How to Make Your Business Stand Out in 2024?

Written by Shaun Bernstein on 09 January 2024.

How many times have you seen a website and felt nothing? What made that website fail to stand out?

You’re searching for information, and your search engine sends you somewhere that it thinks might be helpful.

You browse through the site, and the information is there, but it’s a completely unmemorable experience. There’s absolutely nothing to stand out.

You may walk away with what you need, but unless you saved or even printed specific pages, you’ll be hard-pressed to remember where you found the information.

That’s the challenge of having a mediocre website. It may be serviceable, but it’s also completely unmemorable.

So what is it about your website that’s not making it stand out?

Instead, let’s dare to be different.

Problem 1: Boring Content

The example above highlights this perfectly.

Suppose you’re looking to download a whitepaper on a certain topic to learn a little more. You run a search on that topic, and it leads you to multiple different competing companies, all of which have published a whitepaper on the topic.

When you look closer, you realize that every white paper is practically the same.

From the titles to the content, they’re effectively all mirror images of one another. Even if they contain the info you’re looking for, you’re at risk of falling asleep while reading them!

Beyond whitepapers, this is true for so many sections of a website, from homepage copy to team bios to speaking about services offered.

If there’s nothing to actually pique a reader’s interest, they’re far less likely to engage with the business at all. We’re so used to craving distraction that we’re often thinking about something else entirely while reading.

When the copy is bad, it might as well disappear.

Problem 2: A Boring Look

If you’ve seen a website from the 1990s, it looks today like it belongs in a time capsule.

Everything was rudimentary from today’s vantage point – the colours, the font, and of course the layout. At dial-up internet speeds you could forget all about video.

Consumers today want a much sleeker, more sophisticated looking product. It provides the information that we need, but lays it out in an attractive way that’s easy to use on any size screen.

So why are we constantly let down by those expectations?

A lot of smaller businesses have only made minor, incremental changes to their website over the last 10 or even 15 years.

The result is like adding a new coat of paint onto a house that desperately needs new siding and a new roof. The shell just isn’t working anymore.

Great content is key, but if your visual is so unattractive that it distracts from what you have to say, it’s doing your business a disservice.

There is a common misconception that you need a high price point to make an attractive website. That is simply not true!

Many of the self-serve tools available allow you to create an attractive product at a low cost of entry, with many tools even offering free templates.

That said, if you want your digital house to be well-built as well as well-designed, it’s always best to call in a professional.

Problem 3: A Detached Audience

Computer generated or driven content has become so commonplace today that we barely even notice it.

Except we do – because it does not speak to us.

When crafting your website’s message, you need to keep your audience top of mind at all times.

What can you do for them? How can your services help them? When should they hire you?

There are plenty of places on your website to tout your professional achievements and accomplishments.

Yet make no mistake – your business website should not be a vanity project if your goal is attracting new clients.

SEO-driven copy may be full of attractive keywords, but that copy is usually so loaded in jargon that it rarely speaks directly to an audience.

The same goes for AI-generated copy, which hits some of the right notes but is lacking a soul.

It feels unnatural when we read it because it doesn’t actually speak to us; it speaks at us and hopes that we follow along.

The information may be there, but if it’s not speaking to us, it’s not going to stand out.

Dare to be Different

You probably tell people in person on a routine basis what sets your work apart.

When pressed, you won’t hesitate to say what makes you stand out from your competitors.

So why do we feel pressure to all look the same online? It’s time for that to go.

Whether your work is very straightforward or highly sophisticated, there is no reason not to stand out from your competitors.

This means refreshing your design, revisiting your content, and making sure that your website speaks exactly to your target audience.

We’re Here to Help!

This may sound like a tall order, but thankfully we’re here to help.

The Write Stuff Agency works with teams of professionals that handle all aspects of branding – web design, graphics, photography, video, and of course all things copy.

Our goal is to make your business sound as good as it looks, and yes that means standing out from the crowd!

Let’s talk about your audience, and what we could be doing to better reach them.