How to Improve Your Site's Engagement this Year
Take a look at your website through the lens of your typical users
Driving visitors to your site is only half the battle in gathering leads and converting people into customers. You must also engage and entertain them.
Around 86 percent of customers are willing to pay more for a good experience with your brand. Investing in UX pays off in more engaged and loyal customers who are eager to buy from you.
However, nearly every business with an online presence understands engagement and experience are crucial to attracting and keeping customers. If you want to stand out from the thousands of other companies in any given industry, you'll need to focus on some of the critical elements most likely to improve engagement stats on your website.
1. Embrace Voice Search
Experts predict by the end of the year, around 26.8 percent of American adults will use a smart speaker at least part of the time. Enabling your landing page for voice search now increases engagement from those using Alexa or Google Home to search your site.
Some people also use voice search via their smartphones, so adding this feature to your site engages at least some of your users and helps ready you for Google voice search results.
2. Reduce Page Load Time
You have a few seconds to grab your user and keep them on your site. If your website loads slowly, consumers are likely to grow frustrated and bounce away to a competitor. There are some things you can implement to help with page load speeds.
Invest in the best web hosting server you can afford. Optimize images for mobile and reduce file sizes. Get rid of elements that tend to load slowly or bog down systems, such as JavaScript.
Johnson's baby products site loads so quickly that there is barely a delay between landing on the page and seeing all the elements on it, fully charged and ready for perusal. It also adapts quickly to different screen sizes and shifts rapidly from one format to the next without delay. The focus is on the products because the user experience (UX) is so seamless.
3. Become Transparent
In one survey, 78 percent of users stated poor customer service made them stop trusting a brand. The numbers for users in Canada and the United Kingdom were also well above 50 percent. One way of gaining trust is offering complete transparency from the moment visitors land on your page.
Make contact information clear and easily found. Explain your return policy in simple language.
4. Create Educational Videos
Users might not always exactly know what products or services you offer or how they apply to their everyday lives. Creating educational videos takes the guesswork out of what you do and why you do it. People also consume the content in videos more easily than text.
One Point Partitions features a video on its website that shows how its partitions hook together to create a custom space for any business. The video highlights the way the partitions bolt to the floor and then are secured together for a stable system perfect for bathroom stalls.
5. Create Engaging Content
Do you want to gain more leads out of people who land on your page? One study showed that small businesses with a blog received 126 percent more leads than those without. Why? If you have a blog or some useful content, the user immediately engages with it and sticks around. Content is your opportunity to show consumers your knowledge in the industry.
6. Use Exit-Intent Pop-Ups
While people claim to hate pop-ups, some of them are beneficial in engaging users and increasing conversions. One study showed using exit intent pop-ups increased conversion between 5 and 10 percent. Consider the extra push your last chance to engage someone who was slightly interested but thinking about leaving your website.
Olyplant is located in Athens, Greece, and provides organic plants for people around the world. In addition to engaging content and calls to action (CTAs), the site grabs users getting ready to leave with an exit-intent pop-up that invites them to sign up for the newsletter. If you convert a visitor into a subscriber, you have more opportunities to continue the conversation and engage that user.
7. Offer Inside Information
No matter what niche your business falls under, you likely have some experiences and knowledge that no one else has. What about your company's background makes it unique? Share this information with an insider club made up of current and potential customers.
Write a free report, offer a webinar and give them enough valuable information to keep them coming back for more without giving away all your secrets.
8. Add Live Chat
The average consumer today is pretty impatient and wants an immediate response from brands. They expect companies to answer instantly on social media, and live chat is preferred by many. About 73 percent of customers say live chat is the most satisfying communication method when talking to businesses.
Appalachian Wireless features a live chat option on its site. The live chat reduces down until the user clicks on the CTA, and then it pops up in the lower right side of the screen. This allows users to browse features of the home page uninterrupted but also puts a live person just a click away.
9. Use a Poll
People love to offer their two cents. Add a poll or survey and let your site visitors give you input. At the same time, you'll collect data that helps you better serve the needs of your site visitors and keep them on the page longer. There are many different ways of presenting the poll, such as in a sidebar or via a pop-up. Try different locations and see which gets the most engagement.
10. Break Content Into Readable Chunks
The average site visitor only reads 20 percent of your content. People tend to scroll down your page and take in headers, subheadings, bolded text and images. Blame cellphone browsing or how fast-paced society is, but if you want to grab and keep site visitors, break articles into readable chunks.
Focus on image-rich content, bullet points and short sections of text.
11. Improve Your Link Text
The goal when someone lands on your page is to keep them clicking through different articles and CTAs until they convert into customers. One element of engagement involves the links you use in your anchor text. If you want your site visitor to take action, make it clear what action they're taking.
Look at Your Site From a New Perspective
Figuring out how to engage site visitors sometimes requires looking at your website through the lens of your typical users. Spend time studying internal and external data and figuring out who your ideal target audience is. Try different techniques for engaging users and test each one until you find the perfect mix for your site visitors.