Why Potential Customers Are Leaving Your Website (And How to Get Them to Stop)

Is your website getting traffic but not seeing returns? This may be due to prospects visiting your website but not sticking around long enough to become a new customer or client. They visit for a moment and then bounce away from your website and on to other things. What could have been a sale ends up a dud and you are left wondering if online success is not for you. But don’t abandon your website or online presence just yet because many business owners experience this same dilemma. Better yet I’m about to walk you through five reasons why this happens and, even better, show you how this can be fixed!

Problem 1 – No Clear Message

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Designed by Rawpixel.com

If a customer can’t figure out who you are they will be more likely to leave. Think about that for a moment. Makes sense, right? Nobody likes to feel confused and the more confusing your website or message is the more prospects you will lose to high bounce rates. That’s where the old adage of K.I.S.S. comes into play. This acronym used in many aspects of life stands for Keep It Simple Stupid and should be taken to heart online. Keep things simple! Make your headline clearly state what you do, who it is your help and how it is you do that. What you don’t want to do is try to be too clever. Customers hate this. Keep in mind that while you are an expert in your craft your customers are often not. If they don’t share the same knowledge as you then they may not get all of your witty references. By keeping it simple and getting to the point you will generate more engaged customer interest.

Problem 2 – Aesthetically Displeasing Website

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Designed by Macrovector

                Think about the last time you clicked on a website looking forward to its content. You entered a search into a search engine, found a website or business you thought was promising, clicked on the link and then…dud. Absolute dud. The website was old, outdated and difficult to navigate. You immediately hit the back button and perused elsewhere.

The problem of having an old or out-of-date website design affects countless business owners and yet many are unaware of how many prospects they are losing. Consumers in today’s digital age will never trust an old website that does not appear to have any effort put into it, especially when compared to sleeker modern websites within the same industry. If you don’t put the time into your website customers often feel slighted and abandon services altogether.

Fortunately there’s an easy solution to this. Take the time to make an aesthetically pleasing website. You can accomplish this by either making the time to learn website design and formatting or hiring a web design service that specializes in modern design elements proven to attract prospects, generate leads and maximize conversions (oh hey…that’s me!).

Problem 3 – Words, words, words.

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Designed by Freepik

                When’s the last time that you were excited to read a research paper? If you’re not a professor, lawyer, doctor or other business professional who needs to critically analyze these documents to make a living then you’re answer is probably never. Yet despite our own avoidance of documents with too much text and no visuals many businesses repel customers with websites that are all words. Visual content matters.

In fact it has been shown that eighty percent of people visiting a website are just skimming and not reading. Not having excellent visual cues means you could potentially be losing eighty percent of site visitors and thus a significant number of strong leads and conversions. To fix this is once again simple. Make sure you illustrate key points with visuals while creating dynamic text content. This means using bold or italic text at times and varying height, weight and text size. A good way to figure out if your site is attractive? Ask yourself. If you were to skim through your site would you want to remain engaged with the content presented or do you find it visually repelling?

Problem 4 – Page Load Speed

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Designed by Freepik

A…slow…loading…page…is…worse…than…having…to…read…these…slowly…progressing…words. Why is that? Poor page load speeds cause you to lose prospects before they even see your site. If your site does not load within three seconds, forty percent of potential prospects will already abandon your site. Done. That’s it. Goodbye business!

But don’t feat that’s why us web developers are here. If you can’t find a way to fix the problem on your own (this can be a complicated process of filtering through many files and databases) a web developer is your key to page speed success. The amount you spend on their services  is far worth it in the end, as increased page load speeds not only make customers happy, they make search engines (Google!!) happy too.

Problem 5 – Too Many Options

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Designed by Freepik

Many business owners make the mistake of thinking that the more they offer the more they will sell. While this principle does work in situations such as client prospecting and direct sales outreach, it is not effective on a website and often repels visitors. Too many options or messages overwhelm customers and those that visit your website, leading them to opt for nothing instead while abandoning a website they see as confusing and overcomplicated. To fix this problem make your website one that is easy to understand. Show the customer what it is you offer, how you can help their needs, and why you are the best source for doing so. Giving them a clear path is the best bet for online success.

When pursuing an online endeavor or website many business owners are looking to take advantage of today’s digital age. Yet what many fail to realize is how complicated it can be to attract customers. What makes it even harder is that once you attract them there is no guarantee you will convert them, especially if there are critical problems on your website doing more to hurt your business than help it. By recognizing what problems businesses encounter online and how to combat them you will better position yourself for online success.

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