What’s on your institution's website? You probably have your name, hours, branch addresses, and your products and services. That’s a great start, but by adding a few more features, you can turn your site into a full-fledged marketing tool that converts visitors into account holders. From online banking to live chat, read on to learn the anatomy of a successful bank's website design.
Easy-to-access Online Banking
In a recent study, 77% of Millennials said they would only consider a financial institution that offered online banking as well as in-branch. Meaning if you don’t have online banking, you’re not even going to be considered by younger generations. And if you already offer online banking, it needs to be easy for consumers to find and use. Put a button or link to online banking in your top navigation so visitors know exactly where to go.
Mobile Friendliness
In the past few years, Google has started ranking sites that are mobile-friendly higher in results than sites that aren’t. Ensuring your site is responsive will improve search rankings. An even better reason? According to SimilarWeb, 56% of all web traffic happens on mobile devices, so a mobile-friendly site will make it easier for visitors to access your products and services. Here are some things to consider in making your site mobile friendly:
- Use bigger fonts and buttons (14px minimum for font size)
- Always use a viewport meta tag
- Don't make a separate mobile page --. Instead, use responsive design
- Use media queries (This asks the device what size it is)
- Design using percentages (For example, an image takes up a certain percent of the page width)
- Use standard fonts
- Don't use Flash
Separate Product Pages
Your website shouldn’t just be an online brochure. Think of it as a sales funnel and organize it in a way that helps you make the sale. Have unique pages for every product, and clear calls-to-action for people to be able to navigate to those pages. From those product pages, make sure a site visitor knows how to actually get or sign up for the product or service they are interested in
Online Account Opening with Strong Calls-to-Action.
This is extremely important for all of your products. If a visitor is interested, you want to make it easy for them to open an account or start the loan application process right from your site with a strong call-to-action. Try simple, action-orientated phrases like “Open an account” or “Apply now.” The harder it is to find information or take the next steps, the less chance you have of closing the sale.
This Bank Website has a clear call-to-action above the fold.
Content on the whole page (yes, even below the fold).
We’re sure that you’ve heard the advice to make sure everything important on your site is “above the fold.” The thinking behind this is that most people never scroll all the way down your site, so get all of the good info up top. But if your site is working hard for you, allof the information you put on there should be important. It’s perfectly fine to put some content below the fold because people are used content-rich sites. As long as the information you put on your site is intriguing enough, they’ll want to keep scrolling.
Social Media Integration
Putting your social media feeds on your site is an opportunity to show visitors more about your products, your team, and what you’re doing in your community. You can integrate your feeds to your website, so any social media updates you make will show up. You can also include any YouTube videos (or videos for other platforms) to show visitors your institution's personality. However, don’t include links to any social media feeds that aren’t active. You don’t want to show people that Pinterest you created five years ago and haven’t touched since.
Live Chat
This is a growing trend among businesses. The idea of consumers being able to get their questions answered without having to pick up a phone sounds great in theory but can fall apart when companies realize that someone on staff actually has to be available for the chat platform. Our suggestion? Have your team take shifts and don’t make just one person responsible for answering chats all day, every day.
As you can see, we use a service called Drift to power the live chat on Kasasa.com. This chat syncs up with our companies Slack so that employees don't have to manage several services. It makes responding quick and easy.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
88% of people research financial institutions online before opening an account.* Appearing in the top results of those searches is crucial for your bank or credit union. A strong SEO strategy puts the brand, website, and business in front of the people who are most likely to use your products and services. If you want to see how your bank or credit union ranks for common high-intent search terms, request our free Marketing Insights Report.
When designing your website for SEO, you'll want to ensure you:
- Create a logical and easily navigable sitemap/structure
- Optimize each landing and product term for a unique keyword
- Perform on-page optimization
- Link to other pages on your website
These eight features turn your site into a full-featured digital branch (that’s open 24/7!). You’ll make it easier for consumers to engage with you, your products, and your services. If you’d like help implementing any of the above items on your site, contact our FIRSTBranch team today.
*"CA Web Stress Index," 2009
