Your website is important. It is the face that you present to the world.

Your readers judge you and your books by your website. In fact, the people who visit your website will form their opinion within 50 milliseconds (that’s 0.05 seconds) of viewing your web page.

If you want more Visitors to stay on your website so that you can convince them to engage with you and eventually buy your books, then it is important that your website is effective in retaining visitors.

To find out how effective your website is, ask yourself these four questions.

1.  Does my website load quickly?

 Statistic:  47% of users expect a maximum of 2 seconds loading time for an
average website.

The longer it takes for your website to Load, the more potential visitors bail. People want quick responses. When they don’t get them, they move on to the next thing.

You can test your website load speed on the following free services:

• https://tools.pingdom.com
• https://gtmetrix.com
• https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights

Often the culprit for a website slow load time is that the image files on the website are large. If your website is slow, try compressing your images with this free tool found at Optimizilla.

2.  Is my website content written for easy scanning?

Statistic: Users spend an average of 5.59 seconds looking at a website’s written content.

Research shows that 79% of people scan a web page, while only 16% read word-for-word. Too much information results in cognitive overload. In an effort to reduce our cognitive load, we scan information. This results in more efficient processing of that information by the brain.

To maximize the effectiveness of your website, make your content scannable. Break paragraphs down into two or three sentences. Use headers and bullet points.

3. Does my website include a call to action?

Statistic:  70% of small business websites lack a call to action (CTA) on their homepage.

Good marketing always includes a call to action. Whether this is in an advertisement, in an email, on a social media site, or on your website. A call to action urges the reader to act now.

Include a call to action on your website. What do you want your visitors to do?

• Sign up for your newsletter.
• Give their email in exchange for a free ebook.
• Buy your book today to receive a special discount, bundle, or extra material.

4.  Does my website display well on all devices?

Statistic: Nearly 8 in 10 customers stop engaging with content that doesn’t display well on their device.

Websites look different on different devices. Your website will look different on a lap top computer versus a smart phone. You can view how your website appears on various mobile devices with the free tool found at Responsinator.

Did you know that your website may also look different in different browsers? You can view how your website appears in different browsers—Chrome, Firefox, Edge, etc.—with the free tool found at Browser Shots.

Related Posts:
Is Your Text Causing Cognitive Overload?
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