It is difficult to sell your offer if you are not known, liked and trusted. All three are essential for online authority. It is essential to tell your site visitors about yourself and provide evidence in support of your claims.
In real life, you meet with prospective clients and answer their questions. They can see and hear you. They make up their minds from what you say and how you say it; body language and other visible cues.
This is not so easy online because you are dependent solely upon your content. You can use video and this may provide some visible cues people need to decide but it is still nothing like personal encounter.
It is hard to avoid concluding online marketing is more difficult than face-to-face marketing. For larger investments, your aim is to move prospective clients from your website to a face-to-face, phone or Skype meeting. The last two are perhaps not as good as face-to-face meetings but if you are selling something people want and they cannot find anything similar closer to where they are, they do work.
So, the question is how to marshal evidence on your website that will encourage visitors to explore your offer further or for low-priced products make a first purchase.
Is your site full of useful, reliable information? People impressed by your knowledge may give your offer a try.
Closely related to this is generosity, where you provide useful information free of charge. If you can show you are the hub of an online community that exchanges ideas, so much the better. This can be difficult if you are starting out but established organisations can encourage their members to contribute to their sites. A blog can have several authors who should respond to comments on their articles. A strong community of authors and plenty of comments can do more to contribute to site authority than just about anything else.
If this does not work for you, for example if you don’t have time to blog, it is inappropriate or you are not established, what can you do?
Sources of Authority
Here are examples of things you can include on your site to increase authority. Be aware, it is better to integrate these items into your pages and not relegate them to their own page. However, if someone does want to know more about you it can be helpful to have an about page with detailed information in one place.
- Books and publications – an actual book you can buy from a bookshop is more convincing than an ebook. However, an ebook is easy to download and can be a quick way to establish authority with a good piece of sustained writing. An ebook does not have to be a sustained argument. Why not share an idea as research that might in time become a real book? Compile a report or paper on a particular topic, for example.
- Testimonials are perhaps the most common way of establishing authority. Attribute a statement in quotes with a name and organisation at least. It is better with a photograph and even better if it is a video statement. Don’t edit testimonials to correct grammar; the writer’s idiosyncrasies are more convincing. Also, do not put them on a page of testimonials. Integrate them with the copy on your site and people will read them.
- Third party validation that can be independently verified does not have to be a testimonial. Some sites feature logos of past clients, for example. These will be valuable if you want to attract similar clients but may be a turn-off for others who may think you are out of their league. (This may be an advantage of course!)
- Memberships and awards are helpful if they are real evidence of your achievements. Membership of some professional bodies is conditional on an examination or assessment and so it has real value. If you are an associate, it demonstrates your interest and not so much your achievement.
- Speaking engagements can be evidence of your authority if you can claim to be doing several a month or show some prestigious venues. Certainly, offering a presentation on your website can elicit interest.
- Qualifications – people may want to know about them and so make them available on your website or Linked-In profile.
- Achievements can be part of your employment history. People don’t want to know who you have worked for so much as what you achieved for them. If you have achieved something really important, it can be given greater prominence. If you were the first person to do something, create something or have broken some record, it may be worth mentioning, even if it is not particularly relevant.
Authority on Your Website
You don’t want pages of tedious material. You need somewhere (and a Linked-In profile is ideal) where you can marshal this material and clear links to it on your site. Some visitors who are really interested will seek out this information, so it needs to be available.
Where you can, integrate testimonials into your copy. Mostly people need to know they are there and scan them. If someone is really interested, they will read them.
For organisations with history, the challenge is how to convey your authority on your website. If you are starting out, it will take time to grow authority but persevere; small incremental improvements can lead to a more convincing website over time.
If you are clear about what you want to convey, you can adjust some of the above items to meet your needs. For example, you can ask clients to write testimonials to a template that asks them about aspects of your work where you need evidence.
This post is a part of the series based on the circuit questionnaire, the first element about branding.