Social Media Impact on Your Website:
Part 1: What role does a website play, today?
Author: Robert Kramberger
Prior to the onslaught of Social Media, websites were the primary, digital portal for a business to effectively promote its products or services. The key was to create content-rich sites that would provide a virtual headquarters for your company: a place to not only display items and disseminate information, but to also drive demand, generate leads, and secure sales. Then, along came all these new channels.
Initially, from a business perspective, Social Media was perceived to augment your web presence by using these new channels to expand your company’s presence in the digital realm. The concept seemed clear: drive more traffic to your website, and the site will do the rest. So, what happened?
Social Media, such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, have become more than just channels; they have essentially become entities unto their own, each with their own characteristics that may or may not attract users that could translate into clients/customers for your business. The challenge is to manage the visitors’ experience with your Social Media channels and direct traffic to your website; ‘Organic’ is a term often used.
What does your Google Analysis show? Do visitors still visit your site on a regular basis? And do they connect for anything other than ordering products and services, but only after already making a decision via Social Media? Or, perhaps, they just drop in to see the recent job postings (unless, of course, they have already reviewed them through LinkedIn).
It is vital that the visitors’ exposure through Social Media encourages them to complete the journey and visit your site regularly, otherwise your website risks becoming redundant, or even obsolete. Analytic tools can certainly help determine how your business is faring in effectively driving traffic, but it would be more fulfilling, to both you and your clients/customers, if they could communicate their experience directly with you. Let them share their “journey”, as they navigate from Social Media channels to your website, and back again.
Start by providing them with an opportunity to tell you how and why they were influenced to visit your site; this could be in the form of a simple question. The key is to engage them (converse), and not to simply analyze their behavior. If they ask questions, or make comments, respond accordingly.
Also, when establishing your digital, corporate presence, offer multiple channels to reach out and engage with a variety of visitors. Research shows that the actual value of visitors may vary, depending on the channel used but, generally speaking, visitors to websites that were influenced and directed through Social Media, tend to be better engaged, and therefore, more loyal and satisfied.
Just make sure that the invitation and incentive to visit your website is absolutely clear. Ask them what they think, and also provide visible links connecting all your Social Media channels, including tabs on your website, so that the experience for visitors is truly ‘Organic’.
Web site or website, is it all the same?
Well, I suggest ‘website’, and you may refrain,
But only if you want to relive the nineties, again.
– Robert Kramberger