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How do I attract customers to my website?

A small row of people all holding their mobile phones

Your beautiful website has been designed and published, and now you want to share it with your customers. We have some tried and tested techniques that will have you driving traffic to your website in no time! Here are some easy-to-follow strategies for attracting customers to your website:

Have a presence on social media

Let’s start with the most obvious one: social media. Creating pages about your business on relevant social media platforms can boost visitor numbers to your site. The beauty of making a name for yourself on social media is that it’s free. So, this is a worthwhile strategy for new or smaller businesses who may have limited advertising budgets. Include links on your social media pages to your website, and entice audiences to visit your site with offers, product information and updates.

Start a blog

Who doesn’t love a good read? Blogging is a great way to keep people coming back to your website. Writing a regular blog on subjects that you are an authority on will entice visitors back to your site again and again. It’s not only people that appreciate a well-written article, but search engines do too! Don’t forget to sneak in a few choice keywords into your content, as these can help send your site soaring on search listings.

When you give readers the option to comment or to share your blogs, this can also help you reach more people. Always make your blog content is relevant to your target audiences, offering them an insight into topics that they would find useful and interesting.

As well as blogging on your own site, consider providing a guest blog posting on another related and respected website, including a link to your web page so viewers can click through to your site.

Get SEO savvy

Using search engine optimisation strategies will allow your website to climb the ranks of search listings. This will help people find your site name easier. If your website makes it to the first page of search listings then it’s likely to be getting more clicks than if it were on any other page – that’s how important SEO is!

Some simple SEO tips that really make a difference include making sure you fill out the meta titles and descriptions on your pages and adding keywords that apply to your services throughout your site. It’s also important to keep your website’s information current, updated and relevant, as these are all attributes favoured by search engines.

If you’re new to SEO, we’ve created this easy guide for complete beginners. It’s honestly not as hard as it sounds!

Try Paid advertising

There are lots of free or budget-friendly strategies you can use to attract customers to your site, but if you want to get your website off the ground you might wish to consider paid advertising. Pay per click (PPC), for instance, is one commonly used option. By carefully selecting keywords relevant to your site, an advert for your website will appear online when people enter these keywords into a search engine. Clicking on the advert will then direct visitors to your site, helping to swell your audience numbers. It’s a quick and easy way to get people to you.

These are just some of the ways you can attract more customers to your website. Even if you try other ways of attracting customers, remember to use an analytics tool to make sure you know what works best for your business. There’s no point in repeating something that isn’t producing the results you want. Your time is precious so invest it wisely.

If you still haven’t created your dream site or you are thinking of starting something new, try Go Sitebuilder free for 14-days and see just how easy it is to build your own website – no pros or technical skills needed!

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What are the best digital marketing launch strategies?

Male sitting at a desk next to a large vase of pink flowers. He is wearing a dark blue shirt and using a laptop

Launching your website creates a new, exciting opportunity for your business. It’s your chance to share your unique story with the world and start growing your business online. Launch day is an opportunity to get people talking about your site so make sure you capitalise on this with a great launch strategy.

But what makes a great marketing launch strategy? The first thing to do is to choose a suitable domain name. Using a professional domain name is a must for any successful launch strategy since an individualised domain name is more likely to be memorable to the new website user. That’s why Go Sitebuilder includes a free domain name with every subscription: helping to get your new website off the ground! Once you’ve got that covered you’re ready to head onto the next steps…

Start early:

Planning for the big day should start well ahead of your launch date, even before you have finalised the website design on your website builder. Your top priority is to start collecting emails, so start getting the word out on social media, or other channels, and get people to opt-in to your updates. Keep in touch with these people via email, introducing them to key features on the coming website. This will keep the launch day exciting for customers, and keep your business in everyone’s minds.

Create anticipation:

Whether you have an existing customer base or you are using your website to create a completely new brand, it is really important that you emphasise the anticipation in the lead up to launch day. One way to do this is to offer a private, early look at your new website. This is a valuable VIP-type teaser, but it is also a great way to create loyalty to your brand – right from the word Go!

Capitalise on new users:

Launch day is often the biggest day of traffic in the first year of trading. So, it’s really important to prolong the impact of all those extra users. One way to make sure users continue to spread the word about your new website, even after launch day, is to introduce a referral scheme. A referral scheme will offer a reward to customers if they send a friend the link to your launch page and that friend types in their email. This is a really effective way to make sure news about your newly launched website travels.

Having a website is crucial for every business. If you haven’t created yours yet, why don’t you check out Go Sitebuilder? Create your website from anywhere without the need for any technical skills. Try Go Sitebuilder free for 14-days to see just how easy it is to get your business online.

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The absolute beginner’s guide to SEO for new website owners

Male working from home Dad holding his baby whilst working on this laptop

If you’ve recently built a new website, or you’re still tossing up the idea, there’s one topic you that’s worth brushing-up on – SEO. In a nutshell, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of making certain changes and optimisations to your website so that it ranks higher in search results. This quick beginner’s guide should help you hit the ground running.

1: On-page SEO

The first step in optimising your website for search should always happen on your website itself. This is known as “on-page” SEO and refers to all of the things you can control and tweak in order to boost your site’s visibility on search engines such as Google and Bing. There are many different types of on-page SEO, but here are the big-hitters you should work on first:

  • Page titles: Each of the pages on your website should have a title that reflects your target keywords.
  • On-page content: The words on your website are all-important when it comes to SEO. Not only should they tell your brand’s story and appeal to your visitors, but you should also make sure they’re optimised towards your core keywords.
  • Title tags: The content on your website should be broken down into sections with headings, all of which are strong SEO signals for Google. Again, these should be optimised towards your target keywords

Part 2: Off-page SEO

Once your on-page SEO is done and dusted, you’ll need to consider “off-page” SEO. As the name suggests, this refers to things you can do to enhance your search visibility outside of the website itself. The most common form of off-page SEO is probably ‘backlinks’, which refers to the idea of other websites linking to your content. Google will see these links and thus give your site more authority and bump it up the rankings. Backlinks aren’t easy to build organically, but that’s where the next step comes in…

Part 3: Your long-term SEO roadmap

The golden rule of SEO is that it’s not a one-and-done solution – it’s an ongoing process of tweaking and monitoring. As part of this, you’ll want to build an SEO roadmap or content strategy which will help you stay on track. Google loves fresh content, and will always give a rankings boost to sites which publish regularly, so having new blog posts, landing pages and other forms of website content being added regularly is always a smart idea. You should also plan to monitor what’s working (and what’s not) using a free tool like the Google Search Console.

As you can see, there are a few things to think about when it comes to SEO, but the positive results will all be worth it. Thankfully, if you built your website with Go Sitebuilder, handy SEO features such as site and page-level tagging, will make your life a lot easier. So, what are you waiting for? Sign up for a free trial of Go Sitebuilder today!

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How do you launch a new brand?

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When you’re launching a new brand into the market you will want to make a big splash! Ideally, you’ll be putting out something that is going to make people stop and take notice – ensuring you are the brand or business they remember. Here are our top tips on how to launch your brand with maximum effect.

Give yourself time

You can do things quickly and launch your brand immediately but it is extremely unlikely that that method will have the impact you desire. Give yourself plenty of time. Make sure you are happy with your logo or business name, your website is created and you’re ready to go live across social media. Plan your launch in full, giving yourself a date down the line to aim for, which will allow you the time to get the awareness out there. Ensure that when you join the market, your presence can make an immediate impression.

Make the splash everywhere

Once you have decided on and set up your digital platforms, make sure that all of them have your brandmark on them. Put your logo, business name and message on everything, ready to have the standout impression when you launch. In order for customers to know and remember your brand, it needs to be made recognisable right from the start.

Enhance anticipation

When you have everything good to go and your big launch is planned, you now hold the opportunity to build excitement around your big day. Use social media to tease your followers and potential customers with hints, mystery videos and cryptic clues that get the momentum building, and make your website launch one that cannot be missed.

Don’t forget to enjoy every moment! You’ve just taken an exciting step in growing your very own business and you should be proud to share it with the world.

If you still haven’t created your website, or you’re hoping to set up something new, Go Sitebuilder could be the solution. With hundreds of design possibilities, Go Sitebuilder uses beautifully pre-designed sections and templates so you can build the website you’ve dreamed of, without any technical skills needed. Sign up for a free trial and see just how easy it is!

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4 fool-proof ways to drive traffic to your new website

Launching a website

There’s nothing quite like launching a fresh, new website – especially as a small or new business. After all, your website is part of your public image and your most important digital marketing asset. But, what happens after you’ve hit the publish button?

Your traffic can, and will, grow organically once your site is online but it’s likely to take a long time for you to see the growth you’re really looking for without boosting it yourself. Thankfully, there’s a wealth of easy-to-follow options for driving traffic to your website. We’ve explored some of these options below:

Option #1: Work on your Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Search Engine Optimisation, or SEO, is the heart of any solid digital strategy. Put simply, it’s a staple of on-page and off-page techniques which can help you bring organic (i.e. not paid) traffic to your website. Quality SEO will bring your website higher in the search results when users look for your target keywords, meaning more traffic for you. It sounds scary and complicated but this easy to follow guide will get you started on the basics. Once you understand the basics, keeping your website up to date with fresh content is the best way to play your SEO-game!

Option #2: Create a content strategy

Another great way to keep people coming back to your website is to frequently publish interesting and engaging content. In fact, a solid content strategy is really the backbone of successful digital marketing. The great thing about content production is that it’s low-cost (or free if you’re willing to put pen to paper) and easy to do if you leverage your industry knowledge. Create a plan of the types of content you think your visitors would find interesting or useful and set up a calendar for when you want to post each article or page.

Option #3: Explore the world of guest blogging

Here’s a method of traffic generation which can bring traffic to your site in two different ways. By doing a little outreach and working with related websites, you can arrange guest blog posts whereby you write some content for them, and they allow you to link back to your website. Not only will this bring relevant traffic to your site, but it’ll also generate backlinks which are an essential ingredient to quality SEO.

Option #4: If you’re in a rush, try some paid ads

While the strategies we’ve shared so far are all proven and effective, they can take a little time to reap the traffic rewards. SEO, for example, can take a few weeks or even months to start showing positive results. If you need traffic faster than this, PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising is always an option. With a program like Google Ads or Facebook Ads, you can bid a small amount of money to place your ad higher up in the search results. It can be a great way to give your new business a jumpstart.

If you’re having trouble driving traffic to your website, try out one or more of these ideas and you’ll soon start to see some positive results. And if you’re yet to build the website of your dreams, why not try out Go Sitebuilder today? It’s the easiest way to create a professional website for your business – no technical skills required!

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What are the best new website launch campaigns?

Website launch campaigns

Are you nearing the end of creating your very first website or perhaps a website redesign? Have you thought about how you’re going to share your beautiful new site with the world?

The best way to introduce your stylish new website design is with a website launch campaign. A great launch campaign can help new and existing customers discover your business website and start turning visitors into customers.

Website launch campaign using Go Sitebuilders website builder

What is a website launch campaign?

But what is it? A website launch campaign is simply a communications marketing strategy to introduce a website launch. It generally consists of messaging before the launch as well as after to generate traffic to the new website. Something all successful strategies have in common is that they are responsive to changing website traffic. A great way to ensure you can be flexible in responding to customer needs is to use a website builder that allows you to create and update your website via your smartphone. But this isn’t the only important strategy!

Our experts take a look at some of the most successful strategies for introducing your newly launched website:

Special discounts

A special offers themed launch campaign is highly effective at bringing in new and old customers alike. It is a particularly popular approach with e-commerce sites, where there are ample opportunities to encourage users to complete an action of value. Some customers will actively seek out websites that offer these discounts (like free shipping or 20% off) which make for a highly effective website launch.

Competitions

Everyone loves the opportunity to win something, and this can be used positively in a website launch campaign. A well-run competition can do more than introduce users to your new website, it can also encourage your visitors to check out key pages on your website. For example, you might run a website scavenger hunt. This offers visitors the chance to win a prize or discount, whilst ensuring that they explore pages of your website – driving people to read, click and interact with your new site. 

Showcasing content

It is really important that you think about the content that you want your visitors to see during your website launch. Do you want them to understand more about your business and brand story, or is it more important that they view your products straight away? Whatever your goal, users rarely explore the full website themselves, so make sure you highlight important content and pages.

Two popular ways of doing this are to either:

  1. Create a showcasing video of the important new content
  2. Create a landing page dedicated to the launch of your new website. The landing page could highlight all of the important content you want people to see and drive them to click through to other pages of your website.
Homepage of a website launch using Go Sitebuilders website builder

These are just some of the great campaign tactics you can consider when launching your website. Even if you decide to try other types of campaigns, remember it’s always important to take a step back and give yourself some time between finishing your website and sharing it with the world!

“Lots of my customers have commented on how easy it was to find and use my website – that wouldn’t be possible without Go Sitebuilder and my own domain name.”

Polly Evans – pollyevanshypnotherapy.com

If you still haven’t created your dream site or are thinking of starting something new – try Go Sitebuilder free for 14-days and see just how easy it is to build your own website with no technical skills needed!

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3 inspiring event website designs and must-have features

Events websites

Are you looking to create a stand-out events website? If you’re starting from scratch, or simply looking to freshen up an existing website, it’s a good idea take a look at some of the industry’s best for design and content inspiration. Check out three of the UK’s biggest event websites below:

1. Glastonbury Festival

As soon as you visit the Glastonbury website, you are greeted by the warm colours that beam from their header image. With the infamous landscape and sunset design – the graphic is a mirage of what attendees can expect to enjoy in the summer.

Below this, you are drawn to a rainbow of uneven and clickable menu headings, each a little imperfect, replicating the colourful event shacks that attendees will see during their time at the festival. This is a great way to display consistency, letting the website viewers get an idea on what to expect at the actual event.

The colours and art style create a ‘Glastonbury vibe’, giving you an insight into the place where you’ll be wanting to spend a few warm summer evenings. The homepage clearly highlights all the upcoming artists for the years festival, teasing users to what is in store. It’s easy at first glance to be excited, so it’s clear why so many people click straight to the ‘shop’ icon.



Another great feature on the Glastonbury website is the access information page. It features a very recognisable hero image of different disability awareness symbols; a quick and friendly way to show users that they are an all-inclusive event. The access page has a larger font for those with limited visibility and information on how to get into contact with the team with any queries.

2. The Jockey Club – Grand National 2020

Separated by an array of tonal grey boxes, the Jockey Club website is easy to navigate thanks to its simplicity.

Firstly, the heading for each tab is written in capitals, with a contrasting font against the background to get your attention. Each event tab also features key dates, itinerary and various package options. The information is displayed neatly and effectively. This creates an easy to navigate customer journey, allowing the user to find the information they are looking for. The Jockey Club’s website has been broken up in a way that is easy to understand. They have achieved this by using a comfortable amount of white space along with H1, H2, H3 headings. Their content starts with catchy headings, followed by slightly more information, and then an area which allows users to read in-depth about the event. This is a classic strategy with many benefits – but key in getting people to read your website.

3. Social Media Week London

Another exceptional website for events is Social Media Week London. It has a tasteful colour palette with a pop. The website makes great use of white space and grey/lilac tones to draw users to key bits of information.

On their homepage, they use icons to create an easy and effective way to convey information to the site users; such as a globe icon with ’20+ countries’ for people to recognise that this is a global event. Not only is this a great form of quick communication, but it also ties in together with their look and feel.

If you select the three-line menu navigation, a simple plain red pop up filters in front of the page, with short and snappy headings for you to click on, making for easy navigation.
Finally, they use a running banner which scrolls along with the website, which – if you are running an event with sponsors – is a great way to promote them and show potential attendees who may be coming!

So there you have it, our top 3 event website designs and their top features. If you’re looking to construct an eye-catching event website quickly, easily and affordably then start a free trial with Go Sitebuilder – no credit card or technical skills required!


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How do I promote my new website launch?

Website Launch Plans

The launch of a new website is an exciting proposition for any business, but in order to ensure it goes off with a bang, you will need to plan and execute the pre-launch process carefully. We’ve put together a list of tried and tested expert tips to follow to help you promote your new website.

Build anticipation

Now is the perfect time to start building buzz around your brand! You’ll want to begin by growing your customer base – especially if you’re a new business. You can choose a traditional route such as printing newspaper ads, or a more current direction by using social media. Just make sure, whatever method you choose, it’s a direct line to your target audience so you’re communicating effectively.

Another great way to build up some hype before your launch is to reach out to an email list. Emails can be beautiful works of art that let you relay your message to a group of people all at once. You can use emails to tease or share more information about your launch, products and services. Using beautiful images or including gifs will ensure your emails captivate your audience.

Utilise social media

Every business should make the most of social media to build brand awareness and increase audience numbers, whether they already have a website or not. However, if you’re launching a new site, using social media is a highly effective strategy to promote this event and stoke up excitement for the launch.
Create pages on social media platforms most frequented by your target audiences and regularly drip-feed information about your new website launch to create relationships with your customers and build up the anticipation. As well as detailing when the site will be launched, include information about what you’ll offer, what the site will contain and what visitors can expect.

Tease audiences with snippets from your new website, such as a sneak preview of some images, videos or blogs. Include offers or promotions for the first number of people who visit or purchase from your site once it’s launched.

As well as promoting your launch on popular sites such as Facebook or Instagram, the power of video cannot be ignored, so consider making short videos on YouTube talking about key aspects of your new website and the launch.

Start blogging

You might not be able to blog on your new site yet, but that doesn’t mean to say you can’t post on another related site. Create a guest blog post about your new website launch to feature on a site that your target audience is likely to follow. Include a link to your website and the dates of the launch so that visitors can click on it on the big day. As well as guest blogging, you might also wish to pay an influencer to promote details of your new website launch or consider creating some press release copy.

Timing is crucial, however. If you release a guest blog post or PR copy about your launch, make sure that it hits audiences close to the launch date. If you post too early, audiences may forget about it, but if you post too late, the momentum may be lost.

Now that you know everything that you need to when it comes to promoting your new site all that’s left to do, is to start (and finish) building it! Try Go Sitebuilder FREE for 14-days – no credit card required!

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How to build a social media following for your business

Building a social media following

Whether you’re a Facebooker, Instagrammer, or Tweeter, there’s no denying the importance of social media to modern business. Unfortunately, it’s not quite as simple as throwing a profile onto each of the platforms and hoping for the best – there’s a bit more to it than that. So, if you’re a little behind when it comes to social media for business, here’s how to start building a following.

Step 1: Begin with who you know (and who they know)

If you’ve ever tried to build up a social media following from scratch, you’ll already know it’s an uphill battle. But, if you already have a group of friends or followers on social media for your personal accounts, you can use this as a springboard. No matter how small your circle may be, it’s a great idea to ask them to like/subscribe/follow your new profiles to serve as a base for more organic growth.

Step 2: Incentivise liking and sharing your content

One of the most common tactics you’ll see on platforms like Facebook and Twitter is competitions. Like many other tactics, this is simply a way to bring in even more followers. Consider this: if offering a prize worth £100 results in an additional 5000 users following you for a chance to win, that’s a great return on investment. If you incentivise sharing this way, you’re even more likely to see exponential growth.

Step 3: Post regular content which really engages your audience

One of the things some businesses get wrong when building a following is posting any old thing and then wondering why no growth follows. The reality is that – just like the rest of us – your following want to see something which really engages them. If you’re just posting what equates to adverts, followers are likely to unfollow pretty quickly. Instead, try to produce content which offers real value. This can come in the form of insightful industry articles or even one-off discount codes.

Step 4: Constantly monitor what works (and what doesn’t)

The final piece to this puzzle is perhaps the hardest part: ongoing monitoring and consistency. It’s all well and good to produce some social posts which gain real traction, but there’s no guarantee this will provide long-term growth. Keep an eye on the insights tools provided by the social platforms and try to understand exactly why certain posts succeed while others don’t. This will help you produce more posts which encourage more followers to join you on your journey.

Now that you know how to start building a social media following, you’ll need the perfect website to go along with it. If you’re wondering if you really need a website as well as social media; head over to our blog to decide for yourself. Try out Go Sitebuilder today for free and see what you could create.

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The importance of digital marketing for small business

The importance of digital marketing for small business

It’s a fact: there’s never been a better time to start a small business. The internet has made it possible to launch a company in a matter of minutes, but this is really just the start – it’s what comes next that’s most rewarding. If you’ve already taken the leap into small business ownership, you may be struggling with getting your name out there and bagging clients, and that’s where digital marketing comes in.

Here are the main reasons why digital marketing is so important for small businesses today.

Reason #1: Most of your customers are online

Did you know that, according to the Office of National Statistics, 19% of all retail purchases are now made online? And this number is rising rapidly. No matter what industry your small business is part of, being online is now an absolute necessity. Of course, this means that competition will be increasing all the time – which is why there’s never a better time than now to launch a digital marketing strategy.

Reason #2: It can cost as little (or as much) as you like

Unlike advertising via traditional media like TV, radio, or even billboards, you don’t always have to pay to get your message out there. When your small business is brand new, it makes sense to use pay-per-click advertising to drive traffic, but over time you can build your own organic traffic strategy. This aspect of digital marketing is known as content marketing, and it’s a slow-and-steady way to create “free” advertising to your website, as users arrive on your site naturally via search engines.

Reason #3: You can track your success every step of the way

Another reason that traditional advertising channels are hard to recommend is that they’re just not very trackable. It’s very hard to judge the return-on-investment created by a magazine advertisement, but with digital marketing, you can track a user for the length of their journey. This allows you to dig into the different ways a user has found your business, what they did on your website, and track the exact route they took to purchasing. This data will be invaluable as part of your digital marketing strategy because it instantly tells you what works – and what doesn’t.

Of course, at the heart of every successful digital marketing campaign is a great website. If your business is ready to go, but you don’t yet have a website just yet, Go Sitebuilder can help. Explore the site today and start building your digital presence with a 14-day free trial.