The potential for success for your website depends on the number of visitors you can attract to it, daily. Yet, you find that there is a lot of competition in the online space, and you must find a way to stand out. Here are a few ideas that help you increase user engagement.

Those on the online platform will look for ways to ensure that their websites remain the most relevant. You can therefore not afford to be complacent on the online space. You also have to contend with the fact that the attention span of the online user is very small. There is so much content that they can interact with, that it can be challenging to attract and keep them on your website.

You, however, need to find a way to engage with your visitors. It is especially critical if you use your online platform for e-commerce purposes. You need people to see and interact with the products so that you convert the visitors into customers.

Anytime a visitor does not spend sufficient time on your website; you lose the chance to make a sale. It also doesn’t help if they spend time on your site, but do not take action you desire. You must, therefore, find a way of engaging with your online visitors so that you can achieve your goals. We will share some excellent tips you can use in our article below.
 

1. Design Your Website with the Audience in Mind

Thorough knowledge of your audience is vital if you are to design your website with them in mind. Every action you take, including advertising, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), keyword usage, among others, will come from having a good understanding of your target. While there is some very sound advice out there, you must do your research before you implement any of the ideas.

You may, for example, have had that a minimalist website design works best. If you are targeting a younger demographic who are into pictures, animation, graphics, colors, among others, then minimalist may not work. If you have products that target an older demographic, the language you use will be very different from the one you would apply if talking to younger people.

Talk to your audience and get to know more about what they like. Only then can you come up with something that will respond to them.

2. Your Content Must Be Engaging

You may think that posting content every other day is the best way to engage with your target. However, note that your audience does not seem to be engaging with most of the content you post.

You will realize that quality works so much better than quantity. You must get it right, and it requires that you invest sufficient time in understanding what the audience wants. Link your website pages to your social media and see what kind of content gets the most engagement.

The engagement will be in the form of likes, shares, and comments. Be keen to go through and understand their feedback. Ask them what they would want to see; it may surprise you that some of your online audiences have some fantastic ideas for you.

You must also use good quality pictures and videos. No one has the time or would want to spend time trying to make out what the images or videos on your site are all about.

Play around with the fonts and colors to capture the visitor’s attention. Apply SEO in your Meta descriptions, and titles so that the search engines can find it easily.

3. Actively Engage With Your Online Visitor

The online space is not an excuse for you not to actively engage with your visitors. It can be annoying to ask a question or make a comment, and not have any follow-up from the website owner.

With good content, people will engage with you, and you must respond. You must also develop a thick skin because some people can be very unkind on the online platform. Handle them graciously, and other people will quickly notice your customer care skills. You must never insult, resort to anger, or threaten anyone who may have an opinion that is different from yours.

4. Take Steps to Create an Email List

Email Marketing is an excellent way of targeting and reaching audiences. You get to push targeted messages directly to those you want to talk to about a particular product or service. It is also an excellent platform for running promotions, and that is why you need to create your email list.

Create a contact form on your website. You do not want to lose the opportunity by not capturing data that you can use in your future marketing endeavors.

You must have Call to Action because it is also a powerful tool for getting people to give you their details. Also, run a promotion as a way of collecting relevant information.

Once you receive the contact details, reach out to the subscribers. Email Marketing is powerful, but it can also be bothersome if you do not do it in the right way. Target audiences appropriately and schedule their communication in a way that you can be sure they will read your content.

Why people feel that email marketing does not work is because most people tend to spam or junk such emails. But if you were to take a more in-depth look into how they do it, you will find a problem. They may be bombarding the recipients or sending information that is of no relevance to them.

5. Take Advantage of Internal Linking

Internal linking is an excellent way to get people to interact more with your website.

You must ensure that the navigation is smooth so that they can easily follow the links. You can, for example, link a particular product to a Blog page that shows them how to use it or something related to whatever you are selling. Direct the online visitors to those posts that attract a lot of attention by having them on the sidebar.

Internal links are also a fantastic way to show online visitor-related content. If, for example, someone is looking for pet food, you can create a link that takes them to get accessories as well. You can then send them to a blog post that will give them fantastic information on how to take care of their pets.

6. Consider Chat

Having a chat box is a fantastic way to engage with online visitors. The mistake many website owners make is that they do not have someone on standby to respond immediately there is a query. If you decide to have a chatbox as a way of improving communication, then always ensure that someone is on the other end to handle any questions.

Tell the visitor what time they should not expect instantaneous responses, maybe because you are not operating at that particular time. You must, however, encourage them to still send in the query, and you must give feedback immediately you see the communication.

Also Read: 10 Actionable SEO Copywriting Tips To Improve Website Rankings

7. Ensure The User Experience Is Excellent

Imagine being on a website, and the pages load slowly. Once you get to the page you are interested in, you are not able to comfortably navigate. You click on a link and redirects you to the wrong place. it may even log you out of the website. If any of the above is occurring, you can almost be sure that no one will return to your site.

Give the user a fantastic experience when they are on your site. Your web host provider will determine the experience, and you must, therefore, look for one who has sufficient capacity.

The hosting service you choose will also have an impact. The shared sites are cheaper, but if they’re too many other websites on it, it may impact the overall speed of your website. You must also avoid free web hosts because they have many limitations. Spend some money so that your online visitors have a pleasant experience at all times.

8. Optimize Your Website for Mobile

At present, it would not make any sense for anyone who is transacting on the online platform not to optimize their site for mobile. A substantial percentage of people do their research online before making a purchase. They will also make a lot of their purchases using their smart devices.

People also like the convenience of being able to do all this while On-The-Go. Search engines such as Google also check whether your website is mobile-friendly to determine your ranking. Those that are not mobile-friendly rank very poorly on search sites.

Fortunately, many website builders now have the option of customizing a website for mobile. It means that your online visitor will have the same experience, whether they are using a desktop or their mobile device. However, test the site on your mobile device before you launch it to the market.

You will find that there are specific elements that made slow down how fast your website loads while on the mobile platform. You may, for example, have to do away with some large images, graphics, or video content. Ensure that the visitor has easy access to the links and buttons. They should also easily navigate through the website pages on mobile devices.

9. Keep Measuring the Performance of Your Website

Pay attention to the performance of your website using tools such as Google Analytics. You get to see how many visitors you get on your website. You get an indication of the bounce rate if any. Also get Fantastic information on what your online visitors like to engage with, thus allowing you to continue to generate relevant content.

Keeping a close eye on how your website performs will provide you with the chance to correct any mistakes that could be hampering or leading to poor visitor engagement.

10. You Must Be Consistent

There are many aspects to running a website that requires consistency. One area is about the design and style guide. The online visitors should have the feeling that there is a flow with the font, colors, voice, among others.

If you start informally, you must maintain it throughout your website. It would be very confusing to have a formal homepage and then a total change with how you communicate with the online visitor. The same applies to image sizing, titles, meta descriptions, among others.

You must also be consistent in content creation. If you have a blog, for example, schedule your posts so that your visitors know when to expect new content. It could be weekly once every two weeks etc.

It is critical to note that creating content is not easy, but many people only realize this after they start. Fatigue quickly sets in. While before you were able to churn out content every week, now you find that you can go even one month without posting anything. The online visitor does not appreciate inconsistency, especially if there was something they were interested in. You will lose that essential online traffic because they will go to your competitors.

Also Read: How To Use Instagram To Grow Your Ecommerce Store?

Conclusion

Running a website can be difficult if you do not have the right strategy in place. You need to engage with your online visitors; otherwise, you will have a beautiful website with no one on it. We have highlighted some fantastic ways you can generate better engagement on your site. However, everything you do will not make any sense if you do not have a good understanding of what your target audience needs.

You must respond to a need and be able to generate content that responds to them. Also, ensure that you aggressively use SEO so that the search engines can find you. Finally, take a peek at what your competitors are doing, so that you see how they are talking to their online visitors. You can then apply some of their tactics, or avoid some of the things they are doing depending on what your research shows you. Good luck with running your website successfully.