No one likes to wait, especially when they’re online. When the internet first came on the scene in the 1990s, it wasn’t unreasonable to wait a while for a page to load.
But today’s consumers have less patience, only willing to wait about 2.7 seconds for their websites to load, and that’s across all devices, including mobile. Even a delay of 100-milliseconds can cause a 7% decrease in business.
Whether the website is Amazon.com or a financial website, there’s no time to waste. Even a millisecond lost matters.
But there’s a lot more to analyzing a site than just figuring out load speed. Here are five reasons how a website can benefit from a site analysis.
1. Web Design Improvements
A website design that hasn’t changed in years loses out on a lot of potential business. An amazing looking website in 2007 won’t capture a consumer’s attention in 2017.
That’s because more people now have access to the internet than they did 10 years ago: 1,463 million users in June 2007 to 3,885 million users in June 2017.
With trends and viral posts changing at broadband speeds, it’s hard to keep up with what consumers are looking for, especially while running a busy business.
Today’s consumers have high expectations of what they want to see and how they want to use the internet, specifically photos and video.
Using video, with or without sound, will automatically increase viewership by 49%, but only if they’re around 2 minutes long.
At the same time, consumers are looking for simplicity. An effective website must reflect both technological advances and a return to the basics.
It’s hard for most businesses to accomplish these tasks on their own. They need experts who can meet the demands of their audience, creating easy to use, informative financial websites.
A site analysis will allow these experts to target the weaker aspects of your website and strengthen them.
2. Keyword Analysis
No website would ever be found online if it didn’t use the right keywords. But it’s tough figuring out which keywords work best, especially for a financial-based website.
Not only does one have to worry about regulatory practices, but business owners also have to keep up with trending keywords and content that will attract the right consumers to their website.
If the content is too boring or too complicated to absorb, an e-commerce company can lose out on potential business.
A site analysis can ensure that the proper keywords are used while also keeping the content on the site informative and interesting.
3. A Site Analysis Includes Looking at SEO
Google is always changing their SEO practices, making site analysis a smart investment for businesses looking to rank high on the search engine results page.
A proper site analysis takes a look at the entire website and makes sure everything runs smoothly according to best practices.
It will check to see if the right meta tags are being used and make sure the headers and subheaders fit, ensuring the right consumers find the website.
Without a proper analysis, it’s tough to find all the problems a website might have. Often, what lurks behind the scenes causes the most problems like duplicate content, too many keywords, or missing sitemap data, all of which affect SEO.
These problems wreak havoc not only with search engines, who penalize the site but also with consumers, who lose faith in it.
Luckily, many of these analytical tools are free.
Google Webmaster Tools help troubleshoot poor SEO performance. There’s also a free SEO report card by UpCity to help users see how they stand up to their competition.
Making sure the site is fully secure is part of the analysis. Consumers won’t buy from companies if they feel their private financial information is at risk.
It’s also worth it to invest in an SSL certificate. Another consideration is to switch from HTTP to HTTPS. When data is transferred from one computer to another, HTTPS encrypts the information, keeping it safe while in transit.
4. Marketing the Business
An audience can change depending on what’s being sold. Bonsai Finance, for example, doesn’t sell to Fortune 500 companies, they help individuals find the money they need to improve their financial situations.
Based on this objective, they want to align with companies that do the same thing. That’s not something to be taken lightly. They want to bond with their customers and make them feel safe with their company.
People don’t do business with companies, they do business with people, specifically people they trust. The same goes for websites. They should be constructed to elicit trust from potential customers.
Any products or services offered should help the customer live a better, happier life. Navigation should be seamless and pages should load in a snap.
But successful marketing also depends on a safe and secure website, especially when sensitive information is being shared. Without instilling trust in the customer, no amount of marketing dollars will bring them in.
A site analysis can highlight any problems and allow a company to come up with a solution.
5. Checking the Links
Too many links, broken links, or bought links can negatively affect a website. However, they’re often hard to find without a proper site analysis.
But it goes further than that. The links should be named properly. There should also be plenty of action links on the website, though not too many to overwhelm customers.
Even external links are a necessity in the right amount. They help build organic traffic to and from each site. However, having too many of them can also work against the business.
Getting the Right Help
It can be time-consuming, frustrating, and downright confusing to figure out the latest rules, regulations, and back-end website duties that even small companies have to deal with.
Ensure that your website is up and running at all hours. If it crashes in the middle of the night, fix it before it becomes a major fall-out the next day.
Don’t wait until there’s a problem. Register with us today to keep up with the latest changes in website development and analysis.
