Need Help? Talk to Our Experts
Whether the target is local or international, website audits are essential tools that provide you with an exceptional opportunity for online growth. They help you to first measure, then improve, the efficiency and visibility of your website. In a very real way, they are the baseline of optimization in its purest form; they provide actionable data on the strengths and weaknesses of your marketing campaigns and how to make them stronger.
People have asked us how to come up with ideas to write, and I must confess, ideas can come from the oddest places. Today’s post is due, in part, to a crazy round of several comprehensive website audits all at once. Doing those site audits made us think about our own website, which brought us around to realizing one very important thing. For a company that uses audits with literally almost every client, and believes strongly in the good they do, we… well, we don’t really write all that much about them.
Oh, sure, we might write an article here or there. We posted two of them in the same year (wow!) a few years ago. I’m sure that was exciting for our readership. -But I’d imagine that, were you to just look through our content offerings, you might miss the fact that we really believe in the value of website audits.
In 2018, Gabriella wrote an article titled, Why Do I Need an Audit of My Website, in which she shared five important, top-level points. At its base, a website audit (or website analysis, online marketing analysis, SEO audit, etc. – it goes under many names) can:
But what does that mean, really?
Well, really, what that means is that a comprehensive audit – a full, in depth, looking for the Holy Grail scale website analysis – gets to the very essence of every marketing campaign you will do for the next year. Or even the next several years.
That is a lot of pressure on a five-letter word, which is why so much work goes into it, and why we require our first-time clients with established sites to go through a website audit.
And it all turns into a single four-letter word with a huge amount of weight to it. Data.
Let me take a moment for a nod to the difference between local and international site audits. In short, we look at the same areas. We look at, among other things:
We are looking for three things:
However, with international audits, it becomes more complex with each additional location and/or language. Besides the above, you must also consider things such as:
So, international website audits take more time to work through than local, but the end result is still the same – a massive amount of data you can use to turn your so-so marketing campaign into a powerhouse of selling potential.
If the benefit of an audit is a strong, successful marketing campaign, it is easy to think the value is simply a healthy bottom line. However, it goes way beyond that. The real value of a comprehensive website audit is timely, actionable data.
For example, an ecommerce client came to us a few years ago. One of their points of concern was over half of their traffic was from mobile devices, but they had very few, if any, mobile conversions. During the audit, we uncovered that the mobile version didn’t work right. Whenever anyone tried to click to learn more about the product, an issue with the code wouldn’t allow the click to actually happen.
The data (mobile traffic; no mobile conversions) brought about the action (fixing the technical issue), which brought about an immediate change to the bottom line – an additional $240,000 to the company that year, strictly through mobile.
I could fill at least a few pages with example after example of how the data uncovered made all the difference to the clients. Uncovering keywords with enough low-hanging fruit that it helped a company rank for over 40 terms, with an overall potential targeted traffic of 50,000 a month. Discovering broken navigation that had frustrated visitors leaving the site before a sale. Pinpointing calls-to-action that had no action simply because of the wrong placement.
-And it all came about from the data derived from in depth website audits.
I mentioned earlier in passing that we very seldom have a client where a website analysis isn’t part of the package. In general, if we aren’t doing an audit it is because:
We believe so strongly that we have turned clients away who weren’t willing to have an audit performed.
Why? Well, this is the point where Jessie J comes out on stage and starts singing, “It’s not about the money, money, money…” We’re not simply padding the bill. Believe me when I say that a website audit takes a lot of effort.
The first reason is this: if you aren’t willing to do what it takes to find out what needs to be fixed – on your website and in your marketing strategies -, experience has shown us that you also won’t take our recommendations seriously. Our reputation suffers because you still expect results, even though we’re working at half power with no data.
The second reason is that we’d be working with no data. Without the audit, we’re shooting in the dark. With the data from the audit, it doesn’t matter if we’re in the dark because we have infrared scopes. You get the best results from your marketing campaigns, and our reputation continues to strengthen. It’s a win-win situation.
At the beginning of this post, I said that website audits are essential tools. After a comprehensive audit, where every bit of your online presence is gone through with a fine-toothed comb, you should be able to refer to that data – for at least a year – for every marketing campaign you’re thinking about implementing. You’ll have the right metrics (which is one of a big reasons marketing campaigns fail) and the right information at the right time.
It doesn’t get any better than that.
If you’re ready to take your website and marketing campaigns to the next level, contact Level343, LLC. With over 20 years’ experience in creating successful, converting campaigns, we have the know-how to get the job done. Let us boost your bottom line.
[ad_2] Source link
Digital Strategy Consultants (DSC) © 2019 - 2024 All Rights Reserved|About Us|Privacy Policy
Refund Policy|Terms & Condition|Blog|Sitemap
