By Pranjalee Lahri | 21 March 2024
5 common B2B website mistakes and how to avoid them
The B2B buyer journey has undergone significant changes in recent years due to shifts in technology, buyer behavior, and market dynamics.
B2B buyers are more empowered than ever before, with access to a wealth of information at their fingertips. A drastic departure from the early 2010s, buyers no longer rely on sales representatives for product information but rather prefer to conduct self-directed research to educate themselves about potential solutions to their challenges.
Gartner research reveals that 75% of B2B buyers prefer a rep-free sales experience.
This trend has led to a more extended and complex buyer journey, with multiple touchpoints and interactions occurring before a purchase decision is made.
Even with a plethora of social media channels, software listing/ discovery websites, and communities, the company’s website continues to be the central hub and a key entry point for the buyers in the marketing funnel.
If you are an early-stage startup putting your first online home together or are in the process of refreshing your website, ensuring your website serves the identified purpose is key.
Here are top 5 website mistakes you could be doing right now, which don’t need rocket science to fix.
1. Not starting with a clear objective
Have you ever embarked upon a journey not knowing what you are in for? It’s quite similar when you start a website design/ re-design project without clearly knowing what you are trying to achieve.
For some of you it be:
>> attracting new talent (especially important if you are in MVP/ seed stage and need to ramp up your team)
>> generating traffic or leads (a common requirement for all companies irrespective of the company stage)
>> building credibility (if you are expanding into a new market segment/ geography)
How you shape the website (navigation, content, content flow etc.) is heavily dependent on the above. For the first instance, focusing on Company section – specifically About Us, Careers, and Customers – is critical to influence a potential employee. Whereas, for the 2nd, it’s more about understanding SEO keywords + customer research to identify key requirements, objections, terms they commonly use in their buying journey.
2. Postponing Positioning for later
3. Deprioritizing website UI/UX
Marketing is both art and a science. The art part of this equation is what makes it very susceptible to ‘subjective’ opinions.
Most B2B SaaS founders, more often than not, have a technical background which naturally translates into focusing on ‘product and engineering’. This not only deprioritizes marketing in general, but if there is any effort on marketing at all – it’s on getting a DIY website ready. Which is not bad at all, except – when done by someone without copywriting and branding/ design system know-how, results into a compromised customer experience.
At the bare minimum ensure:
>> your messaging is clear and communicates your value prop
>> the language is simple and speaks to the target segment
>> the narrative is cohesive and consistent across all pages
>> information hierarchy is maintained
>> there is consistency in imagery and design language
>> the website is responsive and renders well on all devices, browsers and OSes
>> UI is simple and easy to understand
4. Leaving integrations for the last
Whether it is integrating your website with a CRM or a simple Google Analytics set up, putting it as the last to-do before go-live can lead to unforeseen delays.
My recent experience in getting a website live served me a major lesson on this. Since the Demo form integration with the CRM was a “standard” set-up, we focused on fine-tuning other areas with very less time left for the API piece. When we finally got around to the integration, we stumbled upon multiple roadblocks – from not having the right privileges/ access to Field-Property mismatch.
When working with an agency, clearly establish the tech stack you need to integrate with the website. If you have an in-house team of developers, sensitize them on the exercise prior to go-time.
5. Trying to do it all by yourself
I get it. You are a hustler, that’s almost synonymous with ‘Founder’. There’s also something to be said about being frugal – at least in the initial days where the mantra is ‘dollar saved is dollar earned’.
But trying to do something outside your area of competence is not just an inefficient use of your energy and time, but the output can be subpar too. I have worked with some brilliant founders who are just not good copywriters or visual graphic artists. Their talents lie in the solution they offer to their customers.
You are better off getting a positioning & messaging consultant who can identify the most relevant customer segments, cull out a value prop and embed this value prop into your website messaging.