How Can I Tell if I’m Reaching an Audience?
Most businesses know their customers. They’ve done market research, sent surveys or just talked to the clients they meet. Collecting customer data is often the first step toward creating marketing copy, website content and other outreach collateral. But even if a small business can’t afford a high-tech marketing firm, its owners at least have an idea who buys their products and services.
After all that hard work, your small business can’t rest. Reaching an audience, no matter how well you think you know them, requires continual tweaking, editing and revising. Most importantly, don’t ignore your website content since it represents your company online. If it’s not working, you’re paying the price.
What’s the Price of Ineffective Website Content?
If you have a brick-and-mortar store, you or your sales staff interact with customers who walk through the door. Your goal may be a sale, but in the process, you help customers narrow down their search and pick the most appropriate product. Your website has no sales force. The content, as well as the design and graphic elements, have to function as:
- Subject matter expert
- Salesman
- Trusted resource
The price of not reaching an audience is the deafening sound of silence. If your website connects with your audience, you notice an uptick in contacts and possibly even greater sales. If your message fails, you miss an opportunity to build your customer base that you may never get again.
How Can I Avoid a Bothersome Message?
There are many ways to mess up your message. The more you know your customers, the less likely you are to fail, but it can still happen. To avoid creating a bothersome message, follow some tips that include:
- Respect your audience.
- Don’t waste their time.
- Don’t use a tone that patronizes them.
- Provide valuable information they may not find elsewhere.
- Give them options, when appropriate.
When your message is all about you or what you’re promoting, that means you’re not delivering timely, valuable information. When your message connects, you’re reaching an audience that may buy from you.
How Can I Make My Message Beneficial?
Reaching an audience means delivering appropriate information at the appropriate time. This involves your website hierarchy. When visitors land on your site, your site has to guide them toward what they’re looking for. Structure your website so that:
- Your Home Page provides broad information about your business, its competitive advantage and the problems your products or services solve — you can’t know what they’re seeking, so provide options.
- You provide choices where to go next without overwhelming your visitors — make your navigation menu as short as it can be while keeping it clear.
- Your Products or Services pages delve into more detail about each — if a visitor’s found these interior pages, they’re closer to buying, so state your case.
- You’ve placed call-to-action buttons or links clearly and strategically on your site — be ready whenever the visitor’s ready; reduce the obstacles when visitors want to contact you.
And if a page title promises information about a specific topic, that page had better deliver the goods. Don’t fool your visitors. Don’t mislead them. Don’t even surprise them. Give them the exact information they’re looking for, and you’ll become a trusted resource and they’ll become a customer. If you want help crafting effective website content, contact the pros at Ray Access.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
