Note, this transcript was generated by AI and has not been edited.

Mary

If there is one thing that business owners need to be thinkin✨g aboꦚut when it comes to doing a new website, whatever you do, never ever work with an agency that tells yo꧋u they can't ꦑbuild a website that you can update on your own. This is a colossal, majoღr, crazy red flag that's designed to keep you from bein🐼g independent. So what you have to do is make sure you find a guide who can help you sta💯nd on your own feet so you can actually own your website and its success.

Wow.

Great advice.

I can't wait to talk about it.

Welcome back to Endless Customers. My name's Alex Winter and today I'm joined by Mary Brown wh🎃o's a lead web strategist here at IMPACT Mary.

What's up?

Hey Alex, glad to be here.

Glad to have you. We always love having you on the show. I can't wait to talk about website stuff today. We got a lot to talk about. We got a lot of ground to cover. The big question, let's start high level. The big question everyone has been asking me or what I've been hearing is,

do I really need a website in 2024? With AI and with social media, is a website really that important? We hear from business leaders all the time that they come to you about website struggles and website challenges, and whether they should or they shouldn't. What's your take on all this?

What do you think about all this?

So, spoiler, I'm gonna get to it, is that there are really two situations in which our team will say you absolutely need a website right now, and I'm gonna get to that, but first, I will tell you, I hear a variety of things from people a ton of different reasons why business leaders fee🍃l they need a new website And I'🌠ll give you so♓me of those so we often hear our site feels really stale

W🌄e feel like we need a design update or we hear you 🌱know We just hired a new CMO 🐼and the new marketing leader comes in and they think hey, we need a new website We need a fresh start We hear things likeไ oh, we just launched a new product line. So o꧟bviously, we need a new 💫website to support that. And maybe𒁃 most often, Alex, that we hea🅷r is our leads are down. So the lead pipeline shrinks, people freak out, they'✅re very stressed, the♕y think, okay, new website is going🍌 to help jumpstart that, right?

Another one we hear all the time is🦋 we're unable to update the site on our own. So if you do not have editing access to the site, you've got to use a❀n agency or a freelancer to update the site. We hear that all the time. This oneꦆ kills me. Every business should be able to update their website. We're going to talk about that mo꧋r♊e too, but you must have to have to be abꦐle to do that. And finally, another significant challenge, but one that we probab♈ly hear the least, is that our website doesn't meet tech standards right now. We need to update iඣt to meet those tech st𝓀andards.

So I'm talking about site speed, responsiveness, page scripts, things like that. People don't always know the details of why, bಞut they do think, okay, our site's painfully slow, and it's a t🌼ech problem, so th🍰at's why they come to us. But it really runs the gamut. There are all kinds of different reasons.

Yeah, those are some really good reasons, and I've heard a lot of those before, especially the new agency coming in, or a new CMO coming into the mix and goi🥀ng like, ìWeíre gꦇoing to redesign everything. Weíre going to redo everything.î🌼 And sometimes that is whatís needed, but a lot of times thatís ಌnot usually the case and it ends up causing a lot more time and money being spent for reaꦫlly no actual gains when it comes to like your bottom line.

So with that, for CEOs, for business leaders that may𝕴be are in this sort of sticky situation or having some of these problems, what advice do you give them? Or what's usually the first entry🎉 point of conversation as you start to𒀰 talk with them about these issues?

So really it's trying to understand whether they actually ꦰhave really impressing reasons why they need a new websﷺi𓄧te, or if these are just symptoms. So oftentimes we do find 𒊎that people are feeli🙈ng those pains and they're just symptoms rather than the actual root cause of what the issue ꦡis. So when we have these conversations, it's trying to get to that root cau�💦�se and understand how bad th🌟at root cause really is and if it needs a new website. Because a lot of times they don't, Alex.

A lot of the things that I mentioned before, they don't need a new websꦛite. And there are things that you can do. There's conversion rate optimization. Trying 🐈to improve the existing website can really go a long ⛦way. You know, a lot of CEOs aren't openi🎀ng up PageSpeed Insights and reviewing theiꦯr site scores to see if core web vitals are an issue, and they shouldn't be. They're running aඣ busi🦩ness, so that's not their expertise.

They won't know the depth of that problem. And with leads, too. Leads are often just a symptom, and can a website help solve for that? Yeah, but it's just one piece of that. So unless they're addressing the underlying marketing strategy, a new website is unlikely to solve the whole problem in and of itself.

No, that makes sense.

Yeah, and we can build a new site that will convert bettꦡer, but if people aren't writing the content that's gonna bring the right traffic, they won't have anyone to convert. Or if they do get traffic, and we do 𝓀get conversions, but the sales 🦋team 🐓isn't on top of their game, you're still not going to get that revenue. So that's why♎ the website is just𝔍 one piece of that whole engine, right?

So w🍸e really need to underst꧑and what the root problems are so we can determine if the new website's going to be the thing that they need.

I love what you're saying. Yeah, and I think for business l🦩eaders out there, the differentiator is lik๊e thinking about ⭕it as the symptoms versus the causes, right🗹? It's l🌳ike you really need to identify these symptom✅s. And business leaders aren't web designers. They're not developers. They're not web experts. So it's not their specialty, but they still need

to understand s🦋🦩ome of these symptoms that are happening. So can we talk a little bit about some of the, yo𒉰u mentioned a few, but some of these common sympto😼ms that you see on a regular basis and that you and your team are fixing on a daily basis.

Yeah, s🃏o definitely slow, slow websites. W𓂃e've had people come to us where, you know, it takes seconds and seconds and seconds to load. And I kn𝓀ow that that might not feel like a really big deal. But 🅰we know that, you know, if it takes longer than three seconds for a site to load on mobile, they might lose 53% of their visitors. That's huge. That's really huge. That's a symptom of a major problem,𒈔 right? Or the not being able to edit the site is that is a symptom 🉐of also just a major probleꦆm. Like they're feeling the pain of that and that is a real problem that t💯hey have. So those along with ones that I alrea🍌dy mentioned are probably the core ones that we see and hear most often and the pain we hear most often about,

that then we can dig deeper into and learn how to fix what they need.

Yeah, yeah, those are really great points. And it sounds to me, too, like the decision becomes difficult for business leaders to go, do I need a new website right now? Or are there some of these symptoms that we can fix and worry about a red🐽esign later? Or maybe it's not really a redesign

and we just need to focus on these symptoms. Is that right that I say it that way?

Yeah, so you said it well, and really, I mentioned this before, there are really t🐻wo situations in which we would say you absolutely need to update your site right now. So one is not being 🧸able to 🧔update it on your own, and I'm gonna keep saying this because of how important that is. So an outdated website is a liability

that can make you look bad, right? That's just very basic. But if you 𒉰are being held hostage by your site and you can't update coffee, you can't create𝕴 landing pages, you can't change CTA✤s, you need a new website ASAP. That would be one of those times that Iꦕ would say right now yo♏u need a new website. You⭕ should never be beholden to someoꦑne else to be able to make these changes. And then the♐ other reason that we would say you need a new website now would be if 🍨you're not meeting current tech standards.

So if you are not meeting the standa𝓡rds that are established by search engines, then you can't rank well. And then you definitely need a new website. So if you can't deliver on those, in either of those two ways, then ju꧟st making updates or making optimizꦅations isn't gonna help you save it. Like your index pages can just keep slippi🐓ng in rankings, your traffic♐ can g✤o down, so these are major problems where we would say right🐷 now, you need a new site.

Yeah, yeah, no, it makes sense, and when we think about They Ask, You Answer, and what Marcus teaches all the time, control is important on your website because it's a living, breathing thing. It's not a set it and forget it. And I thi⛄nk a lot of business peopl꧒e tend to do that. They build the website, it'sꦿ done, they pop champagne,

they're all excited, and then 🔴they don't touch it. And that is just almost like a portfolio page instead of a livi🍬ng, breath🤡ing thing that you can update and t♛hat you can change and that you should be shifting to meet your potential customers where they are. So for the control piece, how do you give that power bacꦆk? Or what should business owners be thinking about in order to have that control

as they start their website journey in 2024?

Yeah, so you need to have something that a person on the marke🍬ti🎉ng team can work with. You need to be on a platform that someone, a marketer, can work with. You do not need to have a developer on staff. I'm saying this in gigantic, capital, b🐲olded, red lette🔯rs. You don't need a developer. You shouldn't need a developer,

your content manager should be able to updꦬate your we🎀bsite. That's really cool.

No, I wasn't expecting you to say that. So you don't necessa🤪rily need to have a 🎶developer on staff, is what you're🃏 saying, in that if it's built correctly, you should have the control.

Yeah, exactly. And that's not a hard thing to find or do, Alex. It's about having, if you're working with a ওcompany to build a new site It's about finding one who would ꦆrather empower you in your team to truly own it or finding one that would rather Handcuff you to them so that they just have recurring revenue for ꦯthe next 1🥂0 years Which is what a lot of agencies do and I hate to 🎀say that But it does happen So finding one that 👍wants to coach and train and teach

You had a really ownও things and finding one that can build on a🔜 platform where you can own it so you can learn things like how to optimize it on your own and really understand the performance of it is crucial for having that control.

Yeah, that's huge. I never really heard it put that way but I love what you're saying because I figured you'd at least need to have like a web specialist or somebody on your team but it sounds like if it's built correctly and you worked with the right team, they can put the control back in your hands

and you can really update your site when♔ you need to, change things when you need to, and you don't need to call your agency or send an email and submit a ticket and wait a week and see what happens and go through the stereotypical agency route.

Yeah, and I will say,

so you mentioned a web specialist on staff. I will say that while you don't need to hire someone whose♒ resume says, you know, web strategist because I work with a lot of content managers who I the🌳n train to learn how to use tools like Lucky Orange and they learn how to r⭕evie🍸w data and perform experience that does take some education, right? So there's there is a difference between owning the abilit🔯y to optimize your site and learning how to do it.🌟 So there are 𒁏two things that go hand in hand there.

There are a ton of ways that companies can learn how to really optimize and learn about conversion rate optimization, which is great. You don't have to have, you don't have to come in with that background. It can be taught and learned. So that's an important piece of the journey as wel🌌l.

Yeah, it definitely is. And it's one of those things too that evꦯen as a business 𓂃leader or as a CEO, you do want to learn these things. And it may seem like you don't need to, but it directly affects sales. It directly affect🐻s the traffi๊c and leads that are coming into your business. So as an owner, that's something♏ that I hope you're

concerned about and that you're focused on. So thisꩲ is just another part of that piece, right? It's just another part of finding th🌃ose traffic leads and sales and finding more🔜 of your best customers.

Yeah, and it's crazy, Alex, because some people 𒆙will say, you know, we just spent a ton of money building a new wꦕebsite, and then they don't want ⛄to find out if it's working for them or not, right? It's part of that set it and forget it thing that we were talking about before, but if you ju𝓡♕st spend, say somebody spends $40,000 on a new website, buဣt they don't🍸 know how to look at data,

🌱they don't know how to see if the site is working for them and if it's not working or if𒈔 they even have a feeling it's not working, th🔜ey don't know♒ how to figure out how to make it work. You just wasted $40,000. Right? That's, it's mind boggling to me. And that is w♋hat CEOs should be caring about, ri🎉ght?

Is all of this money I invested, am I getting a return on that or not?

ROI is huge. And I've heard all too often, and we've talked about this offline too, where somebody will spend $40,000, $50,000 on a new website redesign, they launch it, and they'𝐆re not getting the traffic leads and sales🌊, and then they talk to another agency, and then the next agency is like,

oh, you need to redesign your whole website again and spend another $40,000, $50,000. So that happens a lot, and that's a recurring🐬 thing where it puts a bad taste in people's mouths. And I don't blame CEOs and o🦹ther people for being like, this sucks, I hate dealing with this, I just want it to work. So for people that are struggling like that,

what resources do they have? How can they start to educate? How can you point them in a good direction where they can start to learn a little bit more and get themselves set up for success?

Yeah, so one of those things that you need 🍰to understand, and I've been saying is, what metrics should I be looking 𒅌at to understand whether a w🌠ebsite is performing well or not, right? Because it's not just about number of leads. There are so many other things that you have to look at on a website. You have to know if people are engaging with your♛ content.

You ꦫhave to know if you're♛ getting the right traffic to your website. Just because you're getting traffic doesn't mean there🍌 are people who will ever convert fꦐor you. So you have to know what kind of traffic. An▨d you have to understand what good conversion rates look like and all of those things. S🐽o getting better educated about that is critical

so that you know those things. I always send people first to IMPACT+. You know, we've got a good resource on that. You can learn about the tools that you should be using for that type of th꧙ing. We have courses about how to use things like Looking Orange. So that's a good place to start, just to understand what the heck

should I even be looking at?ꦐ On my website, we talk about those different metrics to be looking at. So just, if yo𒊎u're trying to wrap your head around that from a start, it's defin🔯itely a good place to be looking.

Yeah, that's a great recommendation. I also have a question, too, around the longevity of a site. Because we were just talking about how, oh, you just redesigned ಞyour site, but it'🙈s wrong, so redesign it again and redesign it again. And is there a redesign every couple years? Is that standard?

Or what do you recommend for, I guess, long-term success with your website? So you're making a big investment, you talked about ROI, how do you get that ROI, and how do you keep 📖your site operating optimally for the long-term?

Yeah, so I wouldn't put a certain ✤number of year🌜s on it. I know people would probably like to say, oh, every three yeaꦦrs, every five years, whatever. I wouldn't do that at all. If 💮you can edit your site, you are winning because U🧸X and best practices can change and evolve. So being able to change things and evolve with it is c🌱rucial. And also your business can change. So maybe you devel♏op new products or services and you need to keep your messaging up to date. So being able to change that messaging, have your messaging evolve

as you go along will be huge. Because🌼 that is the backbone of your website is the cont🧸ent of it. So I know some people get bored with design sometimes and they get𝔉 it, but that's not the thing that's going to make people convert. It's your messaginꦆg, it's your copy, right? And the story you're tellin🐬g. So if you can edit and change that story and keep it com🌳pelling for people, that's really huge. If you stay on top of Core Vitals and keep your site's perfor🃏mance as high as possiblꦜe, that is going to serve you well.

So if peopl💛e bounce from your site because it's too slow, it doesn't even matter what kiꦦnd of 𝓰copy you have. They're never gonna see it. So that's another huge piece of this. But a thing that is never going to change, that never changes over time, is making sure that your website builds trust. So if you have a learning center,

if you include pricing information on your site, if you have testimonials, and if you are answering your buyerꩵs most pressing questions throughout their journey, 🦩then you're going to be in really good sha💫pe over years because those are the things that build trust. That's the currency of business. That's what makes people buy.

So as long as you're doing all of those things, then your site will have the kind of longevity you're looking for where you're not needing to spend, again, tens of thousands of dollars every three years.

Yeah, no, that's really great advice. And the design piece, it is important, but design is subjective. And the flashy stuff, as cool as it is, and it plays into the overall perception, content is king. And I think what you said is so valid that the conte💞nt really needs to be up front and how you build tru𒁃st and how you stay open and honest and how you give people these resources

so that they can make an inf♍ormed buying decision. That's really what it's all about. And we're seeing that shift too. Austin and 🍒I were talking about this earlier in studio th💙at it's happening across the board. It's not just websites. Even with video, p꧋eople are caring less and less about these flashy, high-qual🥂ity videos and they care more about what people are s✤aying and the quality of▨ the content and if it's meaningful or not. The other stuff is secondary, it re🃏ally is. S🐓o I think that's a

huge point for people and listeners out the🐽re to take into account as thꦑey go on their website design journey. So one more question for you. When we🌜're talking about the 🐻flashy piece versus the content piece, do you have like, I know you work with a lot of clients and you work wi✨th aꩲ lot of industries and companies. Do you have an example of maybe somebody that was very focusedꩲ on the flashy design side of things and then you kind of brought them into the like,

hey, let's focus moཧre on building trust and theౠ content and giving the control ✅back to you and to your team. Can you maybe share a story with us like that?

Yes, it does happen.

Is this like ♏every engagem𓆉ent that you have basically?

No, no, no, it's no෴t all of🍎 them, but we call it shiny object syndrome, where people will see shiny and they'll say, oh, I want𝓰 that. Oh, I need that. Oh, I want that. Totally. And often what happens🍷 with websites when it comes to shinies and it comes with flashy stuff is it can be really bad for your website pe💛rformance. Really, really bad. Because that's the kind of stuff that can slow your 💃site down. And as I mentioned,🌳 over three seconds on mobile, 53% of your traffic. Not worth it.

That's huge.

Literally half your traffic is gone because you wanna have som𓆏e cool flashy animat🏅ion.

Yeah, not worth it, never worth it. So I'm a geek, you know this, I'm a geek. So for me it always comes 🌠back to those type of numbers and it comes back to making sure that people have their actual needs clearly defined. What is the goal that we're talking about? So I always try to bring people back, center them back to the goals.

What are we trying to do? Try to make as many data-driven de꧃cisions as possible. Is this going to help us convert people or not? Or is it just going to entertain you because it's your website and you want to have fun w♏i♑th it? Making sure we're tracking these type of measurable thing⛄s. So, you know, we will tell someone, here's how your site is performing now, right?

Not doing it, not doing what you need it to do, not being your best salesperson, which is what your website should always be. If it's not speaking to that goal in some way, then we're not doing it. It's not worth, honestly, you know what a lot of that flash also does? It adds budget.

It adds budget because it costs more development and development can be expensive. So it's not worth the extra money either if it's not going to directly impact conversion from a data perspective.

Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. You're right, development time is money. So if it takes🅰 more time ওto create these shiny object things, it's gonna ultimဣately cost you more money to develop these things. And really♈, it's not gonna affect your bottom line. It sounds like it's gonna hurt your bottom line. So you're spending money up front

and you're losing money on the tail end because people aren't engaging correctly with your site. And you said something that really stuck out to me. We talk about this a lot here at IMPACT, making data-driven decisions. Can you t♏alk a little bit more about what that actually means, and especially🌳 when we're talking about having control

and being able to update your site like we were talking about earlier, how that plays into that.

Yeah, so every website should s🅠tart with strategy. It has to start with strategy, and it has to be based in those ty🍸pes of dec🌼isions of let's look at the current data of how people are using the site, let's look at the behavior we want to drive, let's look at the buyer's journey that we need to be sending people on,

and let's make sure that our website i𝕴s rooted in that strategy so that that buyer's journey, the ideal journey comes to fruition. And we're doing everything we can to support that jo🌌urney. And then r🎐eviewing that data of whether it's working or not and making any optimizations to help move people in the direction we need them to. So that's the nice thing about websites

is 💯that you don't have to just cross your fingers and hope and say, gee, I really hope this goes well. You can actually look at numbers. As long as you are educated about what numbers you need to be looking at and how to♚ manipulate them. But you can make really educated decisions based on actual user behavior. So if you're not doing that,

then you're not doing it the right way. So that's why I alwa�🅺�ys advise starting with that strategy, sticking with that strategy, and then always bringing data into it to support everything we're trying to do.

Totally, I couldn't agree more. Do you have use cases or stories you could share where a business owner or a companyꦓ really was so focused o๊n the vanity metrics of things and the design where they were just like, yeah, this is exactly what we wanted and we think it's working, we're making these assumptions that it seems t꧙o be okay.

And in reality, they're missing so 𒁃much opportunity that could have been shifted if they were focusing on the data and they were focusing on exactly 𝔍what you're talking about.

Yeah, and you know what's funny? It🥃's not e❀ven just they're not focused on the data. It can be that they're not focused on the ri꧟ght data. Oh, okay. So I can't tell you how many people that we have who just look at traffic and they just say, we just wanna increase traffic. So they write a ton of content that🍬 is not focused

on answering their actual buyers questions. And so they think, hey, we just got a 🐓b🍬unch of traffic, but it might be related to something in pop cultu🦋re that's very interesting to people at the moment. And they barely tie it to their actual business. So they get🐭 a ton of traffic because that's wh🦄at people are interested in at the 𒊎moment, but it has nothing to do with the actual buyer's journey. It has nothing to do ⛦with building trust with their customer🌠s. And then when they're not converting

and they're not getting the🌱 leads and🐭 they're saying, but we have so much traffic, it's because you have the wrong tr🎃affic. ▨That happens all the time that people have the wrong traffic, t𒅌raffic that will never actually convert for them becaus📖e they're writing the wrong type of thing. And that's one of ♏those times when they might come to us and say, like, gosh,🔯 what's wrong? We have no idea what's wrong. And then once you dig in and you see whᩚ🐷ᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚat you're getting for it, that's when you learn.

Yeah, no, that's a huge point. And I think everyone looks at traffic. It doesn't matter if it's website, if it'♊s social media, everyone's looking at those numbers and howꦿ many views it gets and if it goes viral, right? But that's actually not the bestꦰ way to thi﷽nk about it because ultimately you're looking for conversions. So if you get a million views o🍨n something or a million hits on a page on youꦫr site and you only get one conversion, that's not really, it's💖 not really working so well. Whereas like if you only get 500 people that view it but ma🍌ybe a hundred of those 500 convert, that's

Alex