Putting “Welcome to Smith & Jones Company” on your website may have worked when the Internet was new, but that strategy can cost you sales and search engine rankings today. There’s a better way to attract customers: write benefit-oriented content.
There are millions of websites competing for attention. People are too busy to spend a lot of time reading content. They want to know right away if your site is going to help them.
Instead of literally “welcoming” people to your site – get right to the point, with content that convinces a visitor to stick around, explore your site, and do business with you. Make sure you’ve got a headline that clearly communicates the benefits your product or service offers to a potential customer. You’ve only got about 3-5 seconds to make an impression. Use words that count!
Some companies still put “Welcome” in their title tags as well. This won’t help you with search engine optimization. In fact, it may do the opposite.
Search engines are looking for content. Your title tag should provide specific information about what your company does, with keywords people use to search for your business. And you only have a limited number of characters to get that point across. If your title is too long, the search engines cut it off and replace the extra words with an ellipsis. If you want to communicate more information about your business, use the description meta tag instead.
Welcoming visitors to your site may be polite, but it’s just not necessary. Use your precious title tag and landing page space for clear, concise, benefit-oriented copy. That’s the way to ensure good search engine rankings and higher conversion rates.
