Your website is often the first encounter that a potential customer has with your company. They may stumbled across it through a Google search, or get directed there via a social media post; an advertisement; or a friend or colleague. But, for most visitors, the journey isn’t over once they get to your site. You need to make sure that they stay on your site and — most importantly — convert into a lead or customer for your small business.

You need to design your website for conversion to entice them stay, give up their valuable contact information, and leave them wanting more.

Here are 4 website conversion tips to help you do just that:

1. Serve Up Something Sweet

In order to get visitors to your site to convert and become a potential lead, you need to offer them something in return for their contact information. No, offering visitors “the ability to be emailed by us repeatedly” is not an incentive. Trust me. It’s not. Instead, try offering a targeted email course that gives your website visitors real, tangible value. 

Putting your blog posts or articles behind registration doesn’t work either. Visitors won’t register for content they expect to receive freely – like blog posts and videos. They will register for content that solves a problem they face – whether it’s in the form of an infographic, ebook, white paper and beyond. Give them something that’s worth their while, and they’ll happily give you their name and email address. It’s a great way to start a relationship with a potential customer.

2. Light the Path to Conversion

One way to entice visitors to convert is to ask them for the least amount of information possible the first time they register on your site. Think about it: When you first visit a site, are you more likely to fill out a form that has just 3 to 4 fields in it or one with 10 plus? That 10 to 12 field form would have me running for the hills and thinking twice about if I really want that piece of content, while the shorter form is far less scary.

Through the use of marketing automation on your site, you can first ask for just a first name, last name, company and email address. Then, when that contact revisits, sales and marketing technology can recognize them, track their activity, and send a relevant email or email campaign to guide them to the next step in the sales funnel. As that person revisits your site and downloads more content, you can gauge their level of interest in your business, knowing just the right time to follow-up with a sales call.

By letting your visitors progressively build interest in your business at their own pace, you nurture fruitful relationships – instead of scaring them away with aggressive, sales-heavy messaging.

3. Know Your Audience

content-grid1Make sure that the content you’re offering on your site is applicable to your target audience. It should be a mixture of content that covers each stage of the buying cycle – from people who are brand new to your site (aka “Leads”) all the way through to those who are new and current customers. That content should run the gamut from blog posts, videos and checklists for your brand new visitors all the way to user guides and FAQs for your customers.

If you need help, our Content Grid infographic is geared toward what content to send during an email campaign, but the same concepts work for your website as well.

4. Test for Success

Just like you need to do A/B split tests when sending emails, you should also be doing so with your landing pages. Test two different versions of one landing page; see which performs the best; test it again; see which performs the best; and test again until a clear winner (with the “winning” based on which page gains the most conversions) is shown.

When it comes to website conversion, there’s no room to be complacent. Even a small percentage increase in conversions can turn into big bucks for your business, so try these conversion tips and keep on testing.