3 Ways to Love Your Website Again
“There’s something,” wrote poet Robert Frost, “that doesn’t love a wall.”
Like walls, most websites are unloved, too.
Sure, they may have been set up with the best of intentions. To keep it current with what’s actually happening in your business. To update it regularly. To add value through content like blogs, breaking news, and relevant updates.
But what ends up happening?
Nada. Zip. Zilch.
A confession: I’ve had the same problem. Business is great. Client projects are moving forward. But that promise I made to update my website every week? Forget about it!
At least, that’s what I ended up doing. Forgetting about it.
I didn’t sweat it, though. Neither should you. There are plenty of us whose analog activities get more attention than what we put up on the web. Look, it happens.
But then again, it can’t keep happening, either.
Because people (and search engines) can smell an unloved website a mile away. And while some of them will shrug it off… the more discerning and selective among them won’t.
“If they can’t even keep up a website,” the thinking goes, “can they take good care of me?”
And that doubt isn’t going to help you win them as a client or customer. So, here are 3 simple things you can do to love up your website without spending an arm & a leg on a total overhaul:
1. Simplify, simplify. Henry David Thoreau said it best. Keep it simple. There’s so much garbage on the web, that a straightforward, thoughtful, articulate website really stands out. This alone will definitely win you friends… and business. Can you remove pages for services you no longer provide? Can you take away old stock photos that look “canned” (that you never really liked anyway)?
2. Say less. One thing I teach all of my clients is that writing for the web is its own animal. It’s not like writing a brochure, print ad, or article. In fact, it’s a cross between the theater and a really likeable salesperson who speaks in haiku (and when was the last time you ran into one of those?). Pare down paragraphs into 2-3 line sentences. Make like Hemingway and ditch the adjectives. Hook our attention. Then cut to the point.
3. Abandon grammar rules. With apologies to every English teacher I’ve ever had: good grammar has no place on the web. I’m not saying write stupid (there’s enough of that online already). I’m saying there’s a reason why Nike went with “just do it” and not “you should do it now.” Short sentences rule. And dicey grammar can still be professional. Energetic. And work like gangbusters. The goal is to keep ‘em charmed and reading… not to win the Pulitzer. Go for impact, not literature.
Good luck, and let me know how it turns out.
