To paraphrase Gertrude Stein’s famous quote, “A rose is a rose is a rose,” is a website visitor really just a website visitor? Nope. There are three different kinds of visitors, and each one wants a distinctly different thing from you. Your company’s website is a constant work-in-progress, and as you’re considering what content to add next, you should keep these different people in mind. This article will show you the three kinds of visitors your website must help.
The web visitor looking for you specifically
This is by far the easiest visitor to accommodate. Do you have website? Great! You’re done. Okay, maybe not quite yet, but you’re more than halfway there. If this web visitor is searching for you specifically, this person obviously already knows who you are. He or she might have met you in person, read something you wrote, or heard about you from a friend.
Here’s the important question – once this visitor comes to your site, how are you welcoming him or her? Is your website currently a sales pitch talking all about you? Or, are you welcoming the visitor to your site by asking, “How can I help you now that you’re here?” You can do this by implementing Teaching-Based Marketing. Actually, this strategy will appeal to all three visitors, and we’ll talk more about that in a bit.
The web visitor looking for you or one of your competitors
This web visitor knows what he or she wants, but doesn’t know from whom they’re going to get it. “Milwaukee accounting firms,” “Chicago Laser Tag,” or “Self-Directed 401(k) custodian,” would be some examples. How do you maximize your exposure to these potential customers?
- For location-specific business (like the first two searches above) make sure you’re letting Google know where you are. Google can’t read your mind, so be sure you’re mentioning where you’re located on your homepage. If you have an office location, storefront, etc. also be sure to register it with Google My Business.
- For more general “global” searches, this second visitor will also benefit from Teaching-Based Marketing. Here’s a great example – oftentimes, the number one question a potential customer has for you is, “How much does it cost?” You can answer that in three ways: 1.) Ignore the topic 2.) Simply put your prices or price sheet 3.) Help your visitors understand where pricing within your industry comes from. Educate them on what factors comprise pricing, and conclude with giving them a range of what they should expect to pay for your equivalent.
The web visitor looking for help by getting their questions answered
This is where Teaching-Based Marketing will really start helping you. Assuming you’re not going to spend money on buying ads, let’s concentrate on organic (i.e. free) search traffic and how to earn it. You, me, and everyone else uses Google to get our questions answered, right? So is your website helping Google find answers? Or is your website just about you? Start making your website all about answering your visitors’ questions, and you’ll earn more Google traffic.
Here’s the magic formula for getting Google to drive visitors to you – start producing answers to questions you hear all the time from customers and potential customers. Google’s only job is to deliver relevant answers to questions, and if you do that better than others, you start to get rewarded. In your day-to-day interactions with your customers, you’ll see there are questions that keep popping up. If you’re answering a question more than one time, especially via email, then for goodness sake, turn that question (and your corresponding answer) into an article available on your website. That way, the next time you’re asked that question, you can send the link to your article instead of writing the same email yet again.
Oh, and did I mention this is the beginning of your eBook too?