Do's and Don'ts of Highly Converting Websites

If you think your site is ready to convert traffic, a good test is to invite a friend or family member (or any third party person) to try to purchase a product or service on your site. What questions do they have?

What problems do they encounter?

We have a quick guide here to help you conceptualize all the things you need to do and know about creating a highly converting website.

DO Focus on User Experience

It is amazing to note how many websites simply fail to state the most obvious, foundational message on their homepage: We are X, and we offer Y to people looking for Z. 

It’s so simple yet, often people overthink their own messaging, and confuse the heck out of their site visitors. 

Make it easy for your visitors to go where they need to go. “Are you looking for Y? Here it is!” Simple yet, many websites offer too many options up front and not enough clarity to guide the audience. 

Don’t make users guess what your brand is, what you offer, and what sets you apart from other options in the market. Make clear, bold statements, and follow through on these claims.

DON’T Create a Cluttered Layout

Sidebars! Sliders! Pop ups! Columns of images and text! Very little negative space.

These features can be used advantageously, but not if they are combined to present a million clickable options “above the fold.”

Many people think they need to show everything they are about right up front. 

You do not. 

You can feature something, you can give your visitor some visual “rest areas” on your homepage, and we guarantee, this will entice people to keep looking, reading, learning, and spending time on your site. 

Remember the old adage: “If you confuse, you lose.” Literally, you will lose people. Your traffic will take one look, and if they have to spend more than a couple of seconds trying to find what they need, they will click away and never return.

Clean and contemporary should be your guiding design principles. 

If your homepage looks like a flyer, you need to be more strategic with placement and typeface usage. 

DO use Catchy Headlines and Calls-To-Action (that actually match!)

Just so we are sure that you’re on the same page, a “call-to-action” is usually a button or link that goes right underneath a catchy headline. 

“Have you been in an accident, but have been turned away by other injury lawyers?” CALL US TODAY  People often fear that if their headlines are too specific, they will lose people who don’t identify with them. However, this isn’t how it works. A good headline will invite everyone to be interested. 

In the above example, some people will have been told that they don’t have a case, perhaps, but the rest of the visitors reading that headline will think, “Gee, what would these guys say to me if that were to happen? What sets them apart?” 

Make sure you deliver on what your call-to-actions promise. 

In our example, if your first-line responders don’t have anecdotes about how they won a court case for a client who had been previously turned away, they are not likely to come across as trustworthy in that very first phone call. 

Remember what your homepage CTAs say, and why, and when someone contacts you, find out right away how they found you so you can make good on your promise.

DON’T Stray from your Brand Colors

Organize your content into categories that users can browse if they wish. 

Visitors to your website are more likely to actually pull the trigger on a sale if they find what they need early in the user journey through your website. 

Easy navigation gives the impression that you know what you’re doing, and you understand your audience very well.

DON’T Fill a Page with Long Paragraphs

It was Shakespeare (ironically) who wrote, “Brevity is the soul of wit.” Do not take a paragraph to say something that a single sentence could easily accomplish.

Just like your layout (images, text, containers) you don’t want your site to be cluttered with text. Some people think that if they break up their text with headlines, secondary headlines, and body texts, they don’t need to be ultra-brief. 

Nope! 

Don’t put it on your homepage or top-level pages. 

Use strategically injected images and videos to cut up paragraphs of text. For example, don’t say that you offer three main types of services, simply use icons to show the three types of services you offer. 

People can figure out what you’re saying based on this layout. If you can say something using an image or an infographic, do that! 

DO Make your Site Visually Attractive

This is a mistake: there should be a nice ratio of images to text to headings to “white” or negative space.

SEO Tip: Search Engines cannot read images, so make sure you are optimizing their titles and metadata to get the most SEO value out of them that you can.

DO Test for Functionality!