23: 5 Tips to Create a Website that Converts

Welcome to the Course Creators MBA podcast. I'm your host, Destiny Kopp. And in this podcast we're covering actionable tips to grow your online course business. But before I begin, I want to let you know that this episode today is sponsored by my free mini course Course in a Box, which is your plug and play system with templates and videos to get your online course created. You can grab your free course in a box by going to destinycock.com and I will make sure that this link is in the show notes. And today we are talking about websites that convert. And I have a special guest with me today, I have Carrima Niemash and she is a brand and web designer living in Raleigh, North Carolina who focuses on user experience with design so that your website does look more than just good. It converts into into paying clients. And Carrie Ma, thank you so much for joining me today. I'm so excited that you're here and I'm gonna give you an opportunity if you could tell us a little bit more about you, your journey and how you got to where you are today.

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for having me here. I am so excited too. So yeah, I am a brand and web designer that I started doing this full time about two years ago. I've been in the corporate world and I was designing websites as a director of market for a few healthcare companies. And that's when I started to really kind of realize best practices and what I enjoy doing. So I took that and kind of started my own business and just went all in from day one and was able to scale to a six figure business in a year just by practicing best marketing tips and kind of always thinking of the users and their experience through every marketing message, every website, things like that. And so, so now I try to help others get the success from their messaging as well.

So you mentioned that you were able to scale to six figures within a year. So tell us a little bit more about how you got started, how you found your first clients.

Yeah, yeah. So actually when I was in the corporate world, I was getting paid $30,000 a year, like barely enough to pay my rent.

And I was like to say how much, I mean, can you even rent an apartment and where you live for $30,000 a year?

Yeah, I was in 10,000 DOL credit card debt when I started. I had been fired from my very first job in the corporate world as a writer because I just wasn't meant to be a writer. But yeah, I was, you know, like after getting my second job and getting this like Better title being a director of marketing and feeling good and a little more comfortable. I was like, this is my life. Like I'm waiting a year maybe for a 25 cent raise. And I was like, I can't do that. I'm not made to be, be an employee. And so I hired a. She was actually, it's really funny, I didn't know the difference of different coaches because I wasn't in the entrepreneur space yet. And when you're not in the space, there's so much that you're not aware of. And so I hired a performance coach thinking she was a business coach. But it's really funny because after working with me, she did become a business coach because we had really good success together. But I basically just started from scratch from posting on my personal social media, like, hey, any friends or family need a website or something designed. I was designing resumes for $25 for some friends. Like it was, I was really making no money, but I was like, okay, I just need to build up some testimonials, put myself out there. And so I created an Instagram. And I remember being so scared of what everybody was going to think, like my friends back home and I just started showing work. I was barely getting any engagement at first, but I was like, okay, everybody keeps telling me to be consistent, so that's what I'm going to. And then I just kind of joined a bunch of Facebook groups, really started networking online and in person. And honestly that's what I attribute my success to. I've never paid for advertising. I'm a one woman show, I run it all. And I honestly have just created really intentional, authentic relationships with other entrepreneurs. And then from there I've just become kind of the go to girl when it comes to websites and branding.

Wonderful. So today we are talking about websites that convert. I know I've been to your website and you and I have spoken and I know you have a lot of clients that you've worked with, related to, you know, working on their website. So can you tell me after, you know, working with your clients and going through this yourself and also, you know, you work in the corporate world. What, what does somebody need on the website to, you know, we want somebody to come, right, and visit our website. So that's one, you know, the first thing is we got to get them there, but once they're there, what do we want them to do? Kind of walk us through that process and how do we design our website to get them to what we want them to do?

Absolutely, yeah. And so I love that you brought up that point because I think it's so important to think of what, what we want them to do. Because so many people, anyone really could design a website, right? I know so many clients I've worked with that had like their next door neighbor or their nephew or someone design a site for them. And it looked good, but it's all about thinking of your user and the journey you're taking them through. And so you really kind of have to nail down on who you're wanting to speak to at first. And then from there you just give them an experience that's like seamlessly taking them from step one to the final step. So there are five things that I really, really always try to incorporate to convert on the homepage alone, and that the number one thing would be just images of yourself. And I know so many people kind of shy away from those, but it is so impactful to have people connect with you in that way right off the bat. The second thing just is to run by them really quickly. Just to give kind of an idea is just clear call to action. And so many people are missing this on their website. Having one above the fold, having one in every section of content, telling them, what do you want them to do now? You know you're working on this great copy, you're giving them this wonderful, beautiful site, but where do you want them to go from here? Do you want them to go to your contact page and fill out an intake form? Do you want them to hop over to your social media? Do you want them to download a lead magnet? Do you want them to get on your list? You have to figure out what that looks like before you even start writing your content and make sure that the journey is basically like flowing down directly to that. The third thing that a lot of people miss that is so important to convert is an explanation on what you do and who you help. And that seems so, kind of, you know, like duh, like a duh moment. But so many people are missing that on their site. And I think it's because it's hard as entrepreneurs to kind of wrap up everything we do in one sentence, but that is so, so important. And then the fourth thing I always recommend is just client testimonials, making sure that people have proof that you've helped others, Putting images next to those testimonials, making them seem like real people and authentic and showing how you've changed other people. And I always recommend getting those testimonials after a couple months of people working with you. So they, they've already kind of started to get the benefits and see how that's changed them. And then finally, as far as things that, you know, you could even add these things to your website today, just links to your social media pages. So many people get to your site and people don't realize that the sales process doesn't stop there. People usually, when they come to my site, I get a ton of visitors a month to my site and not every single one of them has the budget or the business yet. But if they follow along on my social media and start to really get to know me and trust me, then when they are ready for that, whether it's a year or two, they'll contact me. And I have that happen all the time. People that are like, hey, I followed your Instagram for the last couple years. I'm finally ready for a website. So just knowing that it doesn't stop there, even if they're not, you know, converting immediately.

So I love all of these things. So images of yourself, clear call to action, an explanation of what you do and who you help, the client, client testimonials, and then the links to your social media page. Now would you say that all of these need to be on your homepage or just throughout your site?

Definitely. I mean, honestly, both. It helps with your homepage because people have the attention span of a goldfish. Literally. Like that is something that has been proven. And so if you do not catch their attention right off the bat, you're going to lose them. And some of the things that I always tell people as far as recommendations go when building out their sites is look at the biggest people in like the marketing industry. And so two examples I always use are Amy Porterfield and James Wedmore. Right. And so if you get on their sites right now, they have everything I just said right there. And so James Wedmore has a call to action. You know, two call to actions actually above the fold. And then he has a power statement. I transform course creators into inner driven seven figure digital CEOs. Let me show you how Amy Porterfield has a photo of herself and says, I teach business owners, educators and entrepreneurs the profitable action steps for building a highly engaged email list and et cetera. And so right off the bat, you're already knowing why you're on the website, whose website you're on, how they can help you and what to do next. And that is so important because if someone comes to your site and they're even remotely confused on what to do next, they're Going to bounce because there's just so much noise out there that we have to really make it so clear on. Hey, here's how I can help you do this.

Next, what are some of the best call to actions that you've seen? Do you think setting up a discovery call works or do you think it's better to get them on your email list? Or what do you normally suggest to your clients?

Yeah, so excuse me. It really just depends on the business that you have. And so as far as people who are having online businesses, I think that definitely an email list, like having someone sign up for a lead magnet and getting them on there. If you have a course or a digital product of sorts or really, I mean, honestly any online business, that's really powerful. But for me personally, what I want to do because I work one on one with people and get into really kind of in depth relationships with them is that I want them to go to my contact page and fill out my intake form, which is really detailed, ask them a ton of questions. And so before I even get on a call with these people, because if I had everybody go to just get on a call without asking these questions, I would, you know, spend so many hours a week on a call, I have to know that they're the perfect person. And so I think it really, I like if you have a podcast, you can have it listen to the latest episode. It really just depends on your personal goals and kind of your own personal funnel and how you funnel clients to get to work with you and where most of your leads come from. And if you are great at converting on Instagram, drive them to your social media more. If you have a digital product, drive them to the shop. And so it really is just depending on what's aligned with your personal goals. And to kind of figure that out, I would just take a step back and think about where you're getting the most conversions from. Look at that and figure out what you can do to drive people there.

Very good. So let's talk a little bit about copy on websites. And is there anything that we need? You know, let's just say we're not a copywriter. Right. I think most of us listening probably can relate to that. Is there anything we need to think about or anything that we can do on our own to, you know, when we're designing our website or going through and maybe auditing our website where we might need to make some tweaks that we need to think about?

Absolutely, yeah. So a few things is a few best practices as Far as writing copy is one, don't do too much because again, people have short attention spans and we are so busy. And especially if you're in a business to business space and you're marketing to other entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs are so busy, we're on the go. So make it quick and easy. Don't confuse them or overwhelm them with a ton of copy. And so that's definitely a best practice as far as just less is more and so so many people will have so many words that people just automatically get overwhelmed. And so it's just having a really good balance, of course, of how you lay out your pages with words but never saying too much. The second best practice I would have for that is to make sure you're making your copy about them. Even your about page. When it's about you, make it about them. Figure out what you can highlight about yourself that at the end of the day triggering something for them to want to work with you. And so, so many people I know have an about page that's like, hey, here's who I am, here's my story, here's what I've gone through, here's what I do now, and that's wonderful. But make that so short and sweet and still position it to a way that shows how they can help you. A good example of that is I could talk about how I studied this in college and got this degree and had this experience. Or I could just say, even when I was a kid I knew I had this entrepreneur itch because XYZ I would never stop thinking of the next big idea or selling lemonade on the side of the street. It's getting those personal stories but positioning them in a way that shows that this is what you were meant to do and that you're the person to help them. And then another best practice is just to not make it too hard and don't reinvent the wheel. So obviously your copy needs to be your own. And I would never say take someone else's copy, but what I will tell people is to go to the leaders in your industry sites. I mean, I'm talking the big people. I'm talking the Amy Porterfields, the Jenna Kutchers, the James Wedmores. I'm talking the really big seven figure people and see how they have laid out their copy. See how many words they're using, see what kind of journey that they're taking you on when you read, see what kind of sections they have and use that as a model for your own. If you see that Amy Porterfield has a section on who she helps and then a checklist on relatable. Like, does this sound like you? Then do that and make it your own. If you see that James Wedmore has an about section that positions himself as an expert by storytelling. From how he used to be a broke bartender until now. Figure out how you can do that. So just don't reinvent the wheel. And it's really helpful because these people have spent thousands, tens of thousands dollars on copywriters, and you get to just see the flow that they're modeling their page in and getting inspiration from that.

So I love that. Don't reinvent the wheel. And you know, when I work on anything, and I did this too, in the corporate world, you always need to go out and look at your competitors and look at best practices, I would say, in your industry, but also outside of your industry, because there's definitely some inspiration that you can get there. So I love that tip.

Yeah.

So tell us a little bit more about the homepage. Is there anything that we need? You know, you talked about some of the five, you know, the five things. But the homepage is so critical. Is there anything that we need to think about when we are setting up our homepage?

I think definitely just make it, well, one, like, within five scrolls. So, like, if you take your mouse and you scroll, it shouldn't be so long of a homepage that people are getting lost. Right. Because so many pages and homepages from people in the entrepreneur space overwhelm others. And so you'll start to realize that, too. As a best practice, if you look at, you know, really good sites, you love that they're usually pretty short, sweet, and to the point. And then as far as that goes, just images. Make sure that you're using, even if you're using stock images, ones that are reflective of who you are and who you want to work with. I love unsplash.com for stock images because there are so many daily that are coming up there that are unique and you can search any words, and they don't look like the same kind of cheesy stock images that have been used a million times. And then I think that another important thing to have is highlight your services. You know, if you have packages or a course, like, show a little bit about that and take people to your sales page from there. Make sure that they know that not only are you this person, not only is this the way that you can help in the future, show them what they could maybe get right now, if that's information from your blog or signing up on a wait list for your course or whatever that looks like, make that really clear. Because at the end of the day, we really want people, as far as conversion goes, to spend time on our site, right? Because it's the amount of time that they spend reading and on this journey and looking at these images, it's what's going to make them clients in the future. So I think just making it so seamless that they, they want to go and read more. And a lot of that too, is just showing your personality. And so many people are scared to do that because we feel like we, especially coming from the corporate world, we always had to be super professional. We had to be super cut and dry. A lot of times we had to email saying things like, best regards and, you know, try to keep it so professional that so many people do that in their copy and on their website. Like, they want to take these images just in, like, you know, pantsuits and blazers and it's just like, no, add your personality into it. If you love, you know, hip hop music, do that. If you love, like, denim skirts, wear that. Just whatever makes you you, no matter what industry you're in, what age you are, just show up as who you are in real life. And that's what's gonna make people really, like, captivated once they get to your site, instead of just seeming like they're on another site of somebody else who's trying to sell them something.

And I know I can relate to the corporate world and how we've been trained, you know, for so many years to be very proper, be very formal and stuffy. So that, that is a hard habit to break, by the way.

No, absolutely. And I, I had a client the other day who's been doing HR for 30 years, right? She's like the cream of the crop when it comes to hr. We were doing her site and she kept sending me these things that were so full of life and personality. But then there's this disconnect in her copy and her images, and I was like, you know what, what do you actually wear every day? Like, say you weren't getting photos done where you're wearing this blazer and this dress. What do you actually wear? And she was like, I wear sneakers and I wear these, like, flared pants and I wear this, like, graphic tee. And I'm like, wear that. Wear those in your images on your site. You know, just be, be authentic. Because people are craving authenticity in such a noisy world, especially in the online space. And it is hard to break that condition where we're being told to, you know, be professional and be proper and show up in this one way. And then we're like, oh, we're doing business. Which means we need to take that to the next level. But instead it's just taking it back a step and showing the real you.

So I have a question for you, and I'm actually, you know, asking you this probably from a personal level too, but how do you know if a website is converting or if it needs an overhaul?

Yeah, so I'm a numbers girl, so I'm all about looking at analytics. And so if you have a Squarespace site, for example, analytics are already created with that. If you don't like, if you have a WordPress showit site, Google Analytics is super easy to set up. It's free. There are so many articles that takes three seconds to set it up that you can Google. And so start looking at your numbers on an app, like, per month basis. And so, for example, I recently saw on my site that 6,000 unique visitors were coming to my site every month just from Pinterest. But what wasn't happening from those people is that I wasn't getting the conversion from that. And so while I was spending so much energy and time on Pinterest and getting the traffic, it wasn't converting because a lot of those people on Pinterest were other designers and people that weren't my clients. And so it helped me realize what I need to do and change in order to make these, like, target the people that will convert. And so take a step at, like, back and look at the numbers of your site. See what buttons people are pressing, see what pages people are spending the amount of time on. Your analytics will show you all of these things. And they it's telling a story of your website. It's telling the story of your business. If you have three blogs that have performed better than any others, put those as the snippets on your homepage. If you have a image that is on a page that people spend a lot of time on, that probably means that people are looking at it for a while and that it's captivating them. So just kind of think of your analytics as something that's telling you a story. And then from there, if you don't already, just make sure that you are kind of like asking people who are in your target audience about feedback on your site, because those people will give you the best feedback. And so when I redid my site recently, I posted in three Facebook groups that have a lot of my ideal clients in it. I was like, hey, I would love your all's feedback on how this user experience is. Because while we can step into our ideal client's head to an extent, right, we can be like, okay, this is what they want to see and we can adopt that Persona a little bit, we still can't fully be them with their experiences and see it through their lens. And so just ask them. And so once I did that, I even got three inquiries and it was just an authentic, genuine asking for feedback because I wanted to make sure it was resonating. And I got three inquiries just from doing that because it was converting so well. And so just never be scared to ask your people and be like, hey. But with that being said, make sure you're not just asking. I have so many clients that ask like their husbands or their friends. And I'm like, don't ask these people because these aren't the people that you're wanting to take on this journey with you. And so be really mindful about who you ask because if your husband loves it and your ideal client doesn't, what's going to end up with money in your bank account?

You know, that is such a great tip. And you know, I hadn't even really thought about going out to some of these Facebook groups, right, where my ideal customer is and asking them to get to give feedback on the, on my website. So I love that. Kerri, Moo, any last minute tips you have for the course creators who are listening here today?

Yeah, so I mean, I think as far as a course, there's, there's obviously so much that goes into marketing your course and I know that you're the pro on that, but I do just want to say make it, make sure that when you're putting that on your website and you're putting these things out there that you are showing who you are behind the scenes. Because at the end of the day, when someone wants to learn from you, it's because they trust you and because they like you. And so if they are choosing you as someone that they want to be their mentor or educator or to get them to the next step in X, Y or Z, make sure that you are showing up as who you really are. And you will be amazed at how many just authentic relationships you create of people that will end up buying from you. And that all can be done from your site and that all can be done on your sales pages, your homepage. Just make sure that in everything you do, it resonates with you and feels true to you as far as design on your site goes. And I always tell people to think of your website creation. Kind of like dating, right? And so you go, you go on a date and you want your date to kind of give you a spiel of exactly who they are and so you can see this image of them and they're going to tell you the best stuff on a first date. Make sure you're doing that on your website. Show the highlights, show the awesome parts of who you are. And then it's the other part of people saying, like, when you know, you know. And so when you're designing your site or having a designer do it for you, make sure that you're getting the yes and the aha moment and the feeling of. Of pride with your site. Because if you aren't proud of the way your website looks, so many people will shy away from sharing it, even if it's a subconscious thing. But when you're proud and you want to scream it from the rooftops, you're going to put yourself out there so much more and so figure out what doesn't feel right and figure out what's going to change to make that feel like something that is so true to you and feels so good for you and make that shift.

Thank you so much. And Carrie Ma, where can people find you?

Yeah, so you can find me on my site, carrimacreative.com if you want to kind of see how I have implemented my own tips. It's K A r I m a creative.com or I'm on Instagram a lot at Carrie Mutt Creative. And on there I'm like always posting a lot of the best tips for web design and brand design and other tips on conversions. And that's my whole kind of brand story is converting. So there's lots of good stuff over there.

Very good. And I will definitely make sure that those links are in the show notes here and course creators, thanks so much for joining us today. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Would love for you to rate and review the podcast on itunes or your favorite podcast platform. Have a great rest of your day. Bye for now.