Is your website design killing your business?

You might find this hard to believe but a large percentage of phone calls that we receive are from business owners that are seriously frustrated by the fact that they are ranking on Google but they are not getting any decent leads. They simply cannot understand why they have paid all this money to an SEO agency and yet their sales and revenue hasn’t increased. They tell me they are ranking on Google but the phone is simply not ringing.
This is far more common than you would think and the answer to this is simple; they are not getting any qualified leads because their website is flawed and not converting site visitors into customers. Called conversion rate optimisation, websites are floundering online badly and customers are deserting theses sites (even eCommerce sites) because they have simply not adhered to fundamental web design principles.

We find that these business owners have not been properly educated at the outset of their SEO campaign regarding the implication of having a sub standard website and the ensuing damage it can and will cause as the ranking begin to rise. It is essentially the fault of the SEO agency for not pointing out the issues on the website and for not fixing these.

For the sake of ease I am outlining some issues that many websites have in common that should be immediately fixed before starting any SEO campaign. I know when people come and see me for their SEO, the first thing I do is go through a check list of things that a website must have and look at any issues with their current site that needs immediate attention. I make sure I tell the client about these at this meeting and look at ways of addressing them promptly. I clearly explain to them that we can certainly drive traffic to their website but this will be pointless unless the changes are done. In 99.99% of the cases these are implemented by us quickly and we see immediate improvements in their websites conversion rates. You’d be amazed by

So, here are some critical ‘ on page’ issues that are killing your inquiry rates.

# 1: There are simply no call to action buttons on the website. You will be surprised by how many people do not even have a phone number on their site. The most important thing you must have on your site is a buying path where visitors know how to contact or phone you. This is mandatory and if your number is not front and centre, then it needs to be.

# 2: I find that a lot of websites have been left untouched for many years and they still carry the excess baggage of what was in vogue 5-10 years ago. This includes lots of animation, sound and over the top graphics that are now not relevant.

# 3: There are a ton of websites out there that still have out dated services that are completely irrelevant to their business and when they start to rank on Google and get inquiries for this they are a complete waste of time. Ideally, you need to be updating your website regularly with your services and pruning the redundant ones.

# 4: I still see sites that have content that has been purely written for the search engines pre Panda update. There is a whole lot of gibberish and waffle that makes no sense and is stuffed with as many keywords on the page in order to try to trick the search engines. The only outcome is that it just annoys people and contributes to lower conversion rates.

# 5: Some websites are still not mobile or responsive. There is so much literature about this online that I’m still amazed by people who still refuse to make their website compatible with mobiles. This is the death knell for any site and owners need to wake up and get on board with modern day technologies if they are to remain competitive.

# 6: You are stuck with a really bad CMS that doesn’t allow you to make any changes or edits – this is really common as many web design agencies con and scam people into using their own proprietary CMS systems – we make sure that the first thing we do is transfer the site over to WordPress.

# 7: Slow loading sites with heavy graphics that were designed by an agency and have never been optimised for speed. Slow loading sites as we all know are a real pain and waiting for them to load simply allows more time for people to exit the site. We make certain that site speed is lightening fast. We also look at the hosting to make sure it’s within Australia and that your not locked into some out dated hosting plan – with excessive monthly fees.

Basically the formula works like this: great content plus top graphics combined with a clever user interface and customer experience will lead to higher conversion rates. Add some decent SEO here and you are on a winner.

The issue with low quality websites is that Google will devalue them and place them lower in the rankings. The more relevant and more Google compliant the websites are the chances of them ranking will be far higher as will the conversion rates.

If you feel that you are missing out on your piece of the pie and you site is doing well on Google, then it’s time to do something about it. Obviously, you current SEO agency is not doing their proper job by telling you’re the bare facts and truth about your website. So my advice is to make the switch and get on board with a proper digital design agency that can handle, web, SEO, design as well as conversion rates. Call the team at Hopping Mad Designs on 02 9360 8514 and stop giving your competition the advantage!

Are you paying excessive monthly hosting fees?

There are many businesses getting absolutely ripped off by website design agencies who have built a website for them and are charging them in excess of $100 per month for hosting.

If you are one of these people wake up and smell the coffee cause you are getting scammed.

We see it all the time and it’s a common scam used by many web agencies to get as much money as they can as a reoccurring monthly fee from you. Essentially, it’s not necessary and it’s fleecing you out of your hard-earned dollars.

What they tell you is that they need to do regular maintenance and back up and checks on the website every month and this is the cost associated with this. This is total BS and if you keep falling for this scam then you need to get out of your contract with the web company.

The issue here is that most of the websites built by these agencies are on their own proprietary content management systems (which they NEVER EVER tell you about before you start) and basically you are stuck with using them and abiding by their ridiculous fees as there is nowhere else to go. You are stuck with them forever as long as you keep using their CMS and this is what they want. The longer you are with them, the more money they get and it’s for doing nothing!! With open-source CMS platforms most security and mandatory updates happen automatically and they don’t charge you a cent for this.

Related Article: Benefits of WordPress for Small Businesses

Don’t get ripped off by paying too much for your hosting

If you would have had your website built using an open-source CMS platform like WordPress then none of these issues would be happening.

The big rip off here is that they tell you that their CMS is oh so SEO friendly and you are going to rank on Google using their CMS and the poor ignorant business owner who has never ever done this before believes all this slick sales talk and gets suckered into signing up with them. Every month from that day onwards they are slugged over $100 for their monthly hosting with all the unnecessary add ons (that will have absolutely no effect on your business).

They package it up so nicely that you feel as though you are getting the sweetest deal on earth. They tell you that their CMS is totally editable (which is a complete lie) and that you can make any change you want ( which is another scam). Basically, you can edit very little and that if you want to make changes you have to go back to them to do it and boy o boy will they start slugging you big dollars for this on top of everything else.

If you’re not using a WordPress CMS – you could be getting ripped off!

The worst part of this is they tell you that they are always updating their CMS in line with current trends including added security features, which is again a total load of garbage. They do absolutely nothing and this talk is all hype to upsell you.

So moving forward, if you are stuck using an old outdated CMS system and you are paying excessive monthly hosting fees to a web design agency please make the move and get rid of them. Be smart and start using a WordPress CMS. This will put you back in the driver’s seat and save you lots of money. There are loads of cheap hosting providers like iinet and Ventra IP that will be able to offer competitive pricing for monthly hosting that are much cheaper than you are probably paying right now. I have provided the links to these companies so give them a call and see the huge savings you can make for your yearly hosting.