One of the things I love about helping small businesses with their online marketing is helping them take a look at who they serve and more importantly “WHAT” they are serving them. Do you know the four questions every visitor asks when they arrive at your website?

When people click on your website, only half of the battle is won. I see businesses spend a lot of money on a website and marketing only to have people click off their site in seconds. Why you ask?  Well maybe because the site is obnoxious, but more than likely it is because of the four questions everybody asks unconsciously when they arrive on a companies homepage.  Let’s look at each one and how they relate to your business.

1) “Is this what I was looking for?”

If someone finds you based on a keyword, or other information that isn’t related to the products or services you are offering,
say bye bye. The search engines job is to try and match you with what a searcher is looking for. Right now I’m working with
a client who offers Executive Coaching, but I quickly realized that we don’t want to use “Executive Coach” as a keyword,
why…because that’s what people type in when they are looking for a Luxury Bus!  Knowledge is power.

2) “Who is this company?”

Visitors who come to your site want to know very quickly who your company is and does it match their needs.  If your site looks like it was done by a 13 year old, they may not stay very long.  Don’t get me wrong there are a LOT of creative teenagers out there, but do you want to bestow them the responsibility of  visitor education, lead generation, and branding for your company, because those are major reasons for your site.  Your website is a reflection of you and your company, make sure people like what they see.

3) “Can they help me?”

This again goes back to the right keywords, but even more than that do you look like a fly by night company, or do you project your self as a professional that can help them (especially if they have an emergency ex. Leaky Roof!)  I talk with businesses every week that say      “I know I should be marketing online, but I’m going to wait until business picks up.”  I think many businesses don’t see the correlation between investing in marketing and getting a return that not only pays for the marketing but a LOT more…That’s the point!  On to #4.

4) “Can I trust them?”

This is a big one and somewhat complicated one.  There are obvious things you can have on your site like BBB logo and testimonials, but people have become a bit more skeptical and know they have a lot of choices.  My number one tip is have people review you and do it often.  These are off site reviews that are generated by others and are best when integrated such as with local business results.  If you go to this link you’ll see an image of a sample business result.  If you look at most of the listings you’ll see that they have reviews.  A very powerful item to incorporate in your local listing.  Another great tool for both trust building and all three of the previous questions, is to include a short video on your home page that introduces you, your business, and your services.  Find out more about video marketing.

There you go the four questions people ask when they come to your site.  Now ask yourself this question…What is your site saying?