Ari Krzyzek – Made to Sell: Creating Websites that Convert

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

Sure, in today’s business world having a website is almost a requirement. But what that website achieves, beyond simply showing you live in the digital world, is entirely up to you. Just because you built something does not mean the masses will come to learn more about your brand, buy your products, or sign up for your services. It would be great if that were the case, but it isn’t. Pulled from my bestselling book, Made to Sell: Creating Websites that Convert, I’ll reveal the tips and tricks to transform your website, and in turn, your brand and revenue. Whether you have a simple one-page site or a complex retail store with thousands of products.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Ari Krzyzek is the CEO and Head of Strategy at Chykalophia (read: see-ka-lo-fia), a woman minority-owned web & creative agency helping women-led brands in B2B tech transform their website into platforms that drive business growth. Inspired by the support she received from women founders, Ari is passionate about providing tailored solutions for women-led businesses. She understands the unique challenges they face in finding the right creative and technical support. Ari is the co-author of the bestselling book, Made to Sell: Creating Websites that Convert. She actively supports fellow female entrepreneurs as a branding and UX consultant through various business organizations like 1871, Chicago Innovation, and as a board member for the Coleman Entrepreneurship Center at DePaul University.

For over 13 years, Chykalophia has delivered high-quality web design, branding, and UX services, seamlessly integrating a balance of creativity and technology. Their WBENC certifications, award-winning work, and 5-star Clutch rating distinguish them in the industry. Under Ari’s leadership, Chykalophia has successfully helped over 250 businesses grow to 6- and 7-figure successes. Esteemed organizations like Verizon Small Business Digital Ready, Gold House Ventures, and SBDC trust Chykalophia to mentor and lead their programming. Ari has been featured in Forbes, Thrive Global, and Buffer, further establishing her as a thought leader in the industry.

RESOURCES

Website: https://chykalophia.com/

SUMMARY

Understanding the User Journey: The Key to Website Success

Having a website is no longer enough. To truly succeed online, businesses must focus on creating user-centric experiences that drive conversions. Ari Shik, CEO of Calafia and co-author of “Made to Sell: Creating Websites that Convert,” shared valuable insights on how to transform your website into a powerful conversion tool.

The Importance of User Journey Mapping

User journey mapping is a crucial tool for bridging the gap between your users and your brand online. By visualizing the user’s trip across different touchpoints and stages of interaction with your brand, you can identify opportunities to improve their experience and increase conversions.

Step 1: Understanding Your Target Audience

Before creating a user journey map, it’s essential to have a deep understanding of your target audience. Shik recommends considering the following questions:

1. Where do they hang out online?
2. Who do they rely on for information?
3. What are their behaviors and preferences?
4. Where are they in their life right now?
5. What are their deciding factors?

By answering these questions, you can create more authentic and resonant personas that will inform your website design and content strategy.

Step 2: Aligning Your Offering with User Needs

Once you understand your target audience, the next step is to align your product or service with their needs. Consider the following:

1. How does your offering solve your target audience’s problems?
2. What is your unique selling proposition (USP) or irresistible offer?
3. Where do potential customers go before finding your product or service?

Use this information to craft messaging that speaks directly to your audience’s pain points and positions your offering as the best solution.

Step 3: Designing the User Experience

Understanding Channels and Touchpoints

To create an effective user journey, it’s crucial to understand the difference between channels and touchpoints:

• Channels: The broader ways customers interact with your brand (e.g., social media, website, email)
• Touchpoints: Specific points of interaction within a channel (e.g., social media post, homepage, contact form)

Creating a User Journey Map

While there are many ways to create a user journey map, Shik recommends starting with a foundational worksheet that includes:

1. User scenario, goals, and expectations
2. Emotions and responses to experiences on your website
3. Areas of opportunity to address user pain points

By mapping out these elements, you can identify areas for improvement and create a more seamless user experience.

5 Questions Users Ask Before Converting

To increase conversions, ensure your website addresses these five critical questions:

1. What is this website about?
2. How does it work?
3. Can I trust this brand?
4. What do I need to do next?
5. What happens after I take action?

Addressing these questions throughout your website will help build trust and guide users towards conversion.

Optimizing, Testing, and Analyzing Your Website

Remember that your website is never truly “done.” Continuously improve your site by:

1. Optimizing content and functionality
2. Regularly testing all elements
3. Analyzing user feedback and performance metrics

Examples of Good and Bad UX Design

Shik shared several examples of good and bad UX design, including:

• Avoiding excessive use of sliders or carousels
• Using subtle animations instead of fast-moving text
• Placing trust-building elements (reviews, press mentions) higher on the page

Key Takeaways for Improving Website Conversions

1. Develop a deep understanding of your target audience
2. Create a user journey map to identify improvement opportunities
3. Align your offering with user needs and pain points
4. Address the five key questions users ask before converting
5. Continuously optimize, test, and analyze your website
6. Implement good UX design practices and avoid common pitfalls

By following these strategies, you can transform your website into a powerful conversion tool that drives business growth and builds lasting relationships with your target audience.

Conclusion: The Power of User-Centric Web Design

In today’s competitive online landscape, simply having a website isn’t enough. By focusing on user-centric design principles and implementing the strategies outlined by Ari Shik, you can create a website that not only attracts visitors but also converts them into loyal customers. Remember, your website is never truly finished – continual optimization and improvement are key to long-term success in the digital world.

To learn more about creating websites that convert, check out Ari Shik’s book “Made to Sell: Creating Websites that Convert” or join the Founders Web Circle membership for ongoing insights and support.

TRANSCRIPT

[Music] welcome everyone to the third Thursday Meetup of the West Orlando WordPress meetup group I’m Rob Watson a co-organizer and host West Orlando WordPress is an official WordPress Meetup Group affiliated with the WordPress Orlando and word Camp us meetup groups sure a website is almost a requirement in today’s business world but what that website achieves Beyond simply showing you to how to live in a digital world is entirely up to you just because you built something does not mean that the masses will come to learn more about your brand buy your products or sign up for your services it would be great if that were the case but it isn’t pulled from AR’s uh best-selling book made to sell creating websites that convert Ari will will reveal the tips and tricks to transform your website and in turn your brand and revenue whether you have a simple onepage site or a complex retail store with thousands of products Ari shik is the CEO and head of strategy at calafia a women minority-owned web and creative agency helping women-led brands in B2B Tech transform their website into platforms that drive business growth inspired by the support she received from women Founders Ari is passionate about providing tailored solutions for women-led businesses she understands the unique challenges they face in finding the right creative and Technical Support Ari is the co-op author of the bestselling book made to sell creating websites that convert she actively supports fellow female entrepreneurs as a branding and ux consultant through various business organizations like 1871 Chicago Innovation and as a board member for the Coleman entrepreneurship Center at depal University for over 13 years caia has delivered highquality web design branding and ux services seamlessly integrating a balance of creativity and techn technology their wbnc certifications award-winning work and five-star clutch rating distinguish them in the industry under AR’s leadership caia has successfully helped over 250 businesses grow to six and seven figure successes esteemed organizations like Verizon small business digital ready gold house adventures and sbdc trust caia trust caia to mentor and Lead their programming Ari has been featured in Forbes Thrive Global and buffer further establishing her as a thought leader in the industry let’s join Ari and caia in transforming uh the the growth for women-led Brands through impactful digital experiences at this point I’d like to invite everyone to mute their microphones and enjoy the presentation Ari thank you for being our presenter the time is now yours thank you so much Rob for having me hey everyone I’m Ari here we often feel feel so confident right when we buy so like brands or maybe like you know different types of product out there maybe even Services despite having to pay for a big price premium price or like however expensive they are right and we just feel like okay this is going to be worth it it’s a good investment we tell oursel all of this different thing and we ended up purchasing them but why do we feel so confident doing that but our customers don’t really feel the same way sometimes when they try to you know purchase from our website or maybe book our services on our website why is that happening right don’t we ask that question often maybe there’s something that we miss or maybe there’s a gap what did actually go wrong so often time when I hear this a lot from multiple clients different business owners entrepreneurs you name it the root of the problem really is is that often time we don’t pay close attention in the user Centric experience right I heard lot always all the time that people would say hey Ari I bought you know my domain I buil my website it’s almost feels like it’s a checklist right I got it done and that’s it and they left it at that but we all know when you build a website the website is never done right and when you build a website it needs a specific strategy so for today I would love to invite you into a little bit more insights around user Journey a little bit more on uux and we’ll dive deeper on this conversation today so with user Journey perhaps some of you have heard about it some of you may maybe this is the first time that you hear about user Journey that’s okay we’ll learn together user Journey is a really fun tool and the way I see it when you leverage this for your website for your business right you’ll be able to bridge the gap between your users and your brand online and thus you know double your sites conversion whatever conversion metrics that you have set for it so for those of you who maybe don’t know yet about what is a user Journey if this is your first time seeing a user Journey or even heard about it a user Journey or sometime we call like Journey map right it’s a visual trip of the user across the different solution so they may be finding you in specific stages like awareness or interest or maybe conversion right there are so many different stages when a user come into your life through your channel through your touch points we’ll talk a little bit more about those as well and user Journey really just like mapping all of those different channels touch points and the different St ages that they’re in in your particular online brand now a little bit more around user journey I do want to guide you into three steps the step number one before you start building your user journey is to really understand your target audience how many of you have a full complete information of your target audience at least you have some right and that is already great but if we can dig even deeper about your target audience not just about okay who they are maybe they’re female or male their age that’s great but even more so where do they actually hang out not just about where they live but where do they spend their time where do they browse their information right who do they rely on when trying to find out about either new information new Services new products what do they ask is it their friends their family or do they rely on very specific Forum online maybe Yelp or Reddit there are so many different channels out there right where do they go then the third question what’s their behavior or even thinking like do they prefer watching YouTube videos over reading reviews is there like specific behavior that you can see from their pattern you know day-to-day activities and stuff like that there’s so many that can you know build into your T audience formation and the fourth question here is actually my favorite where are they in their life right now right often time people will tell me hey Ari I’m targeting women age 25 to 45 that’s great but even better if you know exactly where are they in their life right now say that you are a you know wedding planner right and you’re targeting women age 25 to 45 they’re all women they all want to get married but you know women who are planning their wedding in their 20s versus women who are planning their wedding in their 40s could look completely different right one is pretty much really in love and well I’m not saying the 45 is not fall in love but there’s this different stages in their life where on the 20s you probably see them that this is their very first wedding right and they get so excited and they want to try a lot of new things but for those who are in their 40s they might not want anything too Grand they just want something so simple right so there are a lot of different approach and the way you would communicate your message or even like presenting your information or your website could look quite different for these separate type of target audience and then the fifth question here what’s their deciding factor there’s so many things that we can you know leverage for our decision Factor right could it be money or budget could it be time convenience or is it alignment on values or is it based on emotion what is it so when you have a lot of this information it makes it so much easier to convey all of the information that you need not just to persuade your target audience on your website but also to make them feel that you know them that they feel heard right and that they will trust you so big Pro tip when you create Persona make sure to not creating one just because you’re creating one it has to be a bit deeper right it has to really resonate with them it has to really convey the authenticity of your brand be it your services or your product it needs to really align and speak to them now step number two you know all about your target audience now how can we align it with their needs especially when you’re trying to promote your services promoting your products on the website what can we do some of the question that maybe can help you know get you moving on this journey could be how does your service or product solve your target audience a lot of time when you go to website you probably can see some website that can really speak around okay this is the service this is your problem and here’s how we solve them right or maybe you’re going to a e-commerce website and you have specific needs and they really immediately convey it on the banner so some of those things are information you also need to put together before you update your website or before you even Bild your website number two what’s your unique selling proposition or we call it USB or it could be like an irresistible offer that you have it could be also both if you have vote that’s even better but what are these things that’s truly unique to you that you feel this is it people will see this and it will address their pain points and they will find this as their only best solution what is a product or service and then the third question where would they go or talk before they find your service or product it ties in earlier with the behavior and thinking of your target audience right but before they come to you do they go to a specific surface or buy a specific product right taking an example again for the event planner or The Wedding Planner before they go on to hire wedding planner what do they do right now for your particular brand where do they go first before they get to you and the reason why I highlight this particular question here is for you to start thinking how can I tie in my message with their needs after they completed the previous activity or after they purchase a previous service or product or you could even use it to build Partnerships with different brands or businesses where you could really serve the same target audience and build up partnership that way okay the next part here on the pro tip you can revisit your persona one more time right really look at their behavior as well as their thinking where else can you show up in front of them and this going to tie in very well with channels and touch Point as well where we get to the step number three designing the experience so earlier I mentioned a little bit about channels versus touch points channels are very straightforward it’s a way for you to understand understand where customers come from and how they interact with you or the company whereas the touch point is a little bit more specific some of the example could be an online is a channel then online chat is a touch point or we use your website as the channel your homepage or contact page can be the touch point there are more examples on this slide where you can see if you’re thinking of using social media as your channels for example right your Carousel your post your stories those could be your touch points and if you use search engine your touch points then could be the YouTube videos the case studies reviews or any other media mention okay next up I have an example for you to take a look at for the user Journey when you search user Journey online you’ll find a lot of different types or um even like Style of user Journey there isn’t really a wrong or right way to do user Journey as long as you really account for the scenario of your target audience as well as really mapping the different stages that they are going through with your brand so you’ll have awareness consideration you have purchase or it could be conversion and then what happened after that you can get into as detail as you want or as broad as you want as long as you really track some of these interaction that you want to identify or even make sure that you have specific key metrics that you want to Target for your analytics in the back end of your website I know this image might be a bit small I can also send this PDF a bit later for you guys so take a look at another example I know this I don’t think you will be able to see it so clear clearly but you can see that there are so many different types of user Journey whether you want it to be as simple as you want or you want it to be as comprehensive as you want another one over here but the quickest way to get to user journey is this one it’s the foundational user Journey worksheet that I’ve developed about I would say about four years ago where I find it much simpler for a lot of people to just get started on their user Journey so really the key Point here that you would want to pay attention the top portion on the top section of the worksheet that will be your user scenario their goals and the expectation and then in the middle it’s all about their emotion the responses to the experiences on your website and then the third section is the areas of opportunities where you can address your target audience pinpoint so it’s much simpler way way for you to start thinking through how do I really want to deliver the best experience possible for my target audience on my website the next tip that I have here is really to challenge you to think about where are the different places online that you can leverage so that you can start connecting with your target audience and keeping your brand top of mine for them user joury will really help you to do that because you will be able to really see in different stages what are some of the concern of a target audience and where do they seek those information now wrapping it up for all of the different steps that we just talk about today I have number one target audience number two alignment and then number three designing the experience I have included the QR code in front of you as well so if you want to go ahead and take a quick snapshot of that or scan it it will take you to get to the download page for the user Journey worksheet next up five questions your users ask before conversion take place these are really fun for me to share with a lot of people because I bet it’s going to resonate a lot with you because you may be experiencing the same thing when you go to any new website right let’s start number one the question is what is this website about isn’t that what comes to your mind whenever you go to any new website that you’ve just never heard about before or just like accidentally stumble into you’ll ask yourself like okay this is cool what is it so that’s exactly the same question your user are asking when they land into your website they’ll be simply asking what is it tell me what it is now the quickest way to do this is to leverage your hero for those of you who may not familiar with the word hero so a website hero is the top section of your page typically they’re pretty big it covers with sometimes image full screen image or maybe even you know screenshot of a product or even a video that is the hero and that is a perfect place for you to really convey what it is that you do for retired audience what is it that you sell what is it that you promote or maybe your services or how can you really help them better their life so if you have some sort of like a USP statement of brand positioning statement or any great headline that can really Captivate your target audience attention that can tell them how your product or service can really help them or is it really for them because if it’s not for them maybe it will resonate for them to to you know share with their family or share with their friends if it’s not for them if it’s really clear they will share it to other people so that’s question number one and then number two for the question that we have over here how does it work yes we know how e-commerce generally work but the main reason why how does it work section is so important is because often time we want to get that you know reassurance right we want to make sure that we get the expectation for the brand or what can we really expect about the process here with the brand is there maybe like a specific three steps that we need to be aware of or maybe there’s like you know a surprise process what is it so having some sort of section that explain how does it work for your business for your service or product that would be very critical so that your user can really feel at ease knowing all of these already addressed and then number three can I trust this brand it’s really interesting these days when we see the you know new design styles for website we still feel that is this website still legit is this brand is this business real business then we would look for some sort of like elements right we would look for like a review or maybe we would look for some sort of like certification or whatnot whatever it is it needs to convey some trust level for your tget audience so you could use your reviews you can use your um maybe you have certification or being mentioned on press or maybe you belong to a specific National Organization right anything that you can pull or relevant for your business I would include that on your homepage or any landing page that you are taking people to so that they can build this trust with you and then number four they’re already hooked you got number one answered number two answered the number three is all done they’re hook what do they need to do how do they buy how do they sign up making sure that your call to action is not only consistent but also very clear for your target audience to know what do you want them to do next now number five here what’s next what’s next here really is a followup from your call to action now that your ti audience already buy something for you from you or already signed up or book you or whatever call to action that you already asked them to do what is next for them are they going to get a confirmation email or are they going to be taken to a different page what is the expectation after they completed the call to action so those are the five questions that your target audience always have in the back of their mind so when you don’t have all of this information completed or presented on your website you will start seeing some drop off on your website not enough conversion I would challenge you guys to really take a look at these questions and think through and eval valate your website as well does my website page address all of these questions right now if not there are some room for growth right there are some room to update and tweak your website so that you can start seeing the changes in your conversion the next part that I have is otaa so a love of this OTA in particular because like I mentioned earlier your website Is Never Done Right but what can you do once you’re done with any tweaks though I would totally think about optimizing it now optimizing could mean a lot of different things optimizing could be updating the content optimizing could be making sure that all the different links that you have all the form embedded elements are all working or it could be like optimizing it for different screen sizes whatever it might be right just making sure that all of your web pages are working and people are able to do all the call the action that you want them to do whether it’s to buy book get in touch or whatever else and then testing it’s part of optimize as well earlier but sometimes we forgot that we have things in our website it’s not just you guys a lot of people do this but think of it this way technology will never be reliable 100% right sometime things accidentally broke sometime things accidentally got disconnected so if you can what I would do either you know weekly or maybe monthly just check in and do some audit on your website just making sure things are working it will be so unfortunate right having to get a lot of traffic coming to your website but some of the stuff that you’re asking the target audience to do it’s simply just not working so I feel like a lot of the time this testing component can be forgotten so thinking through like how can you plan in terms of like testing your website if one week is too much then do it monthly if monthly still feel too much then at least you know quarterly right and then the last part is analyzing so analyzing I feel like it’s also so support critical but the time that we typically took to plan for the website launching the website that’s already a lot of work and then thinking through in terms of like do we need to constantly updating the website yes that would be fantastic simply because you’ll never know what else your target audience you know might give feedback on you for improvement sometimes there might be something on your website that just not 100% clear for them so understanding that what you can do that you can incorporate some of this customer feedback either into some specific content or you can use it to build up new content for your website as well and then get ranked better on SEO now next up I have a couple of examples on bad ux as well as good ux design this particular website is actually really really nice I love the website in General and the main reason why I highlighted this one as a bad ux example is simply because they are using way too many slider on one page it’s okay to use Sliders in any web pages that you have throughout your website but I would recommend to only use sliders or Carousel just one the main reason why is because you’re asking the user to do a lot of work here to go through specific your story or content in multiple um parts of your website and all of them are within a specific content sliders or Carousel containers a better way to approach this would be to expand some of your content so that it has a better flow rather than containing everything into content sliders another bad ux example here is very fast moving text that you can see in front of you if you are planning to do something like this I would do it a little bit more subtle um the good example that I can show you is this one it’s a lot bigger and it doesn’t move as fast as the previous example and rather than making it to be so much in your face right it becomes such a nice background element that flows very well with the website another bad ux example that I would say over here is this one so I know sometimes we have a lot of content on our website but to have your you know critical brand trusting element like maybe being mentioned in the press or your reviews or any other brand trusting elements near the bottom of your page that’s almost like missing the opportunity to build up the you know trust with your taret audience right away on the top of the page so I would move something like this a little bit up and then you’ll be able to build up that um you know credibility much faster with your target audience and I believe those are all my examples next up I have my book earlier Rob already mentioned that my book make to sell is part of the bestselling um book on Amazon if you guys want to get more insights about me to sell wrting website. convert there’s a lot more insights in the book feel free to you know snap that QR code and then go straight to Amazon for it if you do have more questions around all things website I’m happy to answer all of those as well or you can also join us at the founders web Circle membership and that’s pretty much it that I have I believe I have another slides for closing me one second if you are online and want to connect with me I’m happy to connect with you on a couple different channels I’m on LinkedIn I’m also on Instagram and happy to chat more with you guys on all website back to you rob wow thank you so much this is really really enlightening and uh it’s a lot of good reminders of things that I need to be doing a lot more with my clients and with the websites that I run so thank you so much for your time and for coming on with us anytime [Music]