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Guest commentary: Does your website speak to visitors?

February 4, 2015
/ Luke Infinger
/ leadership-tips

One of the most important elements of your business' website is content. For starters, sites with regularly updated content are favored in search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo for search engine optimization (SEO) purposes. Second, high quality content isn't just what attracts visitors — it's what keeps them coming back again and again. Content marketing is one of the keys to success in a digital age, but one quick look at a few small business websites will show you that not everyone has a handle on it just yet. If you want to create content that speaks to visitors, you'll always have to keep a few key things in mind. Content marketing involves keeping a website, blog or other digital channel constantly updated with relevant, engaging content that will attract the attention of your target audience. Does the user have a question about a particular product or service that you sell? Your website needs to be the absolute best place to find that answer, bar none. There are two types of content that you should focus on — smart content and visual content. Smart content is engaging and can encompass a large number of different things, such as instructional pieces that help a user solve a problem. Visual content is stimulating in a completely different way and can involve things including infographics, videos, animations and more. There are three things that your content needs to speak to visitors. It needs to be valuable. A 2013 study found that in-house marketers who were personalizing their web experiences (and who were able to quantify that improvement at the same time) saw a 19 percent uplift in sales. According to another study, a full 74 percent of online users reported that they get frustrated with websites when the content has nothing to do with their interests. Your content also needs to be unique so that target audience will find what they are looking for on your website above other sites. Content that isn't unique ranks poorly in search engines such as Google. Your content needs to be user friendly, too. The answer to a user's question shouldn't be buried within pages and pages of additional information that they have to wade through. It needs to be front and center, easy to access and even easier to consume to be effective. Getting visitors to your site is one thing. Keeping them around and convincing them that it is worth the time and effort to come back is something else entirely. To accomplish that in the 21st century, you need to focus on creating valuable, unique and user friendly content that speaks to visitors of all types.

Luke Infinger is the Executive Creative Director of HIP Creative, A Digital Agency Rooted in Design, Data, Marketing & Technology.

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Guest commentary: Does your website speak to visitors?

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