Website Essentials: Top 5 Elements to a Successful Site

When it comes to your businesses website, there are so many elements that go into its design. What is it that makes it not only have aesthetic appeal, but also to make it extraordinarily effective? What goes on the home page? A welcome video or a email subscription banner? Where does the menu go; the side or up top? Where do my social media links go? In what order do I assign my content? All of these questions need to be answered, but you must have the right mindset when designing your website.
Your business’s online home-base is your website. Your social media community is already filled with people who have shown an interest. These platforms are vehicles that create traffic to your website. Along with social media, search engines can also create traffic to your website, and this traffic is from people searching for your services and your business. All of these visitors who visit your website want to learn more about who you are and what you have to offer. Your website has the potential to create lifelong loyal customers, but only if it is setup correctly.
Your website should guide the visitor seamlessly through the page, informing them of who you are and what you do while engaging and entertaining. Think of your website as a funnel, leading them to an objective endpoint, such as to obtain their email address for future follow up, have them purchase your service. In order to achieve this, there are some crucial elements that must be remembered.
Essential Elements of a Website
Frictionless
When visitors first arrive on your website, there is a crucial first impression. If they are not hooked and impressed with this impression, they are unlikely to dig any deeper. Also, if it is not easy to navigate then your visitors will become irritated, thus leaving your site and will continue their search elsewhere. You not only lost a visitor, but their initial impression of you has been tarnished for future interactions. Your website should be smooth, flowing from top to bottom. Make sure the most important information is easily accessible from the home page. Just remember, make your website easy to navigate and make the most important information easily accessible.
Incentivized
Provide the visitors incentives when they are looking around. Encourage them to engage with your content, share your content, and provide their contact information: name, email, phone number, etc. Remember that they decided to come to your page, so reward them for their time visiting. For example, you can provide a free class in exchange for their name and email address. This is a win-win situation; they get a free class and you get their email address to for future marketing. This is just one example, but the key principle is to provide them an incentive in exchange for something. Appeal to their interests, but remember to make it clear and simple, and look for mutually beneficial incentives.
Every element matters when crafting your website, and if one is missing then your website isn’t primed for success.
Optimized
If your website wasn’t professional done, then odds are it isn’t optimized efficiently. There are certain elements of your website that need to be optimized to maximize its potential. The year 2014 marked an important transition, when the number of people using mobile devices to browse the internet surpassed the number of people using desktop computers. If your website isn’t optimized to work on both desktop and mobile, you are missing out on a huge percentage of visitors. Also, your images must be compressed and properly hosted to assure fast loading speeds. The quicker your page responses and loads for the visitor, the happier they will be.
The success of your website is contingent not only if it is mobile friendly and loads fast, but if people can even find it. Optimizing your website to perform well on search engines will create free traffic from people who are searching for your services and business. One action you can take to improve your website’s success is learn how to optimize it for search engines.
Engaging, Educating, and Entertaining
Once you have the attention of your visitors, you have to hooked them and reel them in. To do this, your website must be engaging, educating, and entertaining. The internet is becoming more and more image-based, meaning people are communicating and sharing content through video and picture more than written words.
Inform your visitors who you are and what you do, and provide them value along the way. This can be done through many angles. Your blog can have articles written to educate them on the specifics of yoga and meditation, or maybe you start a weekly video series about the importance of practice. Whatever you choose to do, give value. Helping change the lives of others in a positive way will always pay off in the long run, so focus on doing that throughout your website. Just ask yourself, if you were visiting your page for the first time, what would you want to see and learn, and what would capture your attention?
Story Telling
To tie your website all together, it must portray your brand’s story. You must be sure to tie all of these elements together with a unique and authentic story about your brand. The important aspect here is to make it unique and authentic to you; don’t make just another cookie cutter website. Remember, this is your brand’s online home-base, all the traffic flows to here. Find ways to tell your story in an entertaining and engaging way. Videos and pictures can be a great way to add uniqueness to your site. Include yourself, your team, and what you as a brand do for others. This is a way to really make your site personal and friendly; people connect to people, not websites.
Every element matters when crafting your website, and if one is missing then your website isn’t primed for success. There isn’t one that is more important than the other; they all interweave together, complimenting each other create an entire package. Make sure that your website has all of the elements, and make them unique to your brand.
Check out more articles about yoga, meditation, and social media marketing at www.moreyogamarketing.com/mindful-mornings.
