Inbound marketing is a system, which means that the ultimate output is dependant on a series of integrated inputs. And one of the most important inputs is, of course, an inbound marketing website.
Below, we highlight 7 essential elements of a high powered inbound marketing website, which combine to ensure that the system is optimized for maximum ROI:
1. Relevant Professional-Level Content
Websites aren’t vending machines. They’re conversations between a business and its various target audiences (a.k.a. buyer personas). To ensure that this conversation is effective, engaging and solution-oriented, all content must be relevant and professional. This includes text, graphics, videos, and all other pieces that combine to tell a business’s brand story.
And of course, inbound marketing websites need to push out a steady stream of fresh, relevant content — both for engagement purposes, and for search engine findability.
2. Multiple Micro-Conversions
Micro-conversions are desirable activities that businesses want customers to take (and of course, customers themselves want to take) that represent steps forward along the buyer’s journey. These activities may include downloading an ebook or report, watching a video, starting a web chat, and so on.
It’s important for inbound marketing websites to have multiple micro-conversions, instead of just a single “buy now” (for B2C) or “contact us” (for B2B). This is because many customers aren’t yet interested or ready to engage in a direct dialogue. Forcing them to do so via a poorly-designed inbound marketing website is an ultimatum: get in touch or get lost. Not surprisingly, most choose the latter.
3. Fast Loading & Responsive Design
We’re combining these elements because they’re no longer optional and haven’t been for a few years — although many inbound marketing websites are missing the boat on one or both.
Fast loading means that customers won’t stick around for content to load, graphics to digitally unfurl, forms and buttons to show up, and so on. Research by Kissmetrics.com found that a 1 second increase in load time can reduce conversions by 7 percent!
Responsive design means that a website must load quickly (as described above) and look flawless on various devices and browsers.
4. Findability
Inbound marketing websites need to be findable, which means showing up for targeted keywords via search (regular blogging combined with guest posting is still the best way to do this). They also need to be found in all relevant directories and platforms, like Google My Business.
5. Social Integration
Social integration means two things: first, it means that businesses need to regularly push fresh content across all relevant channels (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.) in order to pull traffic to their inbound marketing websites. Second, means that it should be easy for customers on the website to share content with their social network.
6. Metrics, Metrics and More Metrics
Inbound marketing websites need to capture a full range of metrics — such as time-on-site, referring source, and so on — so they can see what’s working, and just as importantly, what isn’t. Simply keeping an eye on basic traffic statistics isn’t enough. Businesses need to drill deep, or else they can’t adjust and optimize.
7. Game Plan
We’ve deliberately left this for last, but not because it’s the least important element — actually, it’s the most important, but easier to grasp in light of the above. That’s because each of these inbound marketing website elements must be part of a comprehensive game plan that captures both strategy (what a business wants to do) and tactics (how it’s going to do them). Naturally, this game plan must be unique to each business, and it also must be carefully monitored and optimized accordingly.
Learn More
To learn more about developing and executing a game plan for your inbound marketing website — so that you maximize ROI — contact the Leap Clixx team today. Your consultation with us is free.
For more information on how to turn your website into a lead generation machine, download our FREE eBook:
Topics: Inbound Marketing, Lead Generation
