Having a user-friendly, engaging, and effective business website is a critical part of running a business in any industry in the 21st century. But, as you probably know, not all sites are equal — some sites perform much better than others, leading to a higher number of conversions.
Conversions (n.): the number of site visitors you have that convert into paying customers.
So, what can you do to crank up the effectiveness of your site? We’re here to explain. Simply put, your site should be optimized using the most cutting-edge tools available. In this article, we’ll introduce you to some of the best tools for site optimization that you should know about. Read on to find out novel and innovative ways to bring a fresh face to your business website, and start taking in the traffic and conversions.
SEO Tools
First things first, you need to get people on your page. And the only way to do that is to have kick-butt SEO. SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of improving your website’s rankings on Google searches related to your products or services.
SEO is a complicated beast because Google doesn’t publicly release the way that its search engine algorithm works — though it does drop hints. However, some general guidelines are usually good to follow: produce helpful content, have an easily navigable (or crawlable) site, and get tons of people linking to you.
Here are a few SEO tools that every SEO-minded website administrator should have in their back pocket whenever the site needs a little pick-me-up:
Keyword Research Tools
Keywords are a critical part of SEO. They let Google know that your site contains information that’s relevant to users’ searches. For example, if you sell pet food, it’s a good idea to create web pages and web content that contain ample mentions of pet food, as well as related terms, like cat food, dog food, chew toys, or pet vitamins. Luckily, there are plenty of keyword research tools online to choose from, so be sure to research those and pick one that’s right for your business.
Customer-Centric Content
Google is pretty smart these days and doesn’t just care about the number of keywords you have on the page. They want the content that those keywords are part of to be readable, engaging, and professional. And the newest forms of natural language processing AI can tell the difference. So, another tool that you should have in your SEO toolkit is good writing. Usually, that means access to a network of high-quality writers, whether in-house or freelanced. For example, check out Truliant FCU’s blog page, which is immediately relevant to its target users.
A Link-Building Network
Lastly, Google cares about how many other sites are linking to your site. So, in order to boost your SEO, it’s a good idea to build a network of friendly business partners who are willing to link to your site in their content in exchange for you linking to theirs.
Another tool that can help you optimize your business site is a backlink checker. The free backlink checker offered by SmallSEOTools provides users a complete analysis of their site’s backlinks. Without high-quality backlinks, it would be very unlikely to achieve a top position in search engine result pages. You can use the backlink tracker utility to check site backlinks and determine the quality of backlinks linking to your website. This online backlink checker isn’t limited to conducting analysis of a single site; you can also keep an eye on the backlinks profile of your competitors’ sites. The process hardly takes a couple of seconds, and the results are displayed without charging a penny.
Once you get people on the page with SEO, it’s time to get them to click buy.
CRO Tools
Conversion rate optimization (or CRO) is the next step in the sales funnel. You attract as many possible leads as you can with SEO, then convert those leads into paying customers by optimizing your page. How is this done? A few different methods are important, and there are good tools to have for each:
A/B Testing
A/B testing is a simple and effective way to discover data about your users’ activities and preferences. Here’s how it works: you release two versions of a web page simultaneously and randomly. A user who logs on has a 50/50 chance of getting either version. Then, after a period of testing, you pull the data and see which page had a higher conversion rate. Then you implement that page globally.
User Behavior
To gain more fine-grained insights into user behavior, there are technologies that allow you to track user movement on your page. For example, you can see clearly how long people spent reading a blog post, or whether they hovered over a “buy now” button before ultimately deciding against clicking and more. These tools allow you to improve your site based on the things that work, and eliminate the parts of your website that are not helping you convert.
Customer Surveys
Lastly, there’s nothing better than a willing customer just letting you know what’s working about your site and what’s not. To get this info, you can offer coupons and promo codes to customers willing to take a quick email survey about your brand. It’s a win-win: they get a deal, and you get the data.
The last part of an effective site is the most intuitive.
UX Tools
User experience (UX) is critical for any business website. These days, most internet users are accustomed to beautifully laid out, carefully designed, bright and engaging, and fast-loading websites — and will settle for nothing less than the best. Having your graphic design, page loading speeds, and site architecture on-point have gone from being a pleasant surprise for users to be an absolute requirement. For example, the Trust & Will home page exhibits up-to-date, on-trend graphics:
If your site hasn’t changed much since halfway through the 2020s, you’re almost certainly due for an upgrade. Here’s what to invest in:
Page Loading Speed Detection
These days, there are tools that will let you know whether your loading speeds are fast enough. Too slow, and users grow impatient and log off.
Graphic Designers
Whether you freelance or hire someone in-house, having a graphic designer on your team is critical.
Information Architecture Analysis
There are innovative tools that help you see whether your website’s architecture — the way that information is laid out in different places on the site — is up to speed. Use these, and be sure to make necessary improvements.
In addition to a beautiful and functional site, it’s important to load up your site with engaging blog posts, video and audio content, and photo galleries where appropriate. Users want to immediately feel drawn into your site, and varied UX-improving content is a great way to do that.
By combining SEO, CRO, and killer UX, your optimized site will start boosting your bottom line in no time.
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