What Else to Consider When Launching Your Website
by Richard D’Ambrosio /
You’ve put your heart and soul into your website, the very space your business breathes. Your landing page echoes the images; words and suppliers reflect your brand; and navigation through the site to the ultimate end, closing a sale, is good – at least for this phase of your business.
Exhausted by the process, now you need to find the energy to develop a plan to let people know how incredible you and your website are.
Kelly Greenleaf began her journey as a travel agent in the fall of 2015, joining Cadence Travel’s host agency network. As she developed her supplier relationships, industry knowledge and marketing plan, her focus turned to launching a website that would attract the kind of customers she wanted to serve, sophisticated adventurers, and tell her personal stories.
For a little more than four months, Greenleaf worked with Melinda Powers, Cadence director of marketing, and Chelsea Petre, Cadence host agency marketing manager, choosing photos, colors and fonts, designing pages and testing navigation.
“I was anxious to launch my website as quickly as possible, because I didn’t want to start taking on clients until it was up-and-running,” Greenleaf said. “But the process took longer than I’d expected, in great part because I was so, so particular about what I wanted.”
Well Traveled Living soft-launched in February 2016 to a few of Kelly’s friends and family members. Once the team was happy with feedback and their own assessments, they set Apr. 1, 2016, for a full-blown website launch.
Planning the unveiling
Independent travel agents don't often get the chance to draw attention from consumers, friends and family the way other small business owners do. With so many agents today working from home, there is no ribbon-cutting event for public relations photos, and no space to host a “grand opening” reception. That’s why taking full advantage of the launch of a website affords a milestone for agents to celebrate and begin to draw attention to their business.
“I’d spent a lot of time deciding on my company name, selecting which photos I wanted to use on the landing page, the order in which my webpages appeared, what to include in my bio, what to wear for my head shot,” Greenleaf said. “The launch of my website was the first time that most of my contacts would even know that I’d switched careers, so I really wanted it to be well-received.”
“The unveiling of a website is so emotional,” said Powers. “At first, you’re terrified that a client is going to notice a typo on the homepage in three seconds that you didn’t notice in three months … But the fear eventually dissipates and you sort of come out of the trenches and see everything through new eyes.”
Greenleaf chose two key marketing paths; her friends and family email database and social media. As part of her host agency contract, Cadence offered Greenleaf a complimentary launch email through the company’s marketing automation platform, Marketo.
The email contained a short, personal message from Greenleaf “stating that I was embarking upon a new journey,” she said. Also, Greenleaf used Cadence marketing resources, including proprietary graphics, for her social media accounts, signature lines, business cards, letterhead, and other marketing materials.
“On the day of the launch, I was finally able to relax, take a deep breath and enjoy the experience. It was absolutely thrilling,” Greenleaf said. “We’d all worked so hard … it was a joy to sit back and receive so much positive feedback.”
While Greenleaf basked in the glow of personal emails and social media posts, Powers and Petre were monitoring the data flowing through Marketo at Cadence headquarters, including who was opening the email, clicking through to the site, where they were clicking to, etc. They also looked for telltale signs of passive feedback, like people unsubscribing to the emails.
Nearly three out of four recipients opened the email, more than triple the industry average, and the click-through rate was 45 percent.
“This is something that I tend to obsess over, because we really strategized over the communication details,” Powers said. For example, the email was sent from “Kelly Greenleaf,” as opposed to “Well Traveled Living,” the polished brand, and the headline was designed to encourage curiosity: “Guess who just launched a new website!”
“The email was warm and friendly, but very concise, with a few personal sentences and a button to check out the website,” Powers said, to purposely play off Greenleaf’s relationships with the recipients in a manner that reflects her personality and business brand.
Continuing the momentum
Momentum continued to build over the next two years. Unique visitors to Well Traveled Living is up 73.8 percent year-over-year, and total visits are up 52.2 percent year-over-year, about 20 percent of those visits coming from Greenleaf’s social media feeds. Page views have increased 43 percent year-over-year, and Well Traveled Living’s email subscription feature has created an average of one new lead each month — and Greenleaf is using two years of data to plan an update to help her attract more clients.
For those new agents looking to launch or dramatically redesign their website, Greenleaf believes the immersive search into the authentic “you” is the first and most critical step.
Petre agreed. “Establishing a clearly defined brand from the start will make the design of your website a much easier process. You also want to make sure to highlight your differentiators — whether it is the service you provide, your personal story, or your specialties.”
“Ultimately, the secret to efficient, confident decision-making is knowing yourself so well that it creates a filter for every little detail that will come your way … so don’t skimp on that initial self-discovery phase,” Powers said.
Greenleaf also recommends getting professional help. “I was incredibly fortunate to work with a marketing team that really knew what they were doing, and also cared a lot about me. They were great listeners, and also visionaries, and they worked hard to make sure that my website and company launch were successful,” she said.