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Is your website really helping your business?

I know this seems like a silly question to ask in 2020, but I still see examples of websites that do not actually help (or not as much as they could).

For a website to be helpful, it needs to have a well-defined goal. And if you can track that, all the better!

Here are some examples:

  • it helps sell your products or services
  • it showcases your experience and expertise
  • builds a community
  • makes a bold statement about a cause you believe in and support

Website vs. Social Media

Social media gets a lot of attention today. It is tempting to focus on building a following there. We all know and follow “influencers” on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn. 

But who really owns that audience and that space? Hint: It is not the influencer. It is the social media company. 

On a social media platform, even if you create content, you are still the guest. You are still a product that gets attention back to the social media company. You and your business can be kicked out at any time with no explanation given or a way to get back. And everything you have built can fall like a house of cards. 

This is where your website can help in a big way.

At the very least, your website should build a mailing list as a way for you to be able to contact your audience directly and not depend on “the algorithm” or “boosting” your content. 

Unlike your social media page, the website is yours, and so is the mailing list. You may be forced to change hosting or email providers, but you don’t lose your audience or content, provided you are disciplined with your backups.

A website can be supplemented with a podcast. The podcast shows will also be distributed directly to your subscribers at no extra cost to you. There is no algorithm involved and no need to “boost” your content. A podcast has the added advantage that your distributing content cost does not increase with the number of subscribers, as it happens with your mailing list. You should, however, still invite your listeners to subscribe to your newsletter from time to time. 

The Take-Away

The take-away is that your website should do something, not just take up Internet space.

It should at least:

  1. build trust
  2. invite the user to subscribe to your newsletter or podcast
  3. have a clear value proposition and a call to action on the home page

How is your website doing? Let me know about your challenges in the comment section.

Make good use of your Analytics data

Some people love looking at numbers, and some people don’t! Which kind are you?

That was a trick question because it does not matter. You have an online business, so you have to look at the numbers period. It is that simple.

I am surprised that even to this day, there are website owners who are not using Google Analytics. So by using it, I mean actually using it, not just having it installed. If you don’t have Google Analytics installed yet, this article is not for you 🙂

If you don’t like looking at the numbers, think of it as listening to their story.

What story can you learn by listening to your analytics data?

The most basic story could be: your site is broken! A sudden drop in numbers or an unexpected spike in errors is an excellent indicator that something is not working. The sooner you learn about this, the faster you can fix it.

Another story can be the “unexpected audience.” You may be assuming that a specific demographic or geographical region is visiting your site, but you may be wrong. Sometimes you may discover that it makes business sense to translate your offer to a different language, or to promote a page to a different demographic. Without analytics, it is challenging (if not impossible) to adapt to the changes in the market.

However, the most useful way that I am using analytics is to predict the future by looking at the past. Instead of guessing how many sales are you going to generate this month, you can use the past data to get a reasonable estimate of the monthly revenue. This allows you to plan ahead and to budget for your growth. It enables you to think long term, to strategize, instead of just surviving.

The second most useful way to use analytics is for tracking the success of your actions. Meaning: how will you know if the changes you have implemented have helped your business or not? This kind of tracking requires a bit more time to set up, but it is worth it.

It is an excellent idea to have the analytics code installed, even if you don’t know how to listen to the numbers yet. By the time you learn, there will be a story in your analytics data for you to interpret.

Installing the code

Google Analytics has good documentation about how to install their code. Also, most WordPress themes allow you to configure Google Analytics in their options. If a theme does not allow you to do this quickly, maybe it was not the right choice for your website.

For the more advanced users, I recommend using this plugin: PixelYourSite (https://www.pixelyoursite.com/)

How are you using your analytics data? Have you made any breakthroughs? Have you learned any hard lessons :)? Let me know in the comments below.