[00:00:00] Josh: hello friends. Welcome into the final episode of 2022. We're gonna end off this year in this episode, episode 234, with a look ahead at 2023, and I wanna share with you some trends that I've seen become more and more p.
[00:00:17] Josh: that have worked for a lot of my colleagues and a lot of my students when it comes to growing their web design business. So we're gonna talk web design trends, but this is not gonna be. Web design, like design related trends. We're not gonna talk about font types or typography or spacing, navigation, you know, differences between this year and last year.
[00:00:37] Josh: We're actually gonna talk about business growth trends, all of which are proven. These are actual trends that I've seen work and that I personally think are gonna be even more important as we head into 2020. And beyond. Now, one thing I do wanna say before we dive into this, I'm gonna take a little more time with these trends.
[00:00:55] Josh: I'm gonna give you 10 trends in this case. I do have a condensed video version of this though, so if you're curious about, uh, seeing a tighter version of this, you can go to my YouTube channel, josh hall.co/youtube. There'll be a, uh, strip down version of this. I'm gonna try to. Some podcasts slash videos for the new year.
[00:01:16] Josh: But one thing I've learned, if you're interested in this, is that what you put out on a podcast is likely not gonna translate well on YouTube, particularly if it's like a solo episode. So with YouTube, if any of you are doing u uh, video marketing, which yes is gonna come into play here, I recommend that you keep it fairly short, snazzy, and snappy on YouTube or anywhere where you're gonna consume video, unless it's like a full podcast interview or so.
[00:01:42] Josh: Um, whereas one reason I love podcasting is you can do what I'm doing right now and take your time and you can ramble a little bit. Just a little bit, not too much. But anyway, there is a video version of this if you would like to check that out as well. Anyway, 10 tips, 10 proven trends for 2023 that I personally think are gonna be really, really important for you to, in order to grow your web design business effectively.
[00:02:05] Josh: Number one is to have a results based marketing approach. Now, what does that mean? Result space, essentially, there's a lot of things that could come into play with this because it's, it could be how you market, like on social media and even networking, like how you speak about your services, your elevator pitch, if you will.
[00:02:25] Josh: But mostly what I'm thinking about is results space marketing in your service pages and on your website mainly to do with your messaging and your copy. So for example, A quick example would be like I used to say on my website, we build awesome websites, and the good news is that did work. However, now more than ever, clients are not interested in in a nice pretty website near as much as a tool to help grow their business, and that is truly what's gonna separate you from a sea of other web designers out there.
[00:03:00] Josh: Now, yes, web design is a very competitive industry, but the good news is you can differentiate, differentiate yourself very easily. And actually technically with these 10 things we're about to go over, if you do even a quarter of these, you will be separated from the pack. So results based marketing and results based lingo on your website. So instead of saying, we build a nice website, say, we will help grow your business with your new. That's just an example.
[00:03:25] Josh: A lot of my students are doing something similar to that and it's working out pretty well. Now, a couple primary, uh, uh, prime examples of this, and the reason I mentioned the video in the beginning of this is for those of you who wanna see the video of this, We're gonna cover quite a few examples and, and that'll be available for you.
[00:03:40] Josh: It'll be actually be at the Post. If you want to go to josh hall.co/ 2 34, the, uh, the links will be there for you, and then the video will be there as well. But anyway, one of the best examples of this on a sales page is Amy Porterfield. and a, a, uh, course that I took of hers this year in 2022 was List Builder Society.
[00:03:59] Josh: I highly recommend it. It is like a marketing 1 0 1 style course. I recommend everyone build, uh, an email list, even if you have a small one with 50 people and 50 clients. I do have an affiliate link for that. If interested, go to josh hall.co/. L b s like List Biller Society. You can join me over there and take the course.
[00:04:18] Josh: I'm gonna go through it again in 2023 probably, cuz she just added some new lessons. Anywho, what she says on the sales page is List Biller Society is the proven list building system for entrepreneurs. Will your learn to grow your business, reach your ideal customers and generate more revenue through the power of an email list?
[00:04:38] Josh: So notice she didn't just. I'll teach you how to grow your email list. It was a results first approach. It was, grow your business, reach your ideal customers, generate more revenue. Boom, boom, boom. 1, 2, 3, through what an email list. Great example of how to use copy and messaging with results based marketing.
[00:04:59] Josh: Another quickie is also a company called converta converta.org. I had their CEO on the podcast. Was that earlier 2022 or was that 21? It's been a little while, but I had, uh, the CEO of converta.org on, and they have a very simple heading on their website that says, we'll increase your conversions by 20 to a hundred percent on your website.
[00:05:23] Josh: Very clear and very like, measurable as far as a result. So anytime you can give a measurable result as like if you work with us, for example, by getting a new website. You could even say that. You could say, we'll increase your contact form submissions or whatever it is by at least 20%. And then as long as you get to that 20%, then you've hit your goal.
[00:05:45] Josh: That's the way they do [email protected]. And again, it's way better than saying, we'll boost your conversions, because that could be a little vague. It could be like, I mean that that could probably work, but to give it a actual like number. That's gonna frame the conversation way different than anyone else in this case, trying to get more conversions through their website.
[00:06:05] Josh: So couple examples there. Amy Porterfield's, list Builder si, uh, list Builder Society course and convert.org. A couple of good examples of results based heading slash Marketing on their website. So I highly recommend you do the same, particularly on the homepage of your website in any and all sales page.
[00:06:22] Josh: Number two is a intentional website user journey. Now, what does that mean? Well, essentially my recommendation for you is to remember that for the majority of all of your clients and all of your clients' customers, most in, in most cases, people are gonna be in different parts of their journey. They're not all gonna be in the exact same place unless it is just one product.
[00:06:50] Josh: It is very clear, like what they serve and what it does, and everyone's gonna be, you know, using it the same way. In most cases, people are gonna come to a website and there's gonna be a few different things they should probably go into depending on where they are. For example, one thing I learned to, to do with my audience is I looked at all of my web design students and I realized they were like kind of three different types of people joining my courses.
[00:07:15] Josh: There were people learning web. And becoming professional web designers. There were people starting their business, which is actually a little bit different than the first. They can be grouped in the same, but generally people are gonna wanna know how to build websites before they start their web design business.
[00:07:30] Josh: Ideally. That's definitely the case. And then I had people signing up who were ar, they already had a web design business and they're scaling, and these are the folks who are scaling and hiring and building like a six figure profitable business. So I identified that I have three different customer types.
[00:07:45] Josh: So what I did this year in 2022, Was I created a funnel, a very intentional journey on the homepage of my website that lets people go into the correct, uh, category of resources for them. And you can check this out, you can go to josh hall.co and see this. You can also get a direct link to this. It's, it's the only, like, you can just go to the funnel if you go to josh hall.co/get started and there you can go into one, three, uh, one of three pathways.
[00:08:10] Josh: You can go to learn, you can go to start or you can go to grow or scale. I think I've got it listed to. So that's what I learned to do, and I have resources that help people out depending on where they are in their journey.
[00:08:22] Josh: A lot of businesses I've seen do this more recently too, because they've recognized the power of like different pathways. For example, one of my very favorite examples, uh, pat Flynn's Company, smart Passive Income, they just released a new, it's essentially like a community powered. Platform, and it's exactly this type of situation because they've recognized similarly that they have a lot of people in different phases of the journey.
[00:08:50] Josh: They're helping people who are like new entrepreneurs, people who are more established, and people who are more like expert level going to the next level. So they created an all access platform where you can join and they have pathways inside of that all access. That are dedicated to where they are in their journey.
[00:09:07] Josh: So I wanna encourage you to do the same. And you can also do this, by the way, just as a side note with packages and pricing, if you have, for example, a maintenance plan. Which is something I recommend in my maintenance plan course, and instead of just having one maintenance plan, you can have three tiers, three packages to help people out no matter where they are in their business.
[00:09:25] Josh: You could have a like beginner or starter tier. You could have a like advanced or a pro tier, and then you could have an expert or like an elite type tier. All with different price points and with more snazzy value depending on the package they choose. So meet people where they are and guide them through, depending on their journey. So number two is to create some user journeys on your website. So few examples we just mentioned.
[00:09:49] Josh: Number three is messaging and copy. Now this goes kind of into number one, which is like to talk about more results instead of just like, Hey, we build, build pretty things. I wanna encourage you to really, really focus on your messaging and copy.
[00:10:02] Josh: Now, this is a whole different podcast episode for sure, but one thing that I learned, and I'm gonna share some examples of what has worked well for my business over the last year or two is. I changed. Not all. I, I actually learned this from my podcast because the tagline of my podcast is build a web design business so that you achieve freedom and a lifestyle you love As I really thought about my business, that's really the result.
[00:10:25] Josh: That's the end goal of building a web design business that is crafted by you and works around you and your schedule, and your goals, and your hobby and your life. and for me personally, freedom and lifestyle. Those are the two big things. So I put that additionally on my website. If you go to josh hall.co, you'll see in the heading it is learn how to build your web design business so that you can have freedom in a lifestyle you love.
[00:10:50] Josh: And those two intentional messaging and copy tweaks, how, I can't tell you how many people have related to that and come into my courses and my web design club and said, freedom and lifestyle. I want that too. So I realized that was the desire for me, and that's what I put in my copy, and that's the people I've started attracting over the last couple years.
[00:11:09] Josh: So for you, what does that look like with your web design business? Depending on the niche that you're in or if you're a generalist, what is the result? What is the feeling you want to get? Your vibe attracts your tribe. So what type of clients do you want to get? Put that in your messaging, in your copy.
[00:11:23] Josh: Those are the type of people that you will get super, super. Another example is my web design agency in transit studios. If you go there, one thing that we did when it comes to results-based messaging and copy is, uh, Eric, my ceo, came up with this. Now, our front page, the hero section, currently at the time of releasing this says, get more customers from your website. Very clear as day, very straight up, this is what we do. Your website is the tool to get more customers.
[00:11:52] Josh: Now, we could talk business growth, we could talk all sorts of things, but at the end of the. The majority of the a the, um, agency clients that we're getting through my agency in transit studios is getting more customers for clients. That's the goal, and that's exactly what Eric has done, uh, with the heading tweaking on the homepage. So a few examples there of messaging and copy and how important those are with attracting the right type of people for your business.
[00:12:16] Josh: Now, number four is personal. I can't encourage you enough to get as personal as possible on your website. Personalization. Personalization. Now, there's a lot of different ways to do this. You probably think, oh no, Josh probably wants me to record a video and put it on the homepage. I do. I do want you to do that. We'll talk about that next, but there's a few different ways you can add personalization in that. I don't wanna say clever, but just easy without it being like, you don't need to like write a book about your life story.
[00:12:47] Josh: Uh, one quick thing you can do is what's what I like to call a founder's note. So with most web design agencies, one of the problems I see is that, You'll go to this web design agency and I have no idea who's behind this brand. I don't know if it's a 25 person agency with like a brick and mortar business downtown somewhere.
[00:13:07] Josh: I don't know if it's a guy in a, you know, his parents' basement. I have no idea what this business is. And if you are the guy in your parents' basement, I wanna say that's totally fine because I was not that long ago. And what I did and what I learned to do was to just be real about who is in the. And if you don't have a big team, don't worry about it.
[00:13:25] Josh: But what you can do is you could have like a team page or a collaborator page that says who you work with and who's in your network, who pops in occasionally. So that's something you could do on like a team page. Just be very clear about who is in the business and you as the creative director or the CEO or whatever you wanna call yourself.
[00:13:44] Josh: And then like I mentioned, a founder's note before I forget about. It's basically just a, like you as the owner of the business. Just a quick note from you that's personal, don't rip anybody off, but one of my favorite examples is one of my students, Sandy, her website is sandfire.ca. And if you go there, she has a little note on her homepage that says there's a picture of her and then it says, Hey, I'm Sandy.
[00:14:07] Josh: I build websites that work. And then there's a little note that is very personalized to the way she talks. And that's how she's came across very personal in her business. And I can tell you right now, she is scaling her business and has started hiring and has, has really created some amazing momentum. So it's a great example and it's a great way to personalize your site.
[00:14:26] Josh: And again, like I mentioned, she also has a picture of herself, which I would recommend you do as well. So personalize your site as much as you can. Take it one step at a time. Start with your homepage, then get into service pages and go from there.
[00:14:39] Josh: Now, number five, I mentioned video. Yes, I do recommend adding video wherever you can. E you do not need a setup like I have with a fancy mic and lights and stuff like that. But if you can come across on video, it will sell for you over and over and over again cuz people are gonna meet you before they actually meet you and you're gonna build that no like and trust factor. You don't need to do any fancy graphics or anything like that if you don't want to.
[00:15:04] Josh: A couple examples I would say to check out actually, one is on my website maintenance plan page for the old version of my agency site. Now I actually, you can go to in transit studios.com, which is the current agency site, but I do have the old version of my site backed up at. Dot int transit studios.com and that is the version of my site before I sold my agency as I was a scaling freelancer.
[00:15:34] Josh: So if you're curious, you can go to josh dot into transit studios.com to look at the way I had the site going previously, before my C E O. Eric officially took it over. And I say that to say, go to the maintenance plan page, because on that page I have a video walking people through the maintenance plan.
[00:15:51] Josh: I recorded that in my basement with some lights on a blank white wall. That's all I did, and I probably didn't even need to do that. I could have just done it in my office and that would've been fine, or I could have done it on my cell phone. Like you can really keep things super simple nowadays and just be authentic and be real.
[00:16:07] Josh: It'll go a long. Now where I would suggest you put videos ideally to start is one on the homepage. Just that way people without leaving the homepage can get a feel for you and what you do. And then I would also recommend having a video on each of your main services pages. So yeah, if you have a service for web design, do a little like one minute or two minute video about your web design services.
[00:16:29] Josh: Just be, you know, whatever you would tell somebody in a coffee shop. Say it there really quickly. And then same thing for if you like SEO or maintenance or marketing strategies. Have a video on the sales page cuz that will help increase conversions as well. So, Number five, add some video into your website and into your marketing if you can.
[00:16:47] Josh: Number six. You ready for this one? This is earth shattering super modern advice, and that is blogging. Yes, I said it. Blogging is back my friend's. Why? Because personally what I've seen is most people are focused on socials, which means there is like a ton of opportunity that is opened up in the world of seo.
[00:17:13] Josh: And the way you do that is by blogging about writing articles about certain topics and answering questions and just sharing what you know about certain subjects in web design. So I highly re. That you do some blogging, and again, this isn't, you're not gonna do all of these things overnight, but I would definitely recommend you consider it if you're not doing it yet to answer some questions and put out resources.
[00:17:35] Josh: It's gonna build trust, it's gonna build authority, and you will start coming up on SEO because everyone's doing social media stuff. And social media is not generally gonna come up on seo. And it's usually content that people will see and then they're never gonna go back. Whereas with seo, you're gonna go back to things over and over and over and over again.
[00:17:54] Josh: I have to remind myself not to put all my attention on my Instagram, which I'm growing right now, and and other socials when I need to be focusing on YouTube and blogging more. And then one thing I do wanna say is, if you're new to the world of blogging and SEO and you're not quite sure how to get that going, just go to josh.co in search SEO in the search bar, and that'll pull up some resources to help you out.
[00:18:16] Josh: Now number seven. This is a biggie. Accessibility. Accessibility is, has been one of the hot topics of 2022, and it's going to continue to be a very hot topic. I think next year in 2023 we're gonna see a lot of changes in the world of accessibility and the importance of it Now. I've talked a lot about it this year with accessibility.
[00:18:36] Josh: I learned a lot about it and I ended up ruffling a lot of feathers because I discovered that there are really two viewpoints about accessibility. There are people who like the overlay route with tools like access B. I had, uh, one of the guys from access B on the podcast not that long ago episode. Oh, was it two 13?
[00:18:55] Josh: Was it two 13 with Rafi Frome? Lemme double check. I think that was two 13. Yes. Yes. It was Rafi glance of access B. And then there's a second world in the accessibility world, which is like ground up coded accessibility, which is also just best practices for websites, which the folks from Access B.
[00:19:13] Josh: Mentioned as well, like you wanna have a good functioning website that loads okay and is easy to scroll and, and has good color contrast and stuff. Um, but I learned a lot about those two different aspects of accessibility. I wanna recommend that you take it seriously as well. Same thing like I just mentioned about the SEO thing.
[00:19:30] Josh: There's a lot of different resources for this, so just go to josh hall.co and type accessibility in the search bar. And there'll be some resources for you, including some previous, uh, podcast episodes and some other resources for you there for accessibility. And, uh, I'm trying to think if there's anything else I was gonna say on that.
[00:19:48] Josh: I, I guess the thing to remember with accessibility is it would be like you building a building without a wheelchair ramp. That's, that was the best analogy I got from this year. When it comes to accessibility, it's like if you build a website that is not accessible on a basic level to most all people, it's like building a building with no wheelchair.
[00:20:08] Josh: It's like, well, everyone can come in except for anyone in the wheelchair. Like that, put the human element to accessibility that I want to recommend you think about as well. So yeah, check that out. And again, just scratching the surface, but I'll be doing a lot more resources when it comes to accessibility moving forward to help you.
[00:20:24] Josh: Last couple here, number eight. It's kind of similar. Another like boring kind of. Well, accessibility's not boring. This one is to me boring. But thankfully I'm friends with the folks at Term Mageddon because they can help you out with privacy policies, privacy policies. There's so much going on in the world of privacy with GDPR compliance and lawsuits and stuff like that.
[00:20:45] Josh: You basically just need to disclose what information you're taking in on your. There's a couple different ways you can do that. Number one, you definitely should have a terms and conditions page on your website, and if you, let's say you have a contact form on your website, you need to disclose that when somebody submits that contact form, their info is on your website, like in gravity forms or whatever.
[00:21:08] Josh: Plugin you're using. And number two, if it goes to a email system or a CRM like MailChimp or Convert Kit, you need to make sure you disclose that. Hey, by the way, your email is now on the website and will also go into my mailing system, but you can unsubscribe at any time. That my friends, is the golden rule of protecting your butt when it comes to privacy.
[00:21:30] Josh: But there's another level back and that is. Statewide and countrywide privacy policies, policies that you need to disclose, but you probably don't wanna research those and put those on your website. I sure as hell don't. Luckily I partnered with my friends at term gaged, and you can go to josh hall.co/term Mageddon if you haven't checked that out yet, and you can literally.
[00:21:53] Josh: Term again is awesome because you can sign up for an account with them and then they kick out an embed code that you can put on all of your websites that literally have updated privacy policies that cover you for all the states and all the countries updated to the day. So josh hall.co/aged to get your auto updating privacy policies.
[00:22:13] Josh: And again, just remember you also need to have your own site by site terms and conditions page that discloses where that information is going. Particularly if you have like e-commerce, that's extra important. But even if you're just taking a contact form submission, you gotta have that in there. So privacy policies.
[00:22:30] Josh: All right, the last couple, these are kind of fun. We'll wrap. Number nine, another big trend this, this is gonna go against the grain because I don't know if anyone else feels like this, but I sure do. And that is ready for this. The return of the nineties, the return of the webmaster. The reason I think this is honestly coming into play is because clients expect you and anticipate you being more than just a website builder.
[00:22:56] Josh: They're gonna kind of expect you to be a webmaster. They're gonna ask you questions about email, about domain, about maintenance, about security, and I know that's overwhelming. And if you're early in the journey, don't worry. You'll get there with some basic knowledge of all of this. It's why I have all the resources I do with this podcast, my videos, my courses, my club.
[00:23:17] Josh: you are gonna kind of be the webmaster. So expect that. Don't just plan to be a front end web designer. Unless you wanna work for an agency. You are gonna be their webmaster, whether you like it or not. When they forget their domain name renewal, they're gonna come to you and they're gonna be like, who did I register the domain with?
[00:23:33] Josh: And what's a R url? You're gonna get those questions. So b o Web Master, have general knowledge of most all of these things if you can, and then fill in the gaps with. Partners and friends who can do the rest. Like the privacy policy thing I just mentioned. I have no interest in that. So I found term again. So you are the webmaster. Embrace it my friend. Let's go in nineties. Let's bust out those pagers. Let's hike up our pants. Let's open Microsoft 95 and no, I'm just kidding knocking. Open that up. But do embrace your inner webmaster.
[00:24:04] Josh: And finally number 10, this is my favorite. I meant to say in the beginning to to hang around because this is my absolute favorite and most beneficial thing I recommend doing, and that is to have a success stories page on your website. Now, what's the difference between success stories and testimonials or reviews? It is. A little more detail of a story and the results that you get for clients.
[00:24:29] Josh: So the problem with a testimonial or review is that they're generally right after a uh, uh, a project goes live. And I'm actually gonna be talking about this a lot in the next episode of the podcast and the first episode of 2023. We're gonna be diving into this in a little more detail cause I actually do recommend that you get a review and a testimonial, right? While the iron is. But you can't really have a success story with somebody if you just launched their website, right? Like you gotta give it some time and get some results.
[00:24:59] Josh: Success stories are awesome though because you can circle back around with your clients and do a bit of a case study. Now, for me personally, I am working on a success story page, which I'm really excited about. But I've kind of already started it by essentially I'll, I'll be happy to share my strategy by having a lot of students onto the podcast.
[00:25:19] Josh: Whenever I have a student on the podcast and they share the results that they've got through my courses and coaching, that is a success story. That is a case study that I can direct people to when they have questions. I can be like, well, you know, look at, look at this person over here. I mentioned Sandy earlier.
[00:25:35] Josh: Eventually, if I have Sandy on the podcast, I could, I could show what she's done in her business as a good example, and that is a case study in a way for my business. So for you, circle back around with your clients. You don't need to have a podcast or a YouTube show, but you could just do a call with them, find out what's worked, find out what results they got.
[00:25:51] Josh: And then put that on your website as a case study, as a success story. It could be a blog post or it could just be a little blurb on like the results that you got. And then you can put that on your portfolio page and it's so, or you can have your own success story and it's so much more beneficial. So a couple examples of this as we wrap this up.
[00:26:09] Josh: Marie Folio she has a success stories page that is a perfect example of this. So many success stories. And on the main page, there'll be like a picture of the person, there'll be their title, and then there's a read more, and that will just add a little dropdown that drops down about a paragraph or two of the success story.
[00:26:30] Josh: So you could do that, or you could do like your own page. You could make it basically a blog post. Another good example of that. Is actually, we mentioned smart passive income earlier, pat Flynn's Company. They did a success story with me after going through a few of Pat's courses back in 2020. If you go to smart passive income.com and search Josh Hall, uh, you will find my success story there, which is actually how I got connected with Pat.
[00:26:57] Josh: If you're curious about how I've got Pat Flynn on the podcast here a couple times. It started with this, it started with them doing a success story on me because I sent in a video test. For the podcasting course, and they'd, uh, it wasn't Pat himself, but it was one of his team members, uh, back in the day who e uh, interviewed me and she wrote up a little success story post, and I'll make sure this is shared as a link in the, uh, host for this podcast episode.
[00:27:24] Josh: But it's a great example of creating an intentional success story that is way more powerful than me saying, I really like Pat's courses. Like, that's cool, but what's way cooler is seeing how the courses have impacted my life and have got results and helped grow my business. So there we go. I highly recommend you do that for sure.
[00:27:43] Josh: So a quick recap. Number one, results based marketing on your website in particular. Number two, create some sort of journey for people in their different places, different customer types. Number three. messaging and copy. Put an emphasis on your messaging in your copy. Uh, again, kind of in line with the results.
[00:28:02] Josh: Number four, personalize your site as much as you can. Put real images and, uh, just personalize things. Make it less corporatey and less vague. More you and more real. Number five, add video. Even if it's with your cell phone, you will be your salesperson before they even meet you if you have a video on your site.
[00:28:20] Josh: Number six, blogging. There's so much opportunity with SEO now with everyone flocking to socials with content that disappears and no one's gonna see again. Number seven, accessibility. Number eight, privacy in terms. Make sure you keep that in the forefront of all your web design projects. Number nine, embrace the nineties webmaster vibe.
[00:28:39] Josh: And finally, again, the one thing I would do right now is create a success stories page. Circle back around with like three clients. See how the website has helped them and get that out there, my friend success stories page, and then you can market that on any marketing that you're doing. So there you go.
[00:28:55] Josh: Those are my top 10 proven web design growth trends that are happening right now and are gonna be big time for 2023. I hope they helped. If you have any other trends that you'd like to share, go to the podcast post for this episode. Josh hall.co/ 2 3 4. Drop me a comment. I do read. And until next time, here comes a dad joke.
[00:29:16] Josh: I'll see you next year for the next episode, and we'll continue all my friends. All right, everyone, have an awesome end of the year, and I'll see you on the next one.