Each page of your website is like a handshake. Really. To illustrate this statement, let me set the stage for you. You are manning your company’s booth at a trade show and a prospect wonders by and is within reach. This person looks at your booth, pauses, and then takes a brief moment to ask about your product or service offering. What do you say? Remember – you only have about one minute to make an impression and keep their interest. You have about the time it takes to shake someone’s hand. I just finished a call with a client, which is what led me to write this blog entry. On the call, we were discussing page content for his new website. Without realizing it, I found myself saying “Your website content is like a trade show. You have one minute to make an impression and keep a prospect’s attention. What do you say as you shake someone’s hand and make introductions?” His response was that his trade show pitch wasn’t at all close to what he wrote for the website page that discusses that same topic.

The reason I came to this illustration is that this client is from a B2B technology company. The writer of the content speaks at an educated level and tends to go into significant depth on the “how” when writing content. In actuality, he simply needs to discuss the “what” and more importantly, the “what’s in it for me”. He’s absolutely great at demonstrating his product and is very good at explaining the technology behind his offering, but the web page isn’t a demonstration. You simply are not afforded that much time. It is a handshake or an introduction.

The pages of your website only give you enough time with your visitor that is equivalent to a handshake. They are brief moments that allow you to connect with the visitor’s needs or wants. You must provide enough in-depth verbiage to offer value, but not so deep of content that you make the visitor feel like they just fell into a graduate-level course at Harvard.