How to build a website that generates more leads.

Your website is the the most critical element of your online presence. It’s the digital hub of all your online marketing. Social networks are great for creating the buzz and awareness, but conversion occurs on your website. Drive traffic with search, social networks and advertising. Then engage your visitors and motivate them to take an action with informative content and a great offer.

Most business websites do an adequate job of providing a general overview of the company (About us, our services, our location, our people, etc). But the best sites are more than just an electronic brochure. Whether it’s selling a product or just capturing an email address, they have a clear goal in mind – conversion!

The key ingredients of a great website

• Professional Design
  Clean, professional design, and clear navigation that allows you to quickly scan the content. Be sure that the most important sections of your site are clearly visible on the homepage. Don’t hide key pages in a pulldown menu.
• Fresh, Informative Content
  Content marketing is key to the success of driving traffic to your site, and positioning you and your business as an authority. Content plays more and more of a factor in search engine optimization, and is the center of any inbound marketing effort.
• A Call to Action
  What should people do when they come to your home page? If you don’t know, then they won’t either. Make sure you clearly tell visitors what to do. For example, a prominent space asking for their email address. Building a targeted email list is one of the best ways to keep in touch with visitors until they are ready to buy.
• Mobile Compatibility
  By 2014, mobile is projected to surpass desktop computers for Internet usage. If your site is not compatible with tablets or smartphones, you are essentially invisible to a growing segment of your audience. There are several approaches, from a responsive design that changes it’s format based on screen site (like this site for example), or a dedicated mobile site that is optimized for mobile only.
• Content Management
  These days it’s critical that you can access your site easily to make updates and changes at a moments notice. Integrating a content management system (WordPress for example) will allow you to add content and make simple changes that would have required a programmer a few years ago.