With so many marketing channels available these days — we’re looking at you, social media — you may wonder if your community still needs a website. The answer is an emphatic “yes!”
Your website acts as home base for your brand, and it’s critical for educating prospects about your community and collecting valuable data. But the site that served your needs five years ago likely isn’t sufficient today for anchoring a robust marketing program. To maximize your website investment, pay attention to these important features.
1. Responsive Design
The number-one critical functionality your website needs in 2016 is responsive design. A few years ago, “mobile” site design was all the rage.
Today, you can assume that a significant percentage of your site visitors will arrive via mobile devices. In 2014, the number of web users on mobile devices exceeded the number using desktop machines. The question now is, what types of mobile devices will your visitors use?
With consumers viewing your site on so many screen sizes, it has become virtually impossible to design “mobile” sites to meet every need. Enter responsive design, which automatically adjusts your site’s pages to look good on any screen size, whether on a range of mobile devices or on a desktop.
2. Enticing Images and Video
Social media has raised expectations among consumers for information to be delivered in easily understandable, bite-sized nuggets. Compelling photos and videos deliver messaging about your community much more quickly than any text can, and they pull in your visitors and hold their interest.
By including professionally produced, short videos on your site, you appeal to visitors who have no desire to read large blocks of text. Images in general — and especially video — provide a powerful window into your community. Images and video also can stand in as a virtual tour of your campus, piquing prospects’ interest and increasing the chances that they’ll want to visit in person.
3. Vital Information About Your Community
Two decades ago, business leaders began realizing en masse that a web presence was no longer optional. So it’s amazing that so many companies still fail to include key information on their websites or make it incredibly difficult to find.
At a minimum, information on your site should include:
- The full name of your community.
- Your physical address, phone number and marketing department email address.
- Names and brief biographies of key officers, including your CEO, COO, medical director and marketing director.
- Levels of care.
- Your mission statement.
- Requirements for residency.
- Brief history and information about sponsorship.
- Affiliations with medical care providers, universities, religious groups and other organizations.
Additional information is always optional. But consider including your resident handbook, sample menus, sample activities calendars, a listing of resident groups and clubs, and information on your wellness program. The more complete your site is, the more likely prospects will stick around longer — and email or call you to schedule a visit.
4. Ease of Use
In 2014, research found that 55 percent of website visitors stay on a page for less than 15 seconds. If your site is confusing, looks dated, loads slowly or is difficult to use, you can bet that time will be reduced.
Contrary to a trend that surfaced a few years ago, your page names should be clear, simple and generally in line with convention. Users who want to know the name of your CEO will look for an “About Us” or “About” link. Those who want to contact you will want to see a link with “Contact,” “Contact Us” or a similarly clear label. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel here or make users scratch their heads unnecessarily.
And remember that many prospective residents may find your site through a search engine and, therefore, may not visit your home page first. Every page needs a clearly labeled, standard navigational structure and menu.
5. Valuable Data
Does your site incorporate Google Analytics or another analytics package to log user activity? If not, installing one of these useful tools will immediately make your website more valuable to your marketing efforts.
With the proper code installed on each page of your site, you can track:
Number and location of visitors.
Demographic information, including gender and age.
The page on which users entered your site.
Keywords by which users found your site.
Devices used for browsing your site.
Content viewed during visits.
Time spent browsing your site.
6. Fresh Content
Content that’s frequently updated and relevant to your overall brand will help boost your search rankings. It also will get visitors coming back to your site more often.
The best content, of course, entices and persuades your visitors to take action, whether that’s calling you or requesting more information. By creating a blog that’s updated on a regular basis with useful and interesting content, you increase the opportunities for engagement with your visitors, and you establish your community as an authority in your industry.
Keeping Your Website Sharp
Maintaining an up-to-date, engaging website remains critical to an effective marketing program. By adding responsive design, enticing imagery and other important features, you make the most of this digital home base and keep your prospective customerscoming back.