Keys to Making a Successful Financial Advisor Website
If your current website is not delivering the results you expected, it might be time for a few updates.
People’s tastes change. Search engines are always updating their algorithms. New design trends and tech are always popping up. More effective marketing strategies are constantly coming to light.
Your website is the foundation of your online presence so you need to be on top of all the latest design and tech trends if you want to stay ahead of the competition.
Pinpointing Your Website’s Weaknesses
Creating a great website requires a good understanding of design, back-end development, and SEO – just to name a few.
To quickly audit your website and compare it with industry benchmarks, we recommend trying out HubSpot’s Website Grader.
If your site is only scoring ‘OK’ or ‘Poorly’, take a closer look at each category score and find out which parameters need improvement. If you’re taking a big hit on Performance or SEO, then you need to take immediate action. These two directly affect your position on search engine results and your website’s overall user experience.
To improve your Performance rating you might need to upgrade your hosting package so that pages can load quicker. It might also require condensing and streamlining your website’s code.
If your IT person or web developer says that improving your site’s score is not possible, that’s a good indication that they require more training or that it’s time to look for a new web development team.
Of course, the Website Grader doesn’t tell the whole story. It looks for easily quantifiable technical aspects. It can’t measure the other aspects of your website that require creativity and marketing psychology. These are even more important to the success of your website.
Let’s take a closer look at some of these important website elements and how you can improve them.
Modern and Intuitive Design
It takes more than just good design skills to make a positive impression on your website visitors. You also need to keep up with modern web design trends that are more effective at delivering the right message.
Keeping up with the latest design trends also means you’re not going to be left behind by your competitors. People will see that you’re actively maintaining and managing your online storefront, which makes you look more respectable right off the bat.
Another important thing to remember when dealing with web design is that form should follow function. The main purpose of your design should be to make the site easier to use. Designing just for the sake of looking good won’t necessarily translate to a good user experience, which doesn’t help you in leaving a good impression on your target audience.
Intuitive design makes your website easy to use and makes all your content very accessible. All this helps increase the average time each visitor spends on your site.
Compelling Web Copy
A website’s visual design is important, but at the end of the day, it just provides the background and setting for your content. Your web copy will be the hook that draws in new clients and prospects.
Your homepage, about us, and services page should have great copy preferably written by someone who has lots of experience with sales and marketing. It should all be clear and to the point. Being too wordy makes the copy less interesting and just wastes valuable real estate.
Compelling web copy should strategically use power words that evoke emotions and persuade people to take action. They should read more like headlines to better catch people’s attention, and provide as much information as possible in the fewest words possible.
Content Strategy
In addition to impressive design and web copy, a good website should be filled with awesome content. This is how you can educate your visitors, and conversely, your content allows people to learn more about your brand.
Your content strategy will be the foundation of your website’s inbound marketing. The most effective way to get new people to visit your website is by providing solutions to their questions and issues.
Your content should be written and created with a purpose. Make a long list of keywords that you’d like to rank for and develop great content around each one.
Old tactics like keyword stuffing are very outdated and won’t make a dent on your SEO performance. Search engines can discern whether your content is something people will find useful, or if it’s just designed to trick the system.
You also need to build up your site’s credibility by reaching out to other established sites and asking them to link to your site. When search engines see links to your site on a page with high authority, some of that credibility gets passed on to your website.
Aside from written content, you can also develop infographics and create videos on your site. Adding different types of media makes your site more dynamic and engaging.
Here are just some of the types of videos you might want to consider:
- Explainer videos
- Product videos
- Testimonials
- Brand story videos
- Company culture videos
- Promos and ads
- Educational or how-to videos
Videos allow you to show the different sides of your company better than pages and pages of content.
Branding and Marketing Strategy
If you want to increase awareness for your brand and your website, you need to have a solid marketing strategy. You also need to be consistent with how you present your brand image so that people can easily identify who you are whenever they see your marketing efforts.
You can increase traffic to your site with email marketing and social media marketing. This allows you to publish updates to your mailing list subscribers and social media followers. This also gives you the opportunity to actively share your expertise with an audience who is already interested in your company, which further builds your credibility. When people get regular updates about your business, your brand will always be on top of their minds which can eventually lead to better conversions.
Social Media and Social Proof
Adding links to your social media pages on your website makes it easier for people to follow you on their preferred platforms. Social media is a powerful marketing tool that will allow you to actively engage with your target audience. It’s also a great way to earn people’s trust by way of social proof.
‘Social proof’ includes things like public reviews, forum discussions mentioning your company and staff, referrals on social media, “likes,” and followers. It demonstrates that you are trustworthy and helps your visitors form a more detailed impression of your company.
For example, will a new customer clicking over to your Facebook page see that you and the team received thousands of ‘likes’ for raising money for a charity? Or will they see a stream of negative reviews aimed at your customer service department? It’s a powerful part of marketing that every business should actively manage.
Think of social media as an extension of your financial website. Think carefully about the brand and image which you wish to portray. If you get stuck, speak to a digital marketing expert who can adapt your branding over to your social media pages.
Be sure to moderate any comments on your profile pages, and keep your social media pages regularly updated so that there is always fresh content for users to consume. The last thing people want to see is a page that hasn’t been updated in months. It’s a poor reflection on your brand and makes your business look less successful.
If you don’t have enough original content for your social media pages, you can simply repost content from your site, as well as repost industry-specific content from other pages and brands.
As you can see, having a great financial website isn’t rocket science, but it does require some time, effort, and resources to get it right. Once the results start rolling in, in the form of new leads, customers, and sales, you’ll be glad you put in the time.
To give your financial website an overhaul and quickly put some distance between you and your competition, get in touch with a web design team that specializes in financial websites.
Learn how we have helped over 1,000 Companies in the Financial Space thrive. Contact Dan Stark at AltaStreet today.