How do you feel when you land on a website that engages you from the word go and tempts you to stick around? Pretty good, I bet, and I’m sure you become a faithful repeat visitor.
As an Australian SEO, are you making sure your clients’ websites are sticky? If not, you could be wasting a large part of your SEO efforts. Not only will visitors click off to find what they want elsewhere, but it could affect rankings, too.
That’s because Google is incorporating this ‘sticky’ factor into its algorithm in the form of such metrics as bounce rate, average time on site, pages/visit, and % new visits. After all, if your visitors scan your site for a few seconds and immediately click away, it suggests you’re not giving them what they came for.
Having spent time and effort optimising a site to gain good rankings, it’s frustrating to see visitors clicking away almost as soon as they arrive. Here are some tips to help make your site stickier.
- Check your Google analytics for the key metrics mentioned above. Identify rogue pages to find out what you’re doing wrong.
- Your landing page should be uncluttered with simple clear navigation.
- You have to assure the visitor at once that he’s arrived at the right place.
- Your banner graphic should clearly assert who you are and what you offer.
- The headline should speak directly to the visitor and his needs.
- The body copy should comprise small easily digested blocks of text.
- You should have sub headlines and bullets to allow fast scanning.
- Use suitable images to enhance the appeal and vividness of your message.
- Create a feeling of confidence with testimonials, guarantees, credit card emblems, and logos of professional bodies such as your local chamber of commerce.
- The copy should end with an unambiguous call to action that tells your visitor exactly what he should do next such as visit another page on your site for more information, click a buy link, or fill out a query form.
Above all, make sure you’re giving visitors what they want by focusing on the reader and his problems. For example, if a visitor desperately searching for someone to dry out his carpets lands on your page, he wants to know how fast you can get over to his home. If your copy starts by telling him your life story, you’ve probably lost a customer.
Just remember Google’s key criterion of relevance and you won’t go far wrong. Make your site sticky and you’ll have more social shares, more repeat visitors, more recommendations, and better rankings as well.
