If your B2B website isn’t helping improve your bottom line, it may be time to consider making some updates to enhance its value. We have gathered a few suggestions on where to focus your efforts to give you the best return on investment.
Why is B2B website design important for B2B companies?
Many b2b companies neglect making updates to their website as they feel it doesn’t have an impact on achieving business goals. They often say that because their website does not sell product directly on the site that it isn’t worth investing any more money in. Instead, they feel that direct marketing is the best place to spend their budget. This however, could be further from the truth. A b2b website serves as your biggest business salesperson, and allows you to develop awareness for your brand from virtually anywhere in the world. By having a more strategic approach to your b2b website design, your brand can improve search rankings, increase lead generation and improve onsite conversions, all of which will help your business increase revenue long term.
An Effective B2B Website Will:
- Increase lead generation
- Establish credibility and trust
- Generate brand awareness
- Encourage communication
- Improve search rankings
Here are a few suggestions of where to enhance your b2b website:
1. Improved Design
Many b2b companies take a business focused approach when it comes to their website design. They showcase products and services, as well as some information of where to get in contact. Many have outdated branding, and haven’t refreshed their design since the early 90s. By making some design updates using a client focused approach, a b2b business can generate a better return on investment for their website.
You want to start by anticipating the wants and needs of your target audience and anticipate a customers journey from start to finish. This will allow you to guide your visitors to areas of the site that are likely to have the most interest in- whether that be industry news, event registration, technical documents or resources, then eventually present them with information related to your business products. This client focused approach also prevents any confusion when trying to locate information on your site, helping to improve metrics such as bounce rate and visitor engagement.
Below are a few recommendations to improve the design of your b2b landing page:
- Keep website navigation simple so visitors can find the information they need quickly; utilize dropdown features for more specific content
- Include calls to action on key pages to increase conversion rate
- Use professional imagery and updated branding to make a good impression on first time website visitors
- Keep your homepage simple- too much content might overwhelm new visitors
- Explain your mission, vision and values in an about section
- Make contact information easy to locate
- Update your careers page to create a vision of what a day in the life might look like at your company and what benefits are included. This will help increase the number of qualified applicants wanting to work with you over just listing jobs.
2. Mobile Design
Making your b2b website responsive across all mobile and tablet devices is another way that your business can increase leads and visitor activity. Smartphone activity has experienced an 88% increase in growth year after year, with many individuals averaging 5 hours of screen time per day. Visitors that come across a website that is not mobile responsive will usually abandon the site for another search result that is. This means if your b2b website is not mobile responsive, you are likely missing out on a large market of traffic that may have an interest in your products and services.
3. Better Search Tools
Improving search visibility can seem like an overwhelming task, but is a vital component to improving lead generation. By partnering with an SEO strategist that can recommend some tools that will help your business understand how to improve their SEO rankings, you will be well on its way to more effectively driving growth online. Below are a few SEO tools we would recommend for a b2b website:
- Competitive Analysis Tool- see where competitors rank and analyze their keyword strategies
- Google Search Console- allows a business to monitor search performance and helps guide technical decisions and keyword optimization
- Google Analytics- to monitor trends in traffic and better optimize your SEO efforts
- Google Trends- see what topics and keywords are trending in your industry
- Google Adwords Planner-review highly searched keywords and evaluate competitiveness of them to determine your keyword strategy
4. Landing Pages
Incorporating landing pages on a few of your top pages is an effective way for a b2b organization to increase onsite conversion rate. Conversion rate is determined by the frequency that action is taken when visiting your website- whether that be through filling out forms, completing surveys, donating to your cause or completing a purchase. A landing page can help draw attention to these action areas on your website and encourage visitors to perform some sort of action that may bring them closer to a purchasing decision.
A few elements for an effective landing page design for a b2b organization would include:
- Include a clear call to action statement in bright bold lettering (this will help with increasing conversion rate)
- Use a persuasive headline that encourages a visitor to read further
- Create a value statement or offer that is clear and simple to understand and makes visitors aware of your solutions
- Include video or imagery to draw more attention to your landing page
5. Online Chat
Incorporating an online chat functionality is an effective tool to allow visitors to communicate directly and answer any questions they may have early on without having to wait for a response from a contact form or phone message. An online chat function also helps improve the level of customer service your business can provide by allowing for a faster response rate to questions, concerns or comments visitors may have about products or services.
6. Case Studies
Case studies help b2b clients showcase the effectiveness of solutions through previous client success stories. Case studies are detailed overviews of individual projects that discuss individual client challenges, and how the business was able to effectively meet these needs through their solutions. An effective case study will include data and address how they were able to meet the business objectives of their client.
Case studies are helpful for b2b organizations because they help a potential client relate how their solutions could have an impact on their business. Case studies also encourage visitors to interact more with a b2b website by providing an additional source of content that they can read to learn more about a business.
7. Blog
Blogging is an inexpensive way for a business to drive website traffic, enhance their marketing strategy, and build trust in their brand, which can help them increase sales over the long term. Blogging allows a business to have a voice when it comes to industry topics and trends, which can help make them more relatable to their visitors. Blogging is also an effective content marketing strategy for b2b organizations for increasing lead generation. By putting out frequent website content, a business is able to increase their search rankings, increasing the likelihood that new visitors will come to their website.
Below are a few tips when starting a blog for your b2b organization:
- Use internal linking and optimize keywords to help search engines find your blog content
- Decide on a content strategy and which topics your visitors are interested in learning more about
- Incorporate your blog content into email and social marketing campaigns to increase visibility of your blog
- Longer blog posts increases search ranking ability, so focus on creating quality content over quantity
Alliance Interactive partners with b2b clients to provide custom website design, strategy and marketing services.