Here are the top 5 biggest mistakes people make when hiring an online marketing agency to build a website: 

They choose a generic-looking website.

Ten years ago, having ANY website was a major competitive advantage because many businesses had not yet built an online presence.  However, the reality today is that having a website is a basic requirement to being in business.  Too many business owners continue to pay for generic-looking websites that do not stand out from the competition. The result is a website that does not stand a chance to attract your ideal customer. If you want to attract your ideal customer, get a website that acts like a beacon to those people. Plus, employ an effective SEO strategy so that your website appears prominently in the search results.

They hire a non-fluent English speaker to create your content. 

These websites stand out like a sore thumb because they will often have spelling and grammar mistakes. 

They go cheap and go with one of those “Built-it-yourself” website builders.

These companies have great advertising and they make their offering sound like it will be a piece of cake to build a website yourself.  The truth is that the end result may be a website that looks generic. Also, some of these website builders are not compatible with SEO techniques. 

They go with a web designer who does not build their site with a mobile-friendly platform. 

It is astounding that some agencies are still building websites that are not mobile-friendly!  If you are not familiar with the term “mobile-friendly,” it means that a website looks great on both a desktop screen and a smart phone or tablet.  In 2018, 52.2 percent of all website traffic worldwide was generated through mobile phones, up from 50.3 percent in the previous year.  So, if you have a website now but aren’t sure if it is mobile-friendly; grab your smart phone, open a browser, and type in your website address. If you only see part of your website and you need to scroll left to see the entire top of your website, your site is not mobile-friendly.  Visitors to your website will be frustrated when they see your page and quickly leave.  This may result in the search engines penalizing your site because of a poor user experience.

They rely on paid advertising for website traffic.

Paid advertising does what it is intended to do—send traffic to your website!  However, over the long term, paid advertising is expensive and you need to keep paying month-after-month to continue to get traffic.  There are more affordable and BETTER ways to get traffic to your website.  However, these methods require sophisticated skills that many website developers do not understand.

We would be happy to discuss your business goals. Reach out to us via our Contact Us page.