Make a lasting impression with a business website makeover

Today’s guest post is written by SocialMonsters, a strategic content creation and publishing team based in Phoenix, AZ.

When potential customers visit your website, that first impression is significant. How a potential customer views your brand starts as soon as they land on your homepage. Thus, it is vital to make that first impression a lasting one. Makeover your business website with these simple tips and watch your sales take off!
Dust Off the Ol’ Website
Put it on your calendar, it’s time to revamp your website again! Nothing turns potential customers away faster than a dated website that shouts 2008. Enhancing your website on a regular basis will show visitors you are up to date on current content and trends and will also improve your site’s Search Engine Optimization (SEO) rankings if done right.
But where to start? First, decide if your website needs a bit of spring cleaning, a thorough makeover or a complete overhaul. Then, make sure all of your business information is current. Next, make all the trendy social media links easily accessible. Facebook, Twitter, Google+, YouTube, LinkedIn and Pinterest are just a few linkable sites that should be added. Social media links are a fantastic way for your customers to help you promote your business for free by sharing your products, ideas and tips to others.
Make It Jazzy
One key component of a good website is visual stimulation. Visit any movie website, like “The LEGO Movie,” and you’ll get an idea of just how interactive and visually stimulating a website can be. However, your small business obviously isn’t going to have a budget for such a vivid site. Use these sites to brainstorm for ideas.
Sixty-five percent of people who visit your site are visual learners, according to Webdam.com. Thus, photos and videos pump up interest immediately. Adding images and video clips to your site doesn’t have to be expensive. You can either upload your own photos and videos or use stock videos provided by sites like Shutterstock. These are top-of-the-line professional stock videos that are clear, vivid and attractive!
Increase the Speed
One caution in adding more to your website is making sure its page speed is up to snuff. A slow-loading website will not only frustrate viewers, but now Google has made it known that slow-loading websites may have their search rankings affected, according to Moz. Keep your widgets and plugins to a minimum and avoid huge graphics and ad overload. Plugging your website into a CDN (content delivery network) technology can also boost your page speed. Simply put, CDN technology speeds up your page by sharing multiple copies of content on several servers, which is called content replication. With the use of several servers and copied material, any high volume of viewers coming to your site won’t bog down the page speed.
Give it a Personal Touch
Adding a blog to your site offers several advantages. It boosts your SEO ranking, allows you to pull in new viewers, gives you an excellent marketing tool to talk about your brand, and perhaps most importantly, gets you connected to customers on a personal level. With a blog, you’re not only creating a larger network of friends and followers, you’re creating a solid circle of returning customers who trust and believe in what you have to say. Don’t make it all about your brand. Bring in your own voice and let people know you yourself are trustworthy.
How frequently you should blog is a delicate balancing act. Too much or too little can put viewers off forever. Study your website traffic as best as you can. Using analytic tools, like Google Analytics, can help you understand the traffic you’re attracting (or not attracting). This will not only help you decide how often to blog, but also what kind of features your newly upgraded blog should focus on.
Stay tuned for CacheFly’s new redesigned website, set to launch in October!
Author Credit: SocialMonsters.org