Running a Web design company is never easy – especially if you constantly run out of leads. That’s why this January; get ready to warm things up if your leads are getting cold, because we are taking a closer look at the factors that may be hindering your website from generating the Web design leads that you deserve.

Start getting more sign-ups, and make your telephone ring off the hook this 2020!

1. Ask just the right amount of information in lead capture forms

This goes without saying. Lead capture forms that ask for too much information are a huge mistake for any company, including Web design companies.

People are generally wary on the Internet, and no matter how trustworthy your website may look, people would still be unwilling to divulge too much personal information on the Internet.

Rather than trying to collect too much information on your primary lead capture form on your landing page, ask for the minimum instead and just collect additional information later using surveys.

People on your list – the ones who have signed up to receive future updates from your company – would be more willing to provide additional information in the future because they have already expressed interest in your brand.

What you should do:

Make your lead capture form as simple and friendly as possible and just ask for a valid email address and their name.

To make sure that they provide an email that they actually open, it’s a good idea to capture emails also using free downloads and other value-laden downloads on your website.

In the case of Web design companies, a free download can be as simple as a free mock-up (a PSD file or two) that they can use for their own business. Everything operates with the principle of reciprocity, which is why free downloads and similar offers of value still work no matter what you’re niche you are from.

Should you ask for the customer’s office or home phone number? You can, but there’s a huge chance that customers won’t give away this information. So it’s better to work in the opposite direction.

Instead of asking for their phone number, have them call you at the office instead. There are also other ways to capture possible leads through very simple communication channels: there are email and chat, too.

On-site chat functions are HOT and you should definitely add that functionality if you can manage to field chats from potential customers who might have questions about your services.

2. Design your website and landing pages with JUST the customer in mind

This is one of the most common mistakes that we see with novice companies. They always try to make their websites all about THEM.

But here lies a fundamental flaw: when you are trying to generate quality, Web design leads, the focus should always be the customer, all the way.

What you should do:

– Make a dedicated landing page for each promotion.

– Make sure that UI is user-friendly, and everything that is important is above the fold, as per Google guidelines.

– Check the page loading time – any loading time above 3 seconds is a big no-no.

Simplify if you must, and trim down on fat to make sure that you are getting the most important points across in the shortest span of time.

– Have just one very passionate and compelling CTA (call to action) per landing page. Having too many CTAs can actually confuse readers and this can harm your campaign.

– Check the tone of your current copy. A user-focused landing page should always refer to the customer directly.

So do away with your “we” and “they” and replace all those with pronouns like you and yours.

Sure, it’s your website – but you are addressing the customers directly, and you want all the customers to be compelled by what you have to say and offer.

– There is such a thing as an uneven “ask and offer ratio.” Now what this means is that the amount of information you are asking from your customers must correspond to the perceivable value of what is being offered in the first place.

For example, if the main offer is a free digital eBook, or a case study comprised of fifteen colored slides, it doesn’t make sense to fashion your lead capture form with ten fields. All you can ask if this is your offer is a name and an email.

However, if you are offering a webinar, a free eBook download, and 10% off their first product from your website, that is perceivably bigger, and you can definitely ask for more information that will help you in building the best list, and helping your system generate more leads in the future.

3. Focus on features of your main offer

Every landing page has the main offer. How you actually package the offer is going to differ from time to time and there are also going to be many key differences each time you try out a new angle.

Our advice would be to identify the most unique and compelling features of what you are offering, list these down, and then expand to make them both appealing and understandable to your audience. The last part of the process is often the hardest.

A Web designer can go on and on about the technical specifics of material design – but would the common business owner also appreciate the concept the same way? Probably not.

More often than not, business owners are looking for fast and painless solutions to their problems. Many of them have already tried building their websites, but are not getting the results that they want.

So what do they do? They seek out a Web design company that can turn things around for their business.

Take note that the principles we have outlined in this guideline apply to everything on your landing page, not just the copy above the fold.

For example, if you are offering a free download called “Web Designs for Dental Businesses,” don’t just tell them that having updated and sensible Web design is going to boost their business.

This is just the first part of the equation. The more important part, which is the ‘meat’ of what you are really offering, can be explained well enough when you illustrate the actual outcomes when they do get Web design.

The rest of the puzzle, so to speak, can be determined by the customer himself when he takes a look at your website again to find the information he needs. This activates the need for the website to be well-organized, structured, and offering the right type of associated information for users.

Remember that when you want to illustrate a feature of a product or service, you are actually illustrating the direct value of what you are offering to the person’s business.

We want your customers to be able to say “hey, this is exactly what I need because x solves y.” This is the sweetest response you can get from a customer, and that is how you generate leads with a well-designed landing page.

What you should avoid (further):

You probably already know this, but it bears repeating: no matter how good your copy is, if your customers bump into a gigantic wall of text, whether the content is above the fold or below it, you are going to lose them.

Why? A couple of reasons:

– Thick paragraphs are hard to read on mobile devices and computers.

– It is harder to SCAN large tracts of text.

– The text will be visually unappealing and people may just jump to an easier to read the website.

We know what you are thinking: this doesn’t make any sense. People are supposed to be impressed by lots of text. It shows that you have a lot to say, and the page can barely hold your brilliant thoughts. WRONG.

There is no proof that people on the Web love large tracts of text. Maybe they’re more engaged to read longer text when they’re holding their Kindle devices, but a jaded business owner is a different being altogether when you are trying to convince him to call your office for a free consultation ASAP. There’s pre-conditioning (building the desire to make contact) and the call to action, which clinches the desirable outcome.

What you should do:

You don’t have to throw away the existing copy if you have a really good copy already. The issue here is readability on the Web. You can easily solve the ‘wall of text’ problem by creating what is called ‘chunks.’

Easily readable ‘chunks’ of text that are only one to three lines long are best for scanning. This way, no matter how long your text really is, people will be able to scan and digest the gist of it before proceeding to read the entire tract of text.

This is just how it goes on the Internet: before people read anything in full, they need to be able to scan the entirety of the text to see if they are interested and second if the text they found is actually what they are looking for. Because let’s face it: it’s easy to make mistakes while doing a search on the Internet, even with Google’s brilliance with AI and whatnot.

4. Create ultra-relevant offers

This is another supercritical point in the lead generation process. Your traffic has to actually WANT what you are going to offer them. It is not enough to wrangle together a random PDF as a free download and get on with it, just because you will be getting names and valid emails in return.

This is bad business in general and here’s why: you may have gotten the emails that you wanted, but the free download that you offered will give a bad impression of your business. Simply put, the more effort you put into whatever you are offering, the bigger the chances of people coming back to hire your company.

It’s basic consumer psychology: people want answers to their problems, they want to see how authoritative a company is, and more importantly, they need to feel safe knowing that your Web design company really knows what it’s doing.

What you should do:

In preparation for the next great promotion, it always pays to ask your existing leads about the type of content that they’d like to see. Use services like Survey Monkey to send surveys that are easy to fill out. Of course, you may also want to provide an incentive to people when they fill out the survey itself. This might sound like too many steps to get to a particular point, but the important thing here is that you are working to provide the right type of offers to your traffic, so your efforts will not be wasted.

5. Maximize the power of event registrations

Event registrations are HUGE credibility boosters on the Internet. Yes, they may take longer to make available and you may be in for a long haul in terms of production, but keep in mind that if you want to position yourself as one of the credible leaders in the neighborhood that is your niche, then it makes complete sense to get your event registration down pat.

In order to make people want to register for your event, you just have to convey one thing: credibility. And how do you do this? By being authoritative in your own right. This is the reason why many successful businesses online that regularly hold events use explainer videos and talking head videos to get their point across.

When building credibility on the Internet, know that:

– People don’t know who you are and what you do, and therefore, you must be 100% onboard in telling them everything they need to know before they can start trusting you.

– There is absolutely nothing wrong with showing your qualifications, so people will pay more attention to you. The best time to exhibit your experience and qualifications will always be at the beginning of the video presentation on the event registration page.

– It’s okay to state different facts in the introductory video, but make sure that these facts are relevant to the event and you absolutely have to say them. In the context of Web design, you need to focus on conveying desired outcomes and how you are actually going to start fixing your customers’ problems with their websites.

– You should show your face when doing introductory or explainer videos. If you don’t want to do an actual talking head video, that’s fine, but you should at least show a photo of yourself so that people can attach a face to the voice, the qualifications, and of course, the personality that you put forth in the video.

– And finally, it is important that you always convey a sense of URGENCY when inviting people to sign up for a time-sensitive event. Ideally, there should be a limited number of seats, and there should be a countdown system that runs on the event page and through the email blasts you are going to perform to ensure that people are going to sign up and attend the event because they really want to. It is absolutely vital to building that excitement and need in people because that makes them more open to accepting and buying into offers. Keep this in mind and you are going to see a lot of success in your niche.