Your website isn’t performing the way you want and you are being told you need to revamp/refresh your entire website.  Does this sound familiar?  Before you begin a many months-long project like this, here is a roadmap of things you should think about and execute upon, plus the steps that you should take to right the ship.

Questions to Ask Yourself:

A) Look through your Google Analytics. What is your website bounce rate? What is the length of time that unique website visitors are on your website?  If your bounce rate is higher than 55%, then that is a red flag.

B) How many pop-ups do you have?

C) Who is the language on the site written for?  Is it the aging adult themselves or the adult daughter/son/spouse, etc. or do you have a combination for both?  

D) Images: Are you only using stock imagery or do you have high-quality images of both your community as well as action shots of your residents living and engaging within your community?

E) How many different calls to action (CTA’s) do you have on each page? What call to action are your website visitors clicking on and which ones are they not?

F) Is your website mobile-friendly?

G) How soon from when a consumer completes a form, do you contact them via their preferred method of contact?

Next Steps: The Actions to Take

1. Install a heat mapping visual analytics product like HotJar.  It allows you visually see how your website users are navigating your website. You need this in place for a few months before any significant website overhauls.
2. Evaluate both your website language as well as imagery. Are you talking to the right website persona?  Does the website visitor see themselves or their loved one living there? Are you focusing on your value proposition as well as the lifestyle they will have once they move in?
3. Limit the number of pop-ups you have. Ideally no more than one per page.
4. Make sure your mobile experience is top-notch.
5. Make sure you have the systems in place to be able to get back to a consumer as soon as possible by their preferred contact method.

Final Thoughts:

By answering these questions and taking the next steps, you should be able to determine whether you just need to do some simple, but valuable changes or you have to go back to the drawing board with a complete revamp/overhaul of your website.

Stay Tuned! We will take a deeper dive into some technical changes that you can make to your website in an upcoming blog post. 

In the meantime, take a look at our favorite tools blog post where we discuss some of our favorite software tools, which will help you execute many of the steps mentioned above. 

Have you made a change that you think would help others? Let us know in the comments section. Until next time, see you around AgingChoices.