How to Build a Website that Sells

5 min


Are you looking to boost the conversions from your website? Smart marketers know that their website design can make the difference. Whereas the importance of improving SEO rankings, creating a huge social media presence and leads that increase website traffic cannot be ignored, most marketers overlook the importance of having an excellent website design.

Having a high converting website is key to the success of any business. So to say, it has been proven that businesses with enhanced conversion optimization are twice likely to witness increased sales. That said if you have been witnessing increased traffic but diminished conversions, it is time to analyze your website.

But, where should you start? Any website has a lot to offer. Besides the need to be highly converting, any website should be easy to navigate, clearly branded, experience minimal interruption and focused on selling. Being creative is laudable, but if it doesn’t convert, you better revisit its design. Consider working through the list of website building strategies below to boost its conversion.

1. Have a unique value proposition

A value proposition describes what separates your products and services from other businesses in the sector. Online competition is certainly tough; therefore, you should be able to clearly articulate to your visitors what your company can do for them. Your value proposition is better positioned centrally within the site’s overall design.

Potential clients visiting the website should clearly see on the site’s landing page or homepage why they should contemplate purchasing your products or doing business with you. Your value proposition may vary according to the nature of your business. For instance, designing a hair salon website or photography website may involve extensive creativity, which isn’t depicted in medical practice sites.

A perfect example of a website with a clear value proposition is MailChimp.

2. Keep it Simple

Websites made with simple design demonstrate high conversion rates. A common mistake most businesses make is trying to fix as much information as possible in their homepages. They would want to display all their products and services, awards achieved, contact information, affiliations, and other stuff. If this describes your homepage, working on simplifying its design should be your priority.

Whereas it is good to have lots of information about your company on the website, you don’t have to put it all on the homepage. Check out Mint’s homepage to get a clue about what we are describing.

With such design, visitors can easily navigate your website if they need to find more information about your business. The other tip to keep your website simple is choosing the right color scheme.

3. Simplify Navigations

For more conversions, have your website’s navigations designed in a way that it guides visitors through the actions they want to take. Directions may include making a call, filling in a contact form or sharing something from your website. Having modern navigation tools is always a plus. So to say, most customers bypass all the navigations if a website has a chat button, something that overly increases signups.

That said, position your navigation tabs and headings easy to understand. This should also be reflected in the mobile version of the website. It should enable people to click once to get information, products, and services they are looking for. When designing the navigation aspect, follow Hick’s law.

Hick’s law states that the time an individual takes to make a decision is directly proportional to the possible choices available. Simply put, increasing the number of choices increases the decision time. In this context, you can build a website that converts by limiting the options visitors have.

4. Use a predictable design layout

There are certainly some prices for extra creative website designers. However, for better conversion, it is prudent to have a predictable layout. The best way to be sure of this is to look at what your competitors have.

For instance, phone numbers and contact information are normally on the top right corner, logos on the top left, products and services laid out horizontally, and call to actions in front and centre. Avoid the exciting bells, gimmicks, and whistles of web designers who might overload your site with unnecessary modifications. Stick to your goal of boosting conversions, which comes with having a simple and clean website.

5. Minimize User Clicks

A good website design should enable users to get whatever info they are looking for in the minimal number of steps/clicks. For this, exclude pop-ups and irritating interruptions that will increase the visitor’s number of clicks. People are lazy by nature, especially where they have options. Having multiple clicks will simply drive them away.

Your checkout process should also be easy and not a time to start additional, extraneous questions. Make it possible for your visitors to check out quickly and easily as possible with the most minimum number of clicks and distractions. Count the number of clicks visitors take to reach the action service and think of how these clicks can be reduced.

6. Reduce User Input

This is directly related to the number of clicks. No visitor will certainly want to fill in 10 pages form before getting whatever he or she wants. To minimize this, evaluate your contact forms, eliminating any questions that might not be necessary at that time.

Besides, ensure that your web design has web forms made with plain English without complicated layouts. The forms should be simply designed and logical. If necessary, consider a split test and compare the conversion rates of the various forms.

7. Use fewer but quality images

Images are a sure way of boosting your conversion rates. Websites lacking images appear plain, boring and unprofessional. However, this doesn’t imply that you flood your website with crazy images. Too many images affect your website’s loading time.

Google Analytics attests to the fact that websites with few images have high conversion rates. That said, incorporate images sparingly. Ensure that they also look professional as much as possible. Your images should also be relevant to your website content and portray the message of your brand clearly.

8. Have a clear call to action

The importance of a call to action cannot be ignored. For a responsive website, your call to action should stand out in terms of color and position. It should also be outstanding in terms of the wording used. The most effective CTAs are typically placed in the middle of the landing page. Also, pay attention to call to actions in every page. Ideally, you should have one call to action on every page.

Final Thoughts

When building your website, stick by your goals – which are to increase traffic conversions, contacts with prospective clients and ultimately sales. Take some time to check on the design tips outlined above and decide what website design you would like to have to engage your prospects.

It is prudent to always conduct split tests on the various tips and tricks to find one that results in better conversions. Besides, always consider peeking into what competitors are doing to improve your designs. For more articles on marketing for small businesses and brands, check out Outbound.net

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