Website Objectives - The Secret to Consistently Growing Online

Setting up a website opens up a world of opportunity. Getting your business out there on the world wide web creates a hub for your customers or clients to find and connect with you. However, without a clear focus on what your website objective is, you might find you’re currently falling short of all this potential. 

Clarifying a goal for your site may seem a simple concept but it can drastically change how you approach every element of website building. A singular website objective is a guiding compass that can help you stay focused on what’s really going to drive success for you. 

A common trap that many new website owners fall into is trying to accomplish too much at once. Their websites act as a signpost to here, there and everywhere: come shop with us, sign up to our email list, follow us on social media, check out which events we’re showcasing at, we have wholesale options… The list goes on. 

There’s scope to offer all of these things through your website in due course, but not before you know it can accomplish your main objective really well. You have to confidently know that your website is capable of guiding a visitor to take action - Action that drives your business forwards. Read on to find out how you can make this happen on your site. 

 

Examples of Website Objectives

Your main website objective is likely to be determined by what kind of business you have. For example, whether you’re ecommerce, service-led, informative, etc. However, broadly speaking, typical website objectives include:

• To attract x amount of sales per month

• To attract x amount of enquiries per month

• To attract x amount of email list sign ups per month

• To attract x amount of followers on social media per month

• To boost store footfall by x amount of customers per month
  
  

These are just a few ideas of what you may have started your website to accomplish. Of course, it could have been for any other reason not listed here. 

The important thing to remember is that, in the beginning, you have to boil down your motivations for being online to one reason and one reason only. This will help maintain your focus on building a website that delivers on your primary objective. 

 

Setting a Website Objective

As with any goal, it helps to get really specific when setting your website objective for yourself. This helps you to definitively know when you have accomplished your goal or how close you’ve come to success and where you might need to adjust. 

To set out your Website Objective, you should use the SMART Framework:

• Specific - You have to be super clear about the action you want to accomplish

• Measurable - There has to be a way to measure this goal

• Achievable - It shouldn’t be too easy, but not unattainable either

• Relevant - You should be clear about why the objective drives your business forwards

• Time bound - There should be a deadline where you assess your progress
  
  

For example, for a brand new ecommerce store, the owner may set a SMART objective such as:

To have made 10 individual sales on the website by the end of Q4 this year.

This goal has specified that 10 sales is the goal. This is measurable by the number of receipts. It’s not easy for a new store to make 10 sales in a short timeframe but it’s certainly achievable. It’s relevant as it proves the store concept and will have generated revenue for the business, and it’s time bound to the end of the year. 

When it comes to the end of Q4, the website owner can review their progress. How has their website delivered on this goal? If the goal has been met, they can plan out a new goal that moves their business forward (after celebrating of course!)

If they didn’t quite reach their goal, they can review what worked well and what didn’t produce results for them so that they can reassess their strategy, reset the time frame and try again. 

Using this strategy as a website owner, you will be consistently growing your business. You’ll either be setting new goals or reassessing how to meet the objective you’ve set. Once you’ve met your objective, you will always be building on that success and leveling up your business. 

 

How to Meet Your Website Objective

Once you have an objective in mind, it’s down to you to optimise your website and marketing to try to meet your goal. There will be any number of different ways you can go about this so it’s helpful to put together a plan of actions. 

There should be a way to measure the success of each of these actions so that you can determine what worked for your business and what didn’t when you come to review your SMART goal. You can then pick and choose only the most helpful actions to carry forward. 

Here are some ideas of how you can structure your website and marketing to meet your objective:

 

Make Your Home Page More Effective

Your home page is a first introduction to your business for many of your website visitors. It’s important you not only hook your visitors as soon as they find you, but also signpost them to the resources that will help them take action on your site. Discover our tips on how to do so in our blog; How to Make Your Website Home Page More Effective >>

 

Create a Journey in Your Website Menu

Your Header Menu is visible and prominent across every page of your website. The pages contained in this menu should only be the most critical to your website objective and act as a pathway to action. Other pages that aren’t as vital, like your terms and conditions, can be placed in your footer. Consider which pages contribute the most and organise your Header and Footer accordingly. 

 

Utilise Powerful Calls-To-Action

A call to action (CTAs) usually takes the form of a button on a website. It’s a prompt that serves to lead your visitor on to the next step of their journey to take action. It’s through these CTAs that you can guide your website visitors. Consider carefully what the CTA should be on every page of your site and how it feeds back into your website objective. Are there any CTAs that distract from this goal on your pages? 

 

Reevaluate Your Landing Pages

You can find out which pages people are landing on and first discovering your website. If you have a blog or other pages that are ranking well for your website, you might find that people aren’t just landing on your homepage. Consider how you can lead these visitors from your content, onto your journey towards becoming a customer. You could use a call-to-action to prompt them to check out your products or services. You could also invite them to an email list so you can reach out to them later. 

 

Focus on Bounce Rate

Bounce rate is the percentage of people who land on your page only to leave without taking any kind of action. If your potential customers or clients are finding your site just to leave before taking any action, what is the reason? Finding where there are high bounce rates on your site can help you identify where there might be problems with your site that you can address. Our blog on How to Reduce Bounce Rate can help you fix many of these common pitfalls. 

 

Feature Testimonials 

Have you received glowing feedback from those visitors who have already taken action on your site? Showcasing these words can have a profound effect on new visitors and can help them to trust your brand. This in itself can inspire more action on your site. Find out how you can acquire and utilise testimonials for maximum effect >>

 

Keep Testing Wherever You Can

The destination is rarely ever as important as the journey. Having a website objective is the first step to effectively growing your website, but tracking the actions that lead you to complete that objective provides you with a blueprint for future growth. Wherever possible, track what you can in your marketing analytics and Google Analytics to determine what is working for your business so you can replicate your success in the future. 

 

Wrapping Up

Whether you’re just starting out online, or you’ve been running your website for a while now, it’s never too late to pick up an objective led approach to leveling up your website. 

Doing so will keep you focused on what is working in your business and for your website. Running a small business can be overwhelming enough as it is. There’s no need to be spinning plates with your website. If you can do one thing and do it well, you’ll soon find you’re excelling your expectations of where you thought you could be!

If this is your first time finding Create, it’s our goal to support small businesses in getting online and growing. We’ve helped thousands of entrepreneurs build and control their own websites without needing to know how to code. With the support of a dedicated Account Manager and our continually growing community, we want to help you grow too. 

 

 

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