused? Or do they find everything they are looking for with ease?
Having a fresh set of eyes on your work never hurts!
Technical Optimization
Fast Load Times
To achieve this, you’ll want to be sure your images are optimized (e.g. the file size isn’t too big), you only have necessary plugins, and your website isn’t bogged down with too much JavaScript.
If your website has a slow load time, you could be looking at an increased bounce rate.
Here’s how you can test your website’s speed:
In Chrome, right click the web page you want to test
Select “Inspect”
Click the “ >> ” icon at the top of the inspector tool until you see “Lighthouse”. Click on it
Then select “Analyze page load”
Once you run the report, Chrome will provide feedback on your website’s performance and how you can make improvements
Check Your Links
Before you launch your website, double-check that all links are going to the correct destination and work seamlessly. If visitors are led astray to incorrect pages, or to pages that don’t even work at all, your conversion rate will take a hit. Beyond that, the trust you have worked to build will be impacted.
Today, people are used to receiving information quickly and easily, and with the resources we have at our fingertips, there’s really no reason why customers should be dealing with slow load times or broken links.
An easy way to do this is to use a link checker. I like to use this free online tool:
https://www.brokenlinkcheck.com/
I hope this was helpful for you in understanding how to achieve the goals you have for your website!
Looking for support?
Contact me here or by sending an email to hello@designbylayne.com
