How to make your website actually work for you

The stats from Google Analytics show your marketing efforts are paying off, and the amount of people visiting your site is steadily growing. But you’re struggling to turn those visitors into subscribers, let alone clients. If that sounds like you, you might’ve missed the essential first step to building an effective website.

The first step to an effective website is NOT about technology, hosting, or design. Your visitors don’t care whether your site runs on WordPress or Squarespace. And though bad hosting and bad design can definitely hold you back, they’re not the first step. The first step is strategy. Without a strategy, design is just art. It’s making things pretty without considering what it needs to achieve. And your website needs to achieve something for you.

Decide on the main goal of your website

For life coaches and other service-based businesses, it should be to get clients. If you’re launching your first (or umpteenth) group program, it’s still to get clients (into your program). If you want more speaking gigs, it would be to get bookings for those. First, get clear on the main goal of your website. Then you can break it into smaller steps and add call-to-actions related to your main goal.

Define your call-to-actions

You need to have a clear “next step” for your visitors after they’ve read any blog post or page on your site. A call-to-action (CTA) is what you use to tell them what to do: sign up for your newsletter, buy a product, or book a call with you. Think about what you want someone to do the first time they view your website. They say it takes at least 7 points of contact before someone buys, so it might make the most sense to get them to sign up for your newsletter.

The Website Strategy Workbook guides you through creating your website strategy. Get it by clicking the button at the bottom of this post.

Once you’re clear on what you want your website to achieve, you can start adding a clear call to action to each of your pages.

1. List every single page on your website.
2. Next, answer this question for each page: What is the number one thing you want people to do when they’re on this page?

You can have a general number one goal for your blog posts, and change it up depending on the post. For now, focus on the pages and one general CTA for your blog posts.

Keep in mind at what point in the sales process a visitor to that particular page will be. A first-time visitor stumbling across one of your blog posts will be less likely to book your 6-month coaching package straight away, so it’ll make more sense to get them to sign up for your newsletter.

Don’t just ask or tell them what to do either. Give them a reason. Why would they sign up for your newsletter or book a call with you? What’s the value for them in signing up for your newsletter? What value will they get from whatever you’re asking them to do? A call to action isn’t just the button, be sure to add clear & concise text above the button about exactly what a visitor will be getting from clicking that button.

Make your call-to-action stand out

Be clear in the text on your button. Don’t use “Click here” or “Submit” rather say “Get Started”, “Contact Me”, “Book a Call”, or something to indicate what’s going to happen.

You don’t want it to be just a plain link either, make it stand out! Don’t know how to make a link into a button that stands out? Read my post on how to create a custom button for your site.