Practical Steps for Turning Your Website Into a Productivity Machine – Plus Win a Copy of So You Have a Website…Now What
All too often people begin the process of building a website without having clear goals for their website. This isn’t a crime – although I would argue that it should be – but if you’re going to invest your money in having a professional website built, doesn’t it make sense to think of the money you’re spending as an investment?
Is your website producing a positive ROI for you? If not, why? Chances are, if your website isn’t producing positive ROI for you, then you don’t have goals for your website.
Goals? For a website? You bet! The first place to start is to understand that your website is a tool, and if you approach it strategically then you can turn your website into the ultimate productivity machine.
So what goals should you set for your website? Great question! How can your website generate a positive ROI for you? Another great question! First let’s set some goals for your site.
List Building
If a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound? If you have the most remarkable product in the world, but no one knows about it, does it matter? It doesn’t matter what business you are in, and it doesn’t matter how remarkable your product is; if you don’t have clients and prospects, you are doomed.
Trick Question Warning: If a magic genie appeared and was going to grant you any one of the following to help grow your business, which would you choose?
- $1,000,000.00 (cash)
- The best location (with a super cool building) in your town
- A list of 1,000 prequalified leads for your business
Sure, the $1,000,000 and the best location are tempting, but those will only set you up for temporary success. You see, once the $1,000,000 is gone, it’s gone. After a few years, the best location may no longer be the best location, and that super cool building will no longer be super cool.
One the other hand, 1,000 prequalified leads, if treated correctly, will radically alter the future of your business – forever! This is why your website should focus on helping you build a list, help you qualify them, and help you convert them into clients.
To build your list you’ll need somewhere to store them and sort them. Sounds complex? It’s not, especially if you use a list building and autoresponder. Here are a few for you to consider:
- Aweber
- MailChimp
- ConstantContact
- iContact
Prospect Conversion
What if your website could actually help you convert prospects into customers? Sounds too good to be true? With some time and effort on your part you can convert your website into a sales machine for you. Yes, even if you don’t sell anything on your actual site.
Our website, UglyMugMarketing.com, does a brilliant job of bringing prospects through our sales funnel. On our website there are seven places where people can opt-in and request more information. Each of these (delete are different) takes people from where they are and brings them through our sales funnel.
For example, if you opt-in for a website review, our autoresponder then follows up asking you to provide additional information before we schedule your review. Once you provide the additional information, our autoresponder then notifies my assistant to schedule an appointment with me.
After their website review, we then move them to the next step in our sales funnel, which is getting them to complete our website survey. Our autoresponders then follow up with them until they complete the website survey.
After they complete the website survey, our autoresponder then follows up with them. It automatically positions our company as the go-to experts in the world of website design.
One important key to remember when making your website a productivity tool is to
Speak to people where they are:
If you look over our website you’ll notice that we have seven different places for people to opt-in (provide us their name and email address). Each of these opt-ins are different – and communicate with people differently.
For example, if you currently have a website, you might be interested in a review of your website to get an outside opinion. However, if you don’t have a website, then more than likely you wouldn’t opt-in requesting a website review.
Here’s what that opt-in looks like.
You can see this opt-in isn’t generic. It specifically says, “do you expect more from your website?” Sure, this ignores those without a website, but at Ugly Mug Marketing we know that 87% of our website clients have a website when they first come to us. So we know and understand they are hoping to get more from their website, which is why we lead our website with this free website review offer.
Pertinent Info
Do you get tired of answering your phone only to provide callers with the same information over and over again? Why not display this information on your website, and then when the phone rings refer them to your website?
For bonus points you could create a special incentive for them if they do stop by and visit your website. Use this chance to do something truly remarkable. For example, if you get twenty calls a week about when the upcoming seminar will be, you could easily create a special report geared around the upcoming seminar. Then when people called you could say, thanks so much for calling about the upcoming branding seminar, do you have Internet access? Great, visit our website and you can not only get all the information about the upcoming event, but we’ve also created a special report called, “The 4 Biggest Branding Mistakes Entrepreneurs Make – often without even knowing!”
Inventory Review
Have a large, varied inventory? Why not place your inventory catalog online with companies like QuickBooks upgrade? Why not focus people to provide you with their name and email address before they can download the catalog? (Yes, that’s list building!)
One of our clients is a property management company. At any given point in time, they are managing an inventory of over 200 properties. Before they had a website, they would have to update their currently available property sheet each and every week, and then reprint, re-email, and redistribute it to everyone interested in renting/leasing a property. That alone required a tremendous amount of time, and doesn’t even include all the phone calls asking, is the property on DeSoto Street still available?
But now with their new website, everything is centralized. They send everyone to the website. (We designed their website so that once property is entered into the admin panel they never have to reenter it. When a property is rented, they mark it as an inactive property in their admin panel, and it removes it from the public side of the website.)
Solicit Feedback
Do you collect feedback from your customers after they purchase from you? How do you do it? Why not place it on your website? Why not print a small card that is delivered with your product, or send it once you provide your service driving them to your website for an incentive?
Here’s an example: Thanks so much for working with Ugly Mug Marketing over the past few weeks on your new website. We are honored that you decided to work with us. We have a gift that we would like to send you as our way of saying thanks. Simply visit www.DareToBeUgly.com and tell us about your experience working with us, and we’ll send you 1,000 premium designed business cards to match your new website (valued at $250.00). Don’t worry, the survey will take less than 2 minutes.
Think your customers are too busy, or too important? Give this approach a try, I guarantee you’ll be surprised by the results.
Collect Information
Is there any information that you regularly collect from clients and customers? What about from your staff? Potential staff? Why not let your website do this for you?
Sell Your Stuff
Build an online store to sell your goods and services. Tie in a few of the steps mentioned above, and you have a truly remarkable website that not only sells for you, but also is a powerful tool for increasing your productivity.
Conclusion & Win A Copy
Your website is a tool. Nothing more, nothing less! By taking a strategic approach with your website, you can get more from it. The best part is, these are simple, easy, and common-sense ways of making your website work more efficiently for you. After all, aren’t most tools supposed to make our lives easier? We think so.
I’d love to mail you the paper back version of So You Have a Website…Now What?! I really believe it will help you turn your website into a productivity machine. There are two ways to enter:
1: Leave a comment below. The first 15 people to leave a comment below answering the one of the following questions will get a signed copy of So You Have a Website…Now What?.
Question 1: What is the biggest challenge, or obstacle, that is preventing you from having success online?
Question 2: What step(s) can you take today to start turning your website into a productivity machine?
2. Tweet a message. The first 15 people who tweet one of the following messages and then leave a comment below with a link to your twitter page.
Ready, set, start tweeting or commenting!
Due to logistics, this contest is only valid for those with shipping addresses in the continental U.S.. Void where prohibited.
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