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How to Ensure Your Website Attracts More Visitors
January 27, 2014 |Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
A study conducted by CEB found that customers are 57% of the way through the purchasing process before contacting a vendor. That means they're researching possible vendors long before they actually contact them. What can PCB manufacturers do to put themselves on the finalist list? Here are some positive examples of what a few PCB companies are doing now:
Links to Social Content
A company website serves as the hub for its social media. Cross connecting social media networks with the website is good for search engine optimization. Tip: Check links from time to time to make sure they still work correctly.
Customer Testimonials
Nothing establishes credibility with a website visitor like testimonials from satisfied customers. Note that if a testimonial cannot be attributed to a particular person at a company, it's worthless. Prototron's website has good examples of testimonials done correctly. (Full disclosure: I do work with Prototron.)Make It Easy to Contact People
In my year-end review of PCB manufacturers and social media, I reviewed the websites of over 100 companies. I was struck by the website for Compunetics, who listed their seven top executives, along with their phone numbers and e-mail addresses. That smacks of accountability.
Great Technical Resources
This is probably the most important thing a company can use their website for: Providing relevant content that helps a prospective customer solve a problem. Doing this accomplishes two things: It separates the company from the pack who would never “give something away for free,” and it will bring that person back looking for more. Using content in this manner can vault a company from being a vendor to being a resource. Vendors get replaced. Resources are valued. Epec Engineered Technologies, Saturn Electronics, and Transline Technology are good examples of companies that do this well. And for everyone that says only big companies can engage in social media, note that Transline may very well be the smallest of the 100 companies I reviewed. But I don’t think they will stay the smallest.
A Steady Stream of News and Links
Fresh content is good for search engine optimization (SEO). If there are links to other websites, even better. Google and the other search engines like keywords, but that alone won’t move a company up the search rankings. Google wants to see links to other sites, and it thinks that companies with new content (like news) are more relevant.
Make It Visitor Friendly
Many PCB websites offer free stuff: Technical papers, canned webinars, and sign-ups for newsletters--and that is all good. But the sign-up process should be as easy as possible. It shouldn’t a pain in the you know what, or even a speed bump (the term in the industry is to be “frictionless”). The best example of this that I have seen is on Murietta’s website. The sign-up process for their newsletter is front and center on the homepage and consists of one field for an e-mail address. No long form asking for company, title, phone, PCB budget, next of kin, and all sorts of suspicious and extraneous information.
What a lot of these and other companies recognize is that it all comes down to the customer. What do they want to see on a website? These companies understand that it's all about the customer’s needs, not the glorification of the PCB manufacturer.Let me close with a story: While wandering around Screaming Circuits’ website, a live chat pop-up appeared, with an employee asking if he could help me with any questions. That’s impressive. It was 7:30 a.m. his time in Oregon. Now that is really impressive. Oh, and make that 7:30 on a Sunday morning. While you were asleep they were trying to help a prospective customer on their website.
Now that's selling PCBs.In two weeks, the next in the series, I'll discuss what not to do on your website, including some truly cringe-worthy examples.Bruce Johnston is a sales consultant specializing in social media and especially LinkedIn. He has over 25 years experience in high-tech sales and management. He can be reached at brucej@practicalsmm.com or through his profile on LinkedIn.