You’ve got a website, but do you really know what’s working on that site?
As a small business owner, you’re pulled in so many different directions and marketing is just one more thing on your list. Which is exactly why you need to pay attention to what’s working and what’s not so you can focus your efforts on the things that deliver results – leads and sales.
Today, I’m sharing three test you can run on your website to learn what’s really going on and how to put that information into action.
1. Heatmap Tracking
Before you start any testing, you want to get some good data on what is already happening on your website. Google Analytics provides insights into where your visitors find you on the web, yet what happens once they’re on your site is often a mystery.
That’s where heatmaps come in (click here to see a heatmap example from CrazyEgg).
Heatmaps provide you with a powerful visualization of how your website visitors use your site, including where your visitors are clicking and what they’re totally ignoring.
This insight is incredibly valuable, especially as you develop your website optimization strategy.
Instead of randomly selecting things to test, you can focus on specific improvement areas to make the most of the website traffic you’re generating.
Once you have implemented your optimization efforts, heatmaps will show you almost immediately how your visitors respond to any changes you make.
2. Menu
The menu navigation on your site is a great area to test as you optimize your website flow for visitors.
There are two simple, yet powerful, menu tests to consider that could have a significant impact on your website effectiveness.
Menu Test 1: Navigation Headings
As an example, let’s say the Duct Tape Marketing team wanted to improve clicks on Free eBooks so they decide to test a few other headers such as:
- Free Resources
- Freebies
- Free Downloads
They could quickly see if another phrase would work better than ‘Free eBooks’.
Menu Test 2: Order
Another test you may want to run on your website navigation menu is the order you have each navigation item.
As an example, let’s say the Duct Tape Marketing team wanted improve ‘Free eBooks’ in another test. They could move ‘Free eBooks’ to the ‘Work With Us’ spot, testing if that would drive more visitors onto that page.
3. Call To Actions
Whenever you have a call to action – a button, image, graphic, landing page or plain text – you have the opportunity to test different variables as you optimize your website experience.
Two of the easiest variables to test include color and text.
Color
Color can have a major impact on how well your calls to action work throughout your website. But the tricky thing with color is that no one color works best all the time.
What stands out is much more likely to be clicked, so try colors that contrast and stand out. If you’re not sure where to start with testing colors, try this free tool from Adobe that provides great color palettes to test.
Text
What you say on your call to action can have a major impact on your conversion rate. Optimizely has a great article about the 2008 Obama campaign testing text on their call to action button.
The four buttons they tested were:
- Join Us Now
- Learn More
- Sign Up Now
- Sign Up
The best performing button was ‘Learn More’, beating the original by over 40% and resulting in an estimated 2.8 million extra subscribers.
Optimizing your website begins with good data into what’s currently happening. Once you have that data, you can focus on a few key areas to test. Sometimes it’s very small tweaks – a different color, phrase or even menu navigation order – that can have a major impact on how well your website works for your business. But you won’t know until you test.
Michelle Evans is a Business and Marketing Strategist specializing in creating simple, effective marketing and business growth strategies that free up time, bring in clients and deliver results. Download your free Simple Marketing Metrics Guide for a fast and easy framework to help you discover what marketing will grow your business (and what won’t).
