Opportunities are wasted every day a visitor leaves your site without taking any action.
Attention spans are extremely low, which means you have to capture your website visitors quickly. In fact, within just a few seconds from the time they land on your webpage.
It’s such a short amount of time, that with a lack-luster site, can cause a potential lead to vanish.
You want your website to be inviting, intriguing and entice the visitor to stay longer — but how?
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Here’s some different ways you can improve your website to hopefully increase the amount of time they’re on your site for.
Value at the top
The first and probably most important thing you can do to improve the likelihood of someone staying on your website is to ensure the valuable content they came to your website for is clear.
A lot of the time, someone has clicked a result from Google that landed them on your site. And with that, they were looking for something specific — an answer to their inquiry.
By clicking on your site, they want to know that your page is going to provide the answer.
But remember, you only have 3 seconds — so make the answer clear above the fold (before they scroll) so it captures their attention. If there’s enough to get them to stay, they’ll keep scrolling. This additional scroll is where you can continue to add more value and information they’re seeking.
But if you’re vague and only provide the “meat” of the answer at the bottom — you’ll experience very high bounce rates.
Add visuals
There’s no question that a wall of text is just deterring. We don’t have time or the patience to digest it.
In turn, if you add more visuals in the form of images and video, you can really enhance your content and allow the user to engage more to stay.
Nowadays, a lot of users prefer video content, so pairing a video with your copy can give that option — and the likelihood of them continuing to browse your site if they liked the result is much higher.
Additionally, adding images can contribute to the context of your site — just be sure to not utilize “decorative” images just because, and use them if they truly add value.
Linking internally
Another super important aspect to not only keeping users on your site longer, but also for SEO, is to add links internally.
This means linking to other pages of your website within your own website. So if you were to write a blog, add links in that blog that lead to other blogs or service pages on your site.
By adding valuable internal links, your visitor has a chance at clicking those and visiting another page to continue reading more. Just be sure that the additional links are relevant and add value!
Internal linking can take time initially, but once you get in the habit of always linking to your own content, it will continue to provide more opportunities.
Talk like a human
With AI at an all time high, standing out as a human is more important than ever. Be sure that you talk to your reader, write like a “human” would write, and use language as if you were talking to them at your desk.
There is nothing wrong with utilizing AI to generate ideas, but I can’t tell you how much of a turn-off it is to read an article that sounds literally like a robot wrote it (and likely did).
So use your personality, your voice, and your style to make your content stand out — speak to the reader directly, and make them the focus.
Speed up your site
Like we started out with saying in this article, you literally have 3 seconds to capture a visitor’s attention. But what if your website doesn’t even load within 3 seconds?
Well, basically, you’re screwed.
Even if you have stellar content that will engage, if the page doesn’t load fast enough, you aren’t even giving them the chance to read it.
So optimize your website as best as you can! Run it through the Page Speed Insights test, enable lazy loading for images and assets, and double check your website hosting is capable of providing speeds you’re looking for.
Once you’re able to speed up your site, you’re giving yourself a heck of a greater chance at allowing the visitor to read and stay longer.
Wrapping up
In conclusion, the key to keeping visitors engaged on your website lies in delivering immediate value, enhancing user experience, and fostering a real human connection.
My recommendation for starters is to make sure your site loads quickly and provide valuable content that is clear and concise.
By implementing all of these strategies, though, you not only capture attention but also create an environment that encourages visitors to linger, explore, and ultimately, find value in what your website has to offer.
Remember, every second counts, so make each moment on your site count for your visitors.
