Does the design of your website influence a person’s decision to do business with you?
There are many web development companies out there who serve a particular industry, and they market themselves as specializing in designing websites for lawyers or dentists. Yes, these companies can create fancy websites with video and the whole nine, however, upon closer inspection, you discover that the content and design for one lawyer’s website is the same as other lawyers’ websites in other cities or states. This is what I discovered recently as I was doing research on lawyer websites.
Essentially what you have is a “cookie-cutter” website with everything the same except the name of the firm. If you’re a lawyer or dentist, this idea may seem fine because after all, you’re not really competing with lawyers in other states. What you do have, though, is duplicate content on your site, which may not go over well with Google and how this search engine ranks your site.
Even if duplicate content is a myth, the fact remains that your site is just a standard template. There’s nothing about it that stands out, except for an annoying video that autoplays when someone visits the site. The experience is almost like that pushy, overly talkative car salesman who runs up to you the minute you step foot on the car lot.
A study conducted by RainToday.com revealed that 74% of those surveyed said that a service provider’s website has at least “some influence” over their decision to buy services from the provider.
We’ve preached about how content will remain king for infinity, but it’s the design of your website that makes the initial impression. Everything from the colors used on your website to the links in your navigation bar has to grab the attention of a potential client or customer. Whether they are aware of it or not, these details make an impact on their decision to do business with you, and if your website is just like all the rest, it will be difficult for people to remember you.
Think of your website like the clothing you wear; you want to be unique and express yourself in the best way possible. A quality black suit is nice, but you can easily get lost in a crowd.
What are your thoughts about website design and its influence on your decision to buy from a particular service provider?
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Yea, I agree with this. I just built a website for an insurance agency, and ran into a company that builds websites for insurance.
ReplyDeleteAfter reviewing some of their portfolio, all the sites were nearly identical. Hopefully the developer changed some of the SEO aspects of those site.
Even if they are SEO friendly, I would not want one of my sites to look exactly like that of another company.