website reviews via video

Your website design should showcase your company’s strengths and services—not make them impossible to find.

DC-area public relations firm Crawford PR is suffering from a bad case of Internet irony; the award-winning telecom PR strategists have sorely neglected the marketing potential of their own website. With some good content hidden behind an anti-Google shield, potential customers are unlikely to find the company, let alone initiate contact. But with three strategic upgrades, the Crawford PR website could and should become a lead-generation machine.

Site, Meet Google
The homepage look is well designed, clean, and professional, but because every element is an image, the best it can do is rebuff Google’s advances, convincing the search engine that it’s nothing but a pretty face. That’s a real shame, because there are over 40,000 searches every day for the key phrase “public relations,” and over 27,000 for “pr agency.” Unfortunately, Crawfordpr.com is so impenetrable that it doesn’t even show up in a search of “pr” and its specific suburban hometown. Given the evident search interest, that’s a significant missed opportunity.

Cool or Confusing?
But Google isn’t the only rejected suitor, as visitors who do make it to the homepage are likely to be confounded by the menu options. Using a driving analogy, the traditional “services” and “about us” sections, for example, are disguised as “milestones” and “navigators,” making it unnecessarily difficult to find relevant and compelling information. Persuasive material—like the well-done case studies—are too easily missed, and the site thus fails to develop the sense of trust that would persuade visitors to become clients.

Then What?
One of the axioms of Internet marketing is that you have to be brutally clear with your potential customers about what steps they can take toward retaining your services. Known as a “call to action,” this could be anything from a free quote request form to a subscription option on an engaging and updated company blog. The Crawford PR site offers nothing along the lines of a sales funnel, and thus offers little reason for a visitor to make contact.

Physician, Heal Thyself
The prescription? Marketer, market! Reconstruct the site and optimize it for Google, so that online traffic has a chance of finding the website. Make the menu options user-friendly and add a news blog with a subscription option to build interest and trust by actively presenting case studies and analyses of news in the world of PR. Finally, present visitors with a call to action through blog subscription, a free consultation offer, or other means.

Your website can be a phenomenal marketing tool—but only if potential customers can find and navigate it.

The proprietors of Absolute Aluminum went out of their way to put forward an arresting website design, complete with flash animation, sound effects, and links to further company media. The result is slick, but misses a fundamental truth of online marketing: the goal of a website is to increase your audience. If visual pizzazz confounds your site visitors—or, worse, keeps your site out of search results—it isn’t worth having.

Help Google Help You
The single biggest problem with this website is that it has managed to make itself nearly invisible to Google. By implementing a Flash-based homepage design without a single text link to a subpage, the company has effectively convinced Google that its website is one big animation file. Without content to crawl and links to follow, Absolute Aluminum is missing out on even the most targeted keyword searches.

Cool Stuff Overload
The production value of the homepage flash presentation is impressive, but the load time eats up the crucial ten seconds during which visitors look for a reason to stay on a site. The image may have caught their eyes—but as a distraction, not a motivational guidepost.

The problems of the intro, unfortunately, are compounded by the layout, which is far too busy, with a large (but misnamed) side menu, an FAQ section that clutters the page, and redundant or unnecessary links. The result is an overdone visual impression that will tend to confuse potential customers, rather than inspiring them to act on their interest in what the company has to offer.

Missed Opportunities
And what should visitors do if they are interested? That could be a lot clearer. Like many sites, absolutealuminum.com lacks a real call to action—a hook prompting visitors to make initial contact. There is no form to request a free quote, and while there is a newsletter sign-up on the front page, there’s no explanation of what the newsletter has to offer. Visitors may be left feeling impressed with the site’s complexity, but not moved to transition from passive visitor to active consumer.

The Fix
To start, take off the Google-invisibility suit and simplify the website design. Use real text links that the search engine can find and follow, and post the company’s buried—but effective—ads on video sharing sites where they can catch Google’s roving eye. Then, install a news blog to show off the latest projects, providing new searchable content while establishing a sense of professional trust with visitors. Finally, use a subscription option for the blog and an omnipresent “request a quote” form to compel potential customers to answer the company’s call to action. With increased visibility, navigability, and focused visitor direction, Absolute Aluminum should see a marked improvement in traffic and lead generation.