[00:00:00] James Breese: Strength Matters Media. Video. Print. Podcasts. 

[00:00:06] Josh Kennedy: Today's topic is how to pick the right fitness web designer. And it is obviously very, very important because if you want to rank high on Google, if you want to get clients and patients important to have a good fast loading, as we already know, websites, uh, is optimized.

[00:00:20] Um, there was a lot of generic advice out there, and I think James is going to go down the road of ranting on this one, James, how do we pick the right fitness web designer? What, what are some key. Things we should be looking out 

[00:00:35] James Breese: for the road of renting. I like that. That's a great phrase. I might steal that for other early rants I have down the line, but no, this stems from a real case study.

[00:00:46] I spoken to a gym owner this week who is not getting the same results or same return on his Facebook ads. So the Facebook ads themselves, not converting as high, they're getting a lot of fake leads, [00:01:00] fake numbers coming through. They can't follow up with them. So therefore the campaign hasn't yielded the same results as what they normally do.

[00:01:06] So you go into the conversation and ask for a strategy call to speak about, well, what's going different? What, where's, what's happening on Google? Can I get more leads from Google? I need to find new ways of getting leads coming in. And this is something we're seeing across the board at the moment is that people are giving fake numbers.

[00:01:21] And leads and information on social media marketing methods and adverts. And then, but they're converting better on Google, which is why we keep talking about Google all the time. So I said, okay, cool. I can have a look at it, see what's going on. I can have a look at the website, but I need access to your analytics and what we call Google search console.

[00:01:40] So he goes, yeah, I'll get my designer to go and give it to you. The designer couldn't give it to me because he hasn't set it up properly in the first place. And he's somehow lost access to said search console and analytics. But more importantly, we basically called him out for lying to him about what he was doing.

[00:01:59] And [00:02:00] this is just another case of a web design company masking is what we call an SEO company or pretending they know SEO inside out, which is search engine optimization. So you think when you hire a website company that they understand SEO, they understand how to rank your website higher. It couldn't be further from the truth.

[00:02:22] It's a completely different skill set. So what people are doing is they're saying, yeah, I build websites. I make websites look fancy, but they don't understand conversions. They're a website design company, they're not experts and specialists in ranking your business higher. And there's a high percentage of that because it's a very different skill set and understanding and level of knowledge to do this.

[00:02:46] So people are going to website design companies going, Hey, can you build me a website? Yeah, cool. I'll build it for you. Automatically assuming it will rank higher. It's not the case. It is not the case. So, I sent a bunch of questions over to [00:03:00] him to say, look, you need to challenge your web designer to ask him about this.

[00:03:03] And because of that, they couldn't answer those questions. And they've given us generic reports. And he's still locked out of his search console, which I don't even think he's got access to. And it was never set up in the first place. And Google Analytics. So, this is my mini rant for you guys out here now.

[00:03:18] If you're choosing a website design company, what experience have they got in your industry? Do they actually run a fitness and health and fitness business themselves? Do they know what converts? Because what looks pretty doesn't always convert. And a lot of people are going latest industry trends.

[00:03:36] That's different from running a business and seeing the leads coming in day in day out and knowing what works, what works best. So that's my first thing. If you want tip number one, hire a website company that specializes in the area and industry that you're working on. Not a generalist. There's lots of generalists out there.

[00:03:53] In terms of website design company, find a specialist in your niche who understands it inside [00:04:00] out. That is the first tip. Second tip, find a website company that understands how to write marketing copy. And website copy, but also know it within the realms of speaking to health and fitness professionals.

[00:04:16] Because what we want and want to deliver as a health and fitness professional is sometimes different to what the end user wants. We have to find a balance between the two. To showcase our expertise and not just give away random hit workouts or scientifically proven hit workouts, which is what people are looking for, we need to understand this, that it's not what we want and what we deliver in terms of being an expert coach.

[00:04:38] And thirdly is, do they know what Search Engine Optimization is? Do they understand what Google Analytics is and Search Console? And are they helping you create a website? That's designed to get found or designed just to look pretty, because I would sacrifice looks over visibility every single [00:05:00] day of the week.

[00:05:01] Andrew, bringing you in, because you've experienced with seeing this many, many times over the years, what do you make of that? 

[00:05:08] Andrew Wallis: No, it's good. The Road to Rant, I think, is a perfect title for this almost. But, um, yes, I've had personal experience with websites where I made the mistake of thinking that the, the aesthetics of the site, uh, were paramount.

[00:05:28] Don't get me wrong. They play a key role in obviously drawing someone's attention to your site, but equally the content's got to resonate with your target audience. And as you say, if you're picking a generalist who doesn't understand the fitness business and what it takes to run a fitness business, the types of.

[00:05:50] Um, audience you're trying to attract only, you can really, you know, the story. And if you're clear on who your target [00:06:00] audience is and the pain points and the challenges they face, you can weave that, that's that content, that message, that story into the content, basing it around keywords. And unfortunately, we're seeing time and time again, that the generalist web designers out there, they're not experienced in that side of things.

[00:06:20] They're just. Their main focus is, is the aesthetics approach. And that's a big mistake if we just go down 

[00:06:27] James Breese: that road massively. And it's, it's, um, again, I've been looking at this for years and just not done anything about it. It's why, you know, shameless plug. We're part, you know, part of our services is a website design company, because I've just seen over the years that people.

[00:06:44] And designers are not getting it right for people. And I haven't had the heart to tell them that they've wasted 5, 000 on a website that's not going to work because of the web design company. I just haven't had the heart to do it. But now I'm just calling these people out. I'm absolutely calling these website designers out who are charlatans, who are [00:07:00] just conning health and fitness professionals and business owners around the world.

[00:07:04] In doing fancy designs saying they can get more clients and leads, but in reality, they're not because they're not SEO specialists and that's a completely different skillset. 

[00:07:12] Josh Kennedy: I was going to say, so if somebody already has a beautiful looking website, which they are very happy with, but then they look behind the scenes and it doesn't have the SEO, do they then need to, is the next best thing to do rather than get a whole new website to just find an SEO specialist?

[00:07:26] Would that be the best 

[00:07:27] James Breese: route? It depends. That would be the quickest way. But as an SEO strategy comes into play. You've got to look at the speed of the website. If the website is sub 90%, your website's going to be sub 90%, which therefore it's not going to have the highest chance of ranking. It's as simple as that.

[00:07:45] So sometimes even this fancy websites, they think it's all good. You've got to cut it away, clear the clutter, start again, fresh. It really is as important that clean, if it's on WordPress, fresh install, fresh theme, [00:08:00] fresh design to go into here. That's fast loading optimized with the right plugins to help you get a quicker website.

[00:08:06] That's, that's how it goes. And that was my advice to this Jim owner. He needs to. Cut ties with his website company. He needs to do a fresh install. He needs to optimize and research the keywords needed for his local area. And then we can start building an SEO strategy after that. Because if I start doing blog posts and doing SEO for him right now, it ain't going to work.

[00:08:24] It just ain't going to work. Like we talked about Samantha Mattards case study a few weeks ago. Like we gutted her website out. And then we started adding content and now it's ranking number one on Google already in less than a week. That's the, that's the difference. That is the, the difference we're trying to say to people.

[00:08:40] There's a higher level strategy in play for this. And you've got to think about in terms of starting from scratch, it's a sad reality. And I'm so sorry to be the bearer of 

[00:08:49] Josh Kennedy: bad news. So the moral of the story is everyone should get rid of their websites. Is that what you're saying? No, this road to ranting is 

[00:08:57] James Breese: get rid of emails.

[00:08:59] Not quite, [00:09:00] because there are, there are generally some websites out there that just need a few tweaks. Okay. 

[00:09:04] Josh Kennedy: Well then there you go, I guess. Get into your Google search consoles, check your, uh, page speed and find out where 

[00:09:10] James Breese: you rank, where you sit. But I kind of like the questions, like, cause we wanted to make sure we called out this web designer a little bit to see where he was at.

[00:09:18] So the questions I put together were, were this for basically to see if they actually know what they're doing. So for any trainer or coach or fitness business owner out there. Who wants to like, who's not sure their website's converting, not happy with it. Ask, you ask your designer these questions. So I'm going to go to my little list over here.

[00:09:35] Can you explain the current SEO strategy for my website? That's the first one. What keywords are you targeting for your website? Are there any technical issues on your website that could be affecting our SEO such as slow loading speeds? Why is it X percentage for speed or mobile? Can you provide any recent reports or data or analytics that demonstrate progress and results?

[00:09:59] [00:10:00] And what's the number one search term people find us through Google Search Console? If they can't answer any of those questions, it's time to jump away. Fly away from them as fast as you possibly can, because that means they just don't understand it. They don't understand it. 

[00:10:15] Josh Kennedy: There we go. Tell you what, should we put those questions in the show notes as well?

[00:10:17] So everyone's got access to them. I think that'd be a good idea. We might get some peed off web designers getting in contact with us. 

[00:10:24] James Breese: I think so 

[00:10:25] Josh Kennedy: too. Well, there you go. These are the, it's really important guys. These are the questions that need. That is it for today. Please don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe.

[00:10:33] And if you want help getting more clients or patients, then booking your free 15 minute strategy call with us by going to strengthmatters. com forward slash strategy.