Val Selby [00:00:06]:
Hey, this is Val Selby and after over 20 years online, I can track where my mindset has blocked me. If procrastination, impostor syndrome and a lack of focus have been blocking your biz, then Val Full Volume is here to help you see choices you are making. Get ready to use your expertise to collaborate like a pro as you create the business of your dreams. Now is the time to make changes and live your best life. Let's get to it!  

Val Selby [00:00:36]:
Alright. Welcome. Welcome. This is Val from Val Full Volume. I'm so happy that you are here another week. I'm excited because I'm using a new platform, so I'm looking forward to how does this sound? Give me some feedback. Does it sound better? Do you notice a difference? If I hadn't said anything, would you have been like, whatever. I'm just looking forward to it because previously I was using another platform. I'm not gonna go into it right now. A very, very popular platform that I've used for many, many years even before COVID. And I've just had nothing but tech glitches going on with it and I know not everybody has, but you know what? I was and I was getting really horrible recording so I'm moving on from there and, trying something else.

Val Selby [00:01:29]:
So I'm looking forward to that. Data, data, data. Getting new data. How does this sound? What do I need to change? Leads me into today. Today. Today. Today, we're talking about websites. Let me just start off with the news that your website is never done.

Val Selby [00:01:51]:
Now I know you might have just taken that and gone, oh, shit. Shit. Then why am I even bothering? But I want you to look at it as a positive. Your website's never done. You know why? Because you're never done. You're never - you are always changing. So the fact that there are probably a lot of holes in your website right now is A-OK. It's A-OK.
 
Val Selby [00:02:14]:
It just means you constantly get to go back and review and make updates and changes, which we should be doing. We really, really, really should be doing it. That is a should. Updates. Update's important. It's really hard for any of your new customers or clients to get to know you if you haven't updated your website. If you change directions and your website does not even show anything about what you do or who you are or any of that, then people are gonna be coming to your website and going, Huh? And she's trying to sell me this? No. Bye, girl.

Val Selby [00:02:52]:
I have been going through quite a bit of this, and I might have touched on it before. I'm not quite sure, but I've been going through quite a bit of this because Bundle Bash started as a side hustle, and it took off. And, of course, because it was already my area of expertise that I hadn't leaned fully into, hadn't committed full business. Unfortunately, when the side hustle was started, it had a lot of gaps. And so when I've been doing the rebranding, when I and the team have been doing the rebranding, it's been awesome to go back through and fill more of those gaps. You know? Those things that have been on the list and it's like, oh my god. I can't believe I haven't done that. I've been telling people to do that.

Val Selby [00:03:34]:
Like, the About Page. I'm adding those things that have made me a little bit hypocrite, I mean I'm always fessing up if I don't have it myself and explaining that I don't have it myself either, and I realized that that's a poor decision to not bump it up. But things like that, things like the About Page, things like some of the original sales pages back when I had a partner on the website. And so it's got both of us on there, and everybody comes on now and goes, who's that? You know, it's like, okay, that needs to be changed. It's a filling those holes. And for a while, it felt like, oh my gosh. There's so much to update and change. And you know why it felt that way? Because all I was doing was having it go through my head.

Val Selby [00:04:22]:
I need to do this, I need to do that, I need to do that, oh my gosh, this isn't done either, blah blah blah blah blah. And built it up to be like this ginormous thing of 40 hours a week, 365. You know? You know how we could do that? Do you do that? It's just me? We build the projects up into our head to way more than they are. And so I suggest you do this easy thing, and you just start mapping out what needs to get changed. Just start going through it. The great thing about when you're going through your website and you start making the map of, okay, I want this changed and I need this updated, is you get to make the choice at the time if you're going to update it. So I still write it down. I just get to put a check mark next to it.

Val Selby [00:05:07]:
That's how I roll. I still have to write it down. Otherwise, my brain's gonna say, I gotta go check that. I don't remember because it's not official. There's no check. Right? So I have to go make sure that that happens. So I make a list of everything that I would like updated and a lot of it, you know, how make notes, how do I want it updated? You know, what needs to happen? Is it just this or is it just that? As I'm making that list, often there are pages that are just like a super quick fix and I can do it right then and there and cross it off. It's done.

Val Selby [00:05:36]:
It's done. So all of that all of that, even those little ones are just compounding in my brain and my brain's going, we're not gonna start this project because it's just too much. We don't have time for this. Versus here's the list. I have 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 20 minutes. I'm gonna take an hour, whatever it is, and I'm gonna go crank that out. You know? Just that one little thing on the list. I'm gonna go crank that out.

Val Selby [00:06:01]:
And you can work on it over time instead of having to take a weekend or, you know, dedicate a whole day or week or whatever to updating it. Just make that list that you can start working through. Because as I said, your website's never done. You are going to consistently need to go in and update and tweak because you change, the world changes, your niche might change a little bit, your niche could change a lot, and you don't wanna leave people confused. So you want them to come to your site and know exactly what you want them to do. So go on through that and figure out, you know, things that are not branded the way that you would like them to be branded. It shows you, shows your personality, shows your company, obviously, pointing out who you are, what you do, where do you want them to go next. You know, make that list so that you can go through it.

Val Selby [00:06:58]:
The great thing is you can keep that list and, you know, maybe go through it once a year even. Now how easy would that be to just have that list and you just keep going through it once a year? You know, it's like, alright. Gotta go do this, this, this, this. Done. Quick checkup. Quick check-in with it. It's all working just fine. Another thing for fixing the holes is broken links.

Val Selby [00:07:19]:
Broken links are so horrible. No. They're not that horrible. They're just a pain in the butt because I find often when I have broken links, it means I'm leaving money on the table. Meh. Nobody wants to leave money on the table, but a broken link does that. Because if I have a broken link that was supposed to go to the trip wire or the broken link that was supposed to go to this workshop or that workshop and it's not working, people are not going to go hunt for it. That means I lost them. And who knows how much I might have lost them because if they're like, oh, Jesus.

Val Selby [00:07:55]:
Look at it. It's so unprofessional. She can't even get these right. You know? Look at me making shit up in my head. Weird. Human brain. But for real, you want the links to work so that you can make the money. So double check your links.

Val Selby [00:08:12]:
I did not pull up. I want to say that I have my site in Ahref, A-H-R-E-F, I believe. I know. Would have been nice if I pulled that up for you. I believe that's the one, and it's free, and I get updates when there's broken links or, you know, bad images or any of that kind of stuff. That's another thing. Go through your images. Do your images. Are your images congruent with your branding? Or was that when you first got online and you're just like, ah, throw an image in there? You know, double check.

Val Selby [00:08:47]:
Quick change. Quick change and just grab some images. Home page. So kinda got the three things. Home page needs to have your what to do. They got to your home page. What do you want them to do immediately? I'm not telling you what your answer is. I want your website to tell your visitors what the answer is.

Val Selby [00:09:09]:
What do you want me to do when I get to your site? What do I need to know to move to the next step with you? You know, that could be a start here page, but, definitely, your home page will convert better if you've got at the top what you want them to do very first, grab them. So if you - and I know we're mostly doing phones, so make sure you're going back and forth between your phone and your desktop. I'm Gen X. I'm still on my laptop. I've always worked on my laptop. I don't use my phone that much for going through websites because I prefer to pull it up with my 30 inch monitor and look at stuff bigger and faster because I can pull up a bigger picture. Anyways, just remember to always pull it up in your phone and make sure that the phone view is working as well working to do what you want as well because most of my traffic is coming from mobile. So even on mobile, when you open up your phone and you go to your website, the first stuff that pops up is called above the fold.

Val Selby [00:10:21]:
It's the technical term. It's above the fold. So that's anytime you're pulling up your website at all, any of the information, it's above the fold. You want the most important information above the fold, and you want them to know exactly what to do above the fold because that's the first look. That pops up, people decide if they're even gonna take the time to move their little finger up there and scroll. There's a thought process for that having to happen. They have to come up and they have to decide that they are going to scroll. So when that pops up on the computer screen or it pops up on their mobile phone, that needs to grab them, needs to get their attention, and needs to help them realize that they are in the right place.

Val Selby [00:11:06]:
So this is why I can't tell you exactly what to do because for your niche and your community, that's the information you know. I'm more than happy to help you figure it out, but I can't do it here on a generic podcast for the world. We need to talk very specifically for you and what you are wanting your customers to do. But sit and pay attention to, you know, when it pops open, what's it even look like? I had this, like, super epiphany because I was doing - it was, you know, previous website and I'd hired a Pinterest manager. Somebody I didn't even know, never met before. I was just bringing her on. We were gonna do a, you know, a free call just to get to know each other just because I didn't even know what a Pinterest manager would do. So I wanna have the conversation.

Val Selby [00:11:55]:
And so she was getting prepped for our call and then she had to email me because on that website, she's just like, like, I don't know what you do. And I'm like, in my own head, I'm like, what are you talking about? Because I'm branded all over the place. Right? I'm like, it's everywhere. The social media, everything, it's all obvious, you know, and I'm life coach working with midlife women. And I'm like, okay. So I'm gonna go in with fresh eyes. I'm gonna go in and try and pretend I'm her. She never met me.

Val Selby [00:12:23]:
She doesn't know anything about me whatsoever. And I opened up the page and I went, oh, shit. My home page did not convey what I did. There was blog posts and podcast posts and, you know, all of that stuff to lead them to, but there was nothing smacking me upside the head that said, this is what Val does. I'm like, oh, good grief. Okay. I need to pay more attention to that because how often are we sending people to the home page? A lot. And it does help if you have outside eyes looking at it.

Val Selby [00:13:03]:
Believe me. Because even though I know these things, I can still feel like, oh, gosh. I, you know, I threw this page up kinda thing and it I'm sure it's good enough and then have somebody, you know, especially a stranger. It's so good to have somebody that doesn't know you look at your website and, like, compare, even, like, swap. Such a good idea. Swap looking at each of your website so that you can tell them, you know, real good feedback of, okay, well, I didn't know any of that.

Val Selby [00:13:30]:
Works beautifully because I had that happen with my designer too when we were going through and she's just like, okay. So you've got a little bit of information, but why does anybody care? Always asking why does anybody care because what's in it for them? Why do your clients care? Why does your traffic care? You know, just like, okay. This is great and it's an awesome start, but what makes this? What makes them this? I'm like, oh, okay. Finish. I gotta finish the thought. So filling the gaps in your website, as you can tell, it's never ending. But that's the beauty because that means you can always go in and you can edit, you can upgrade, you can change, you can revamp completely. It's fluid.

Val Selby [00:14:13]:
And you just need to remember that it's fluid and go in periodically and make sure that everything is flowing in the direction that you want it to flow. So go in and write down all of the pages and newsletter, you know, funnels and stuff like that. I'm even going through all of those funnels, you know, product funnels because I want to make sure that everything is congruent for the branding. So I've got, you know, this automation, this I've got the list of everything, and I'm just I'm slowly going through it. It's such a big project, and I didn't wanna overwhelm myself because I still want to be creative. And if I'm just going back and just updating all of that stuff, that just zaps my creativity. So you can make a list of the things that you want to go back through and update or check that they're still okay. Then you want to make sure that you are paying attention to any broken links, and there's programs out there that you can run your website through and it'll let you know the broken links.

Val Selby [00:15:10]:
And big one, check your home page. What's your home page telling people? Is it telling them about you? What you want them to know? What they need to know, and why they care about continuing to read your newsletters, whatever you're gonna have that call to action be, work with you. Why does that even matter to them, and how are you gonna help them? Okay. I'll just leave it at that. That's a lot of work ahead. Okay? I know. I know it's a lot of work because I'm still doing it myself as I'm rebranding. So just make that list and just start tackling them one by one, and you'll get through it.

Val Selby [00:15:49]:
You'll get through it. Every time you get a different funnel fixed up, it feels so great. You're like, ah, yeah. I'm looking professional. So celebrate. Hit me up and celebrate if you need it. If you need any help, I'm always here for, know, sessions or we've got the memberships or all sorts of stuff. So thanks for being here, and I hope that your website is looking fabulous very soon if it isn't already.

Val Selby [00:16:14]:
Fill those holes. Fill those gaps. Alright. Talk to you next week. Adios.