Websites aren’t just a storefront. They are a critical means of lead generation for businesses. With around 3.2 billion people online, websites give businesses an unprecedented amount of access to potential customers.

At Step Change, dealing with close to 100 clients per annum, we’ve noticed a trend in businesses realising the potential of leads that their websites can bring. There has been a steady hike towards businesses aiming to revitalise their websites to ensure their web design is conversion-optimised.

Here are three tips you can employ to kickstart your website’s lead generation this New Year.

1. Access web data for continuous improvement

When was the last time you accessed your Google Analytics data or even thought about tracking how people interact with your website? 

Before you’re able to access this information, a great idea is to set up your Analytics account with goals you want to track. 

Usually, these are ‘Thank You’ pages, which the visitor will land on when they fill out a form. It’s important you get granular and make sure each form has a different Thank You page; otherwise, it makes it harder for you to see which forms have a higher rate of conversion.

Once these goals have been set up, you can start working out the different reports you need in order to answer any questions you might have with your website. 

Using these reports, you’ll easily see how long people spend on your website, the rate of bounces, and the different actions people take that lead them to conversion. By aggregating the correct data, you’ll soon be able to diagnose the weaker areas of your website that require improvement in order to achieve the rate of conversion you desire. 

Your access to this web data means not only can you see the effect every little change has on conversion but it also allows you to experiment with different conversion tactics. These may include chat bots, exit grabbers, and calls to action. Coupled with your data, this means you’ll see a clear measure of the impact these tactics have on your conversion rates.

2. Increase your website visitors

You won’t have an accurate sample size of data to work off if there aren’t a lot of people visiting your website. Increasing the amount of website visitors is a headache to most business owners because it opens up various tactics that they don’t have a lot of experience in.

A great way to gain more website visitors? Google AdWords.

Essentially, by following the character guidelines and restrictions, you’re able to craft written or display (image) advertisements, which will show up on Google searches or websites to your target market (which you predefine by location or other factors pertinent to your business).

By experimenting with different ad copy or images — tightening or widening the target audience — you’re able to refine your strategy to ensure you’re attracting the right leads to your website.

Then, once they click the ad and land on your website, you need to ensure that the pages they land on are conversion-optimised by using Google Analytics data (as discussed above).

Aside from AdWords, there are various different free ways to increase website visitors, like SEO, content, links, and partnerships.

The good news is, there is a proven formula for attracting more website visitors. By tackling AdWords, content, SEO, linking, and some offline methods, you’re guaranteed to have a steady trickle of visits on your website that parallel your business growth and convert into customers.

3. Give purpose to each webpage

A website isn’t as simple as connecting random webpages together and letting the visitor make sense of it all. 

Each webpage needs to have a purpose and a journey so that the visitor can keep browsing rather than hitting a dead end.

To achieve a purposeful website, mapping customer journeys are a great way to gain an understanding of what it is your visitors may look for and how to plan your website so they can get the maximum value and convert into customers.

Once you analyse your website and ensure each webpage has a purpose and fits into a greater journey, you’re likely to find that you can remove several redundant webpages to achieve a cleaner website that’s highly functional and optimised.

The end game of having a purposeful website is still to achieve the goal of conversion by ensuring that every visitor that lands on your page can reach a clear decision of whether or not your services are right for them.

With these three tips in mind, you can now navigate the world of websites and ensure that your website is healthy and converting sales.

If you’d like more information on increasing conversion rates online, feel free to drop us a note, and we will get in touch.

Written by Lina Lau, Digital Executive at Step Change

Lina’s natural flair for Java code meant she was presenting theories to her own lecturers before even graduating. A computer science and law major, she brings unique ‘systems meet psychology’ approach to marketing and strategy. Strategic problem-solver at heart, she honed her tech skills by teaching herself how to hack and understanding crypto currencies. Her diverse range of skills and natural love for entrepreneurship and understanding businesses led her to Step Change.