As companies invest more money and resources into their online presence, websites are under more pressure than ever to generate leads that keep the business prominent. Having a website is an important first step, but it's not enough anymore — you have to make sure that site is optimized to accomplish your goals.
For a lead-generating website, there are a number of pitfalls that can ding optimization and inhibit the online property from realizing its potential. Here are four of the biggest problems that can hinder websites in their lead-generation efforts.
Your Content is Stagnant or Irrelevant
Engagement is an important part of generating leads with a website, and content is the best tool to create a consistent experience in that regard. When websites have content that either isn't updated regularly, or isn't specifically relevant to what consumers are seeking from your company, then that content fails to engage.
The solution is simple: Create and publish content consistently, and make sure that content is relevant to consumers and speaks to their most important pain points. Content should have a clear relationship to the reasons why you're trying to connect with consumers.
Confusing or Conflicting Calls-to-Action
Sometimes, a single webpage will have more than one call-to-action (CTA), which confuses consumers. Each CTA pulls potential clicks away from the others. Other times, a page doesn't feature any CTAs at all, or the calls-to-action are murky or confusing. Think of each page of your website as part of the sales journey, with the immediate focus being on driving an action to generate a lead. All the content of a webpage should be geared toward that single CTA, which should be clear and actionable. Otherwise, consumers will be left to their own best judgment in how to proceed with your company.
Your Website's Design is Unfocused
A website's design must be intuitive, leading consumers smoothly from landing pages to lead-generation forms. The pages themselves should be simple in design, and uncluttered — think of every superfluous feature on a page as a potential distraction to a qualified lead. Limit content to the essential on all pages designed to facilitate lead generation. Any forms should be simple, asking for only essential information, to ensure consumers don't get discouraged before completing them.
There's No Clear Conversion Point
As CustomerThink points out, consumers shouldn't have to dig to figure out how take the next step with a business. A lead-generating website should be designed from head-to-toe with this conversion point in mind. This means that a lead-generation form should be prominently displayed so that it's only a click away from your landing page. If you have physical business locations, your hours, address and contact information should be readily available, possibly on every page.
The idea behind a conversion point is that consumers will intuitively understand how they can take the next step — even if they have their choice of how to proceed.
By testing new solutions to these problems, you can see changes in their lead generation rates, and learn more about your customers in the process.
