As a real-world example, I’ve been helping businesswomen with their home pages and advising them on which items can help them attract their ideal clients.

One of those items is your name if you’re a solopreneur, or a one-woman business and especially if your name is not in your domain. Their picture and name mean that the person landing on their website knows immediately who is offering their services.

Guess what I didn’t have on my own home page? There’s a video talking about who I help and my services. Not once in the video, or on the home page, was my name. Doh!

On some websites, it’s not even in the About Me page (quickly check my own website - phew, it's on there).

Why do we miss something so basic?
Because we know who we are. The assumption is that other people will know us, too, but if someone has arrived from a search engine or AI search, then they may not know much about you.

We tend to see errors on our website because they stand out from the norm. However, I’ve realised that messages and errors in the back end of the website can easily be ignored because they are seen as too hard, overwhelming, or people don’t know who to ask about them. Eventually, even back end errors can become invisible with their own blind spot.

The Big Picture
When we get used to the details, the nitty-gritty of the website, we can forget about the big picture of the website. We’re so focused on this particular offer, on this landing page, that we forget that it is all part of the client journey. In this way, we can often cause a gap by not letting the visitor know the next step in the journey.

There’s nothing wrong with testing out a service first before adding it to the website. For example, setting up a new service to test whether your clients want it before adding a landing page on your website. The test service can simply be an event in a booking system. However, when the service is successful, it can be added to your website, or a link can be added if the landing page is hosted somewhere else.

Each piece of content can have a what’s next step, a call to action in some form. At the end of a blog post, it can be an offer of a service (spoiler alert for this post), to book a discovery call, to download a checklist, or something else. It’s all part of the bigger picture of your website strategy.

You’re Not Your Ideal Client
This may seem obvious, but you’re not your ideal client. You may have been once, but you’re not any more. It can be difficult seeing your website through the eyes of your ideal client.
You may miss something in the messaging, because it’s obvious to you.
You may miss the next step, again, because it’s obvious to you.

I’ve seen websites where it was easy to get confused and lost because you clicked on a link expecting to go to one place and ended up somewhere else. For someone who has created it, it may seem obvious, or it may be a mistake that no one has picked up yet.

If you paid someone to create your website for you, have you gone through it all to make sure that it has the next steps that you’d expect? Even though they were designing it with your ideal client in mind, they may not have been clear about the bigger picture, and the client journey may end up in a dead end.

Why book a Strategic Web Review
You may be thinking, Karen, you’re not my ideal client either, so why should I book a Strategic Web Review? It’s true that I may not be your ideal client. However, I have been using WordPress for over 16 years, and I’ve seen a lot (and I mean a lot) of websites in that time. Some of them I designed, others I’ve visited as a potential client. If you don’t know me, I’m a problem solver and a systems person. I love simple systems, simply pathways. I know what makes a difference to a website, from it being a placeholder to being an active member of your team, working towards your business goals.

Now you know what you haven’t been seeing, you can look at your website again with fresh eyes. However, you’ll be doing that with your expertise and experience and not mine.

To book a Strategic website review, which is a 45-minute recorded online session with you, me and your website:
https://www.kisswpwebsites.com.au/Website-review