Branding and Marketing for Professional Services Firms
5-point B2B Website Design Checklist
for Greater Visibility Elizabeth Harr
Why is it so important to get B2B website design right?
80.8%of professional services buyers check out your website — before
they do anything else.
Source: Referral Marketing for Professional Services Firms Research Report
Your website not only can be —it should be — your highest performing business
development asset.
5Mistakes in B2B Website Design
1
2
3
4
Muddled Messaging and Cliche Imagery
“Un”Responsive Design
Salesy Content Only
Outdated / Weak or No SEO
Lack of Engagement Tools5
What is a high-performance website?
Anatomy of a website that performs - and makes you more visible
Clear messaging and professional imagery — powerful signals to your
audience on what matters to
#RethinkingReferrals
Source: Referral Marketing for Professional Services Firms Research Report
43.6%rule out referrals because they couldn’t understand how the firm could help
them.
Your website should convey your overall brand positioning.
3 Simple Questions
What do you do?
3 Simple Questions
What do you do?
3 Simple Questions
Who do you do it for?
What do you do?
3 Simple Questions
Who do you do it for?
Why should clients choose
Imagery sends a message about the quality of your brand.
Death by cliche.
Professional imagery can still be playful, unexpected …
… backs your brand, and signals to your audience what you’re really all
The Importance ofResponsive Design
graph growth of mobile searches
Mobile-friendliness is now a search ranking signal.
Google’s Mobile Search Update
Responsive design for a mobile and tech-savvy marketplace.
If your website is not responsive, you’re leaving a lot of potential business on the table.
Educational Content
Content that is useful to your clients and showcases your expertise.
What is educational content?
Educational Content is Not…
Brochures TestimonialsCase Studies
Syndicated Content
Faux White Papers
Marketing Copy
There are two types of content.
Content Type #1: Stock Content
Purpose
Focus
Access
SEO
Examples
Issue level
Requires
registration
Premium quality to demonstrate expertise
Optimize titles and landing pages only
Guides, ebooks, research reports
Examples of Stock Content
Your stock content needs a home…
Resources Page or Library
…and a front door.
Landing Page
Landing Page
Draw traffic
Topic
Open access
Optimize titles and contentBlog posts, articles, videos, social media
Content Type #2: Flow
Purpose
Focus
Access
SEO
Examples
Topic level
Open access
Draws traffic
Optimize titles and content
Blog posts, videos, articles, social media
Examples of Flow Content
Some of your flow content goes out into to the world.
The rest stays at home and lives in your blog.
Building a Better Blog
Longer, substantive posts
(1,000+words)
Demonstrates your expertise
Optimized for search engines
Includes social sharing buttons
Contains offers for deeper
engagement
Includes cross-links
Stream of fresh content
Blog No-No’s
Your News and Events
Who Joined Your Firm
Your Community
Service
Miscellaneous Announcemen
ts
Educational content has wide scale applicability and builds visibility because people love to digest it & pass it around.
Promotional content has specific applicability — and people don’t necessarily love to digest it nor does it get passed around. If it’s all you
Optimize Your Website for Search Engines
SEO is a technique designed to make your content easily accessible to the right
audiences.
What is search engine optimization (SEO)?
How to Think Like a Search Engine
• Relevance (keywords)
• Website authority (links)
• User experience (responsive)
• Technology (optimizing)
Do keyword research to understand what terms people are searching for and your capability for ranking for those keywords.
Find a balance of
Volume
Difficulty
Relevance
Choosing the Right Keywords
Assess Relevance through Simple, Free Research Methods
Google Auto-Populate
Google Related Searches
Google Trends will put that relevance into better perspective
Using Google’s Keyword Planner in conjunction with a tool like Moz will help you
compare volume with difficulty.
MozKeyword
Aim for keywords with difficulty lower or just above your website
authority
Broad Specific
Audience will be larger, but less qualified
Audience will be smaller, but more
All Keywords are not Equal
Implement the the keywords in titles, title tags, meta descriptions and within your
content.
Titles
Title Tags
Meta Description
Within Content
Engagement Tools:Include Offers
and Calls-to-Action
Stage 1Attract Prospects
Stage 2Build Engagement
Stage 3Turn Opportunities into Clients
Offers to expose visitors to other
content
Offers to move prospects
through the
Conclusion — Your Visibility Checklist
Clear Messaging and Professional Imagery
Responsive Design
Educational Content
SEO Strategy
Offer Strategy