Category: Studio Website Strategies
The 4 Top Things You Should Do AFTER Your Studio’s Website Has Launched

After weeks of tweaking materials and mind melding with your website designer, your site has launched. Congratulations! Now you can finally let it do its job and get back to fully concentrating on your dance studio…

But wait!! As tempting as it is to consider the project “done”, there are things you can do to take full advantage of your new site and ensure you get your money’s worth.

If need of a new studio website? Visit Studio of Dance .com to see whether we're a good fit!

Here are the top 4 things you should remember to do AFTER your studio’s website has launched:

1. Promote It
The buzz is likely out on your website, but make sure to promote it fully. Start by sending out an email blast and Facebook post encouraging your students, dance parents, and friends to check out your new website and then to share it with their friends. Put your web address on flyers, show programs, signs, and anywhere else you can think of.

It’s also a good idea to offer web-only specials or coupons, to give people another reason to go to your website. People love to get a good deal, and once they’ve visited your site, it will be easier to get them to return.

2. Drive Traffic to It
As often as possible, drive traffic to your dance studio’s website from your social media channels. For example, when you upload a video to your YouTube Channel, make sure that the title or description of the video includes your website address. When posting to Facebook, give a ‘Latest News’ teaser, and then provide a link to the News page of your website for those who want fuller information. If you’ve added a batch of new photos to your studio site, tweet about it, with a link to your Photo Gallery page.

Get as much traffic on your website as possible, and you’ll have the forum to excite visitors about your classes, programs, events, and camps.

3. Link It
Improving your dance studio’s online presence through local directories is an excellent way to keep top of mind with those in your community. Start off by claiming your listing with Google My Business, and move on to other local directories such as Yelp, Yahoo Local, Bing Local, and BBB.org.

Besides utilizing local directories, create online partnership opportunities where you can. Linking to and from other websites, when done in a thoughtful way, can increase your studio’s exposure, as well as establish important business relationships.

Reciprocal links can also help with your search engine optimization, as long as you aren’t seeking them out for that purpose alone. The important thing is to put your dancers, parents, and prospects first, and consider what they would be interested in and find valuable.

4. Maintain It
Think of your website upkeep as an ongoing discipline, instead of a performance that ends when the curtain goes down (aka: when the website launches). Maintaining, updating, and monitoring your website is a practice that will last as long as your dance studio does.

Not what you wanted to hear, right? It’s ok. There are things you can do to make maintenance easy, and dare I say, enjoyable.

Keeping your website up to date is the #1 way to ensure it remains the sweet little marketing engine that it is at launch time. Here are three ways to make updating easy:

a) Plan ahead to make it easier to deal with needs and problems when they arise. Keep a record of all your login information, and the contact details and support email addresses of your web designer, hosting company, and domain name company. If your website designer manages everything, then it’s that much easier to keep that info at hand.

b) As soon as your website launches, set a schedule to remind yourself to check in. It’s easy to get so wrapped up in studio life that you forget to perform maintenance or even glance at your website. Solution? This is a GREAT task to delegate to a trusted studio staff member. As with most things, though, if it’s not scheduled, it doesn’t get done. Just a month or two of neglect due to a busy competition schedule or recital prep, and suddenly that manageable task can feel truly daunting. Ensure success by scheduling maintenance sessions into the office calendar 1 or 2x per month.

c) Use maintenance sessions to remove outdated information from your website, add timely event details, revise your dance school’s calendar, update competition result information, and/or add a special contest or promotion. If you’re wanting visitors to take action on a certain page, make sure to add a clear Call to Action.

A few times per year, schedule a fuller review of your website. During these sessions, identify places where you can improve your site and create an intuitive, streamlined experience for prospects, parents, and dancers. Think about your overarching goals, and the mission and branding of your website as it relates to your studio. This type of session will also help you notice things you may otherwise have forgotten to update, such as a change in faculty or a photo needing replacing.

Think now about your website’s life post launch. Schedule time for social media, marketing, and maintenance, and you’ll set it up for long-term success. You’ll ensure that it remains current, professional, and your #1 tool for bringing new dancers into the studio, while also keeping existing dancers (and their parents) happy and loyal!

Best wishes,
Stacey

Your website is your dance studio’s #1 marketing tool. Is yours sorely in need of a redesign? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

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Harnessing the Power of Image-Centric Marketing for your Dance Studio

Concerned about finding new dance students? About keeping your existing ones? Nervous about your competition? Completely understandable, but never fear. Using the online marketing strategies that highly successful dance studios are using, you can address these concerns and thrive.One popular current strategy is using image-centric content. This is exactly what it sounds like – using imagery to grab visitors’ attention, and share information in a way that is simple and easy to digest.

The idea of creating image-centric content is not new; we’re all accustomed to seeing lots of images on websites and social media. But it’s very common for photos and other graphics, despite their importance, to be left until the last minute when we create new content. They can be seen as an afterthought, or even a nuisance. Website design and Facebook page launches are often delayed or even abandoned because of them.

At the very least, image centric marketing can feel like one more time consuming “to do”. Well, keep reading! I’ll be sharing 8 free tools you can use to create marvelous images and graphics.

The Power of Images

The human brain is wired to respond to images. In fact, 90 percent of all information that we perceive and that gets transmitted to our brains is visual. Communicating through imagery means you can communicate more value, more quickly to visitors skimming your website or social media.

Happily, you don’t need to be a graphic designer to learn some simple tricks and techniques that will punch up your website and grab the attention of your social media audience.

Don’t get me wrong or let the pendulum swing too far – Text is super important! Many people still research and yes, READ, getting a full sense of a service or product before making their purchasing decision. It’s just that graphics, in conjunction with text, can provide visual examples, emphasize relevant points, and portray emotions that support your message.

For example, language takes more time to process than image elements. Consider the example below. From a website visitor’s perspective, would it be easier to understand a dance position that is described, or shown?

Image-centric marketing for your dance studio

We not only more quickly absorb information that is visual – visual elements also affect us emotionally. Which of the following is more effective in portraying the warmth of a dance studio?

Visual elements affect us emotionally

 

8 Free Tools You Can Use to Create Marvelous Images and Graphics for Your Dance Studio

1. Quozio.com

Quozio isn’t fancy, but it sure it easy to use. Just go to www.quozio.com and enter your quote or other text, and then press “Go.” They will automatically format it, but if you don’t like what they give you, you can easily select a different background.

Then, you can either right-click on the image and select “Save image as”, in order to add it to your website, or you can share it to your social networks. Easy & fun!

Quozio

2. UseChisel.com

Write your thoughts on photos! With Chisel, you can upload your own photos, which is cool, or you can choose a background from Chisel’s huge library of images. Next you overlay a quote, caption, or other text of your choosing. When you’re happy with your creation, you can share it on Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter, or save it for use on your dance studio website.

Chisel

3. Share As Image

Here is another awesome, free tool for making creative looking quotes and sayings. With Share As Image, you can convert any highlighted text into an image. As with Chisel, you can upload your own images, or use theirs. Once the image is created, you can download the image or share it on your social media accounts.

Tip: Use the “Try It for Free” link underneath the Buy It Now button; otherwise, the service is $8 per month.

Share As Image

4. QuotesCover.com

QuotesCover gives you a huge library of quotes to choose from.  Once you’ve decided upon a quote, you select whether you’ll be using the image as a Facebook or Twitter update, Facebook or Google+ header, or a Twitter header, and the image automatically sizes to the appropriate dimensions. You then scroll through font and color combinations to figure out what floats your boat.

QuotesCover isn’t quite as simple to use as those above, but is still a valuable (and free!) tool with which to up your image game.

Quotes Cover

5. Canva.com

This graphics tool is just bad-ass (pardon my French). It gives you a ton of options – layouts, banners, grids, shapes, and frames – to get you going. With Canva, you have the option to create Facebook, Twitter & Instagram graphics, Facebook cover photos, and much more.

The user interface is wonderful to use, although it’s easy to spend a lot of time tweaking your image and text into the perfect combination. Some of their photos and templates cost $1 to use, but many are free. If you’re signed into Facebook, Canva can pull in your own photos, or you can upload photos from your computer.

 Canva

6. Pixlr.com

Pixlr is a fantastic tool for those who want to edit their dance studio’s photos without delving into Photoshop or another high-end graphics program. It’s an internet based program (so you don’t need to download it to your computer).

Pixlr is not as easy to use as the options above, but it can do so much more and is worth looking into. Here’s a blogpost I wrote on How to Easily Crop, Resize, & Add Effects to your Dance Photos using Pixlr.com.

 

And 2 Fun Options for Pinterest Lovers!

I found both of these to be super easy and fun to use.

 

7. Pinstamatic.com
This site was designed to be used mostly with Pinterest, but you can also create great graphics to share on other social media networks.

 

Simple and fun. When you are done with your graphic, you have the option to pin it, post it to Facebook, tweet it or email it to yourself.

Understanding image-centric content can help optimize your dance studio’s marketing efforts and give you an edge over competitors who mainly publish written content. Give one or more of these image tools a try, and improve your visitors’ website and social media experience!

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you tired of your studio’s website? Ready for a website overhaul? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

 

Keep It Fresh: Steps for Updating Your Dance Studio Website’s Content

The end of a year is an excellent time to take stock… Has it been a great year for your dance studio? Is it thriving? What new challenges (landlord issues, faster than expected growth) have appeared, and how are you handling those? What accomplishments can you point to and be proud of? Now is a great time to acknowledge your hard work and pat yourself on the back before heading back into the fray.

As part of your end of the year assessment, do an annual review and update all of the content on your studio’s website. Can’t remember the last time your website content was updated? Your studio’s website is likely frightfully stale. Even if you keep up several of your pages, such as your Events and Calendar pages, it’s very easy and common for other site materials to become out of date.

  • Have you had one or more instructors leave recently? Hired new ones?
  • Do you have new dance programs that need mentioning on your website?
  • Is there a notice on the site about an “upcoming” audition that happened three months ago?
  • Are the toddlers pictured in your photo gallery now in high school?

When your photo gallery tells you it’s time to update your dance studio’s websiteDepending on the size of your website, this task can take 30 minutes to several hours to complete. I’d recommend sitting down at your computer with a cup of coffee or your beverage of choice, and starting with your homepage. Then methodically visit each of your website pages. Have a notebook so you can take notes, or start a draft email if you expect to send your findings to someone else.

Step 1:

The first order of business is to delete any out-of-date or incorrect information. Keep your eyes out for references to old dates… If it’s 2018 but your Summer Programs page features ‘2015 Summer Classes ’, that’s not good!

Step 2:

If you will be deleting an old class schedule or performance announcement from your site, add new information to replace the old, if you have that available. If this exercise makes you recognize some gaps – materials that need to be written or gathered together, that’s ok. Make a list of needed items, put it off to the side, and continue going through your studio’s website.

Step 3:

Once you’ve gone through all pages, send your list of changes to your web designer (if you can’t do them yourself). It’s nice to give them a “heads up” if you expect to send a batch of new photos, new tuitions sheet, and etc., in the coming week. And then schedule a time to write any new materials needed.

If you’re not able to update your own website with a content management system, you’ll need your web designer to do it for you (or whoever maintains your site).

Updating your content in a year-end review does NOT mean it should be only done once per year. Regular updates will keep visitors coming back to your site.

Keeping your website content current is also important for your SEO (search engine optimization). Why? Google devalues websites that remain static, which means your position in the search engine rankings can be hurt if your content isn’t fresh and relevant.

Now you can embark on the new year with the knowledge that your dance studio’s website is up to date with fresh content and is being the best marketing tool it can be for your business!

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you tired of your studio’s website? Ready for a website overhaul? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

 

Is your Dance Studio’s Website About to Go Down?

It’s downright scary when you go to your dance studio’s website and it’s down. Or you hear from a dancer or parent that it’s not there… eek. Almost always, a downed website is a case of an expired domain name (website address).

Knowing who maintains your domain name and when it expires will give you peace of mind and ensure that your website stays right where it should – in front of the eyeballs of your customers and prospects.

Do you know who maintains your domain name? Here’s an easy way to check!

The Whois service

WHOIS (pronounced as the phrase “who is”) is a system used to find out information about the ownership of a domain name.

To quickly figure out who maintains your domain name, go to www.whois.net and simply put in your website address. When you see the results, the piece of information you’re looking for is “Admin Name”. The person maintaining your domain name is the person or company listed in that section.

A) If you are one of our website customers, and you see ‘Studio of Dance.com‘ (or Stacey Marolf), then we are the ones who maintain your domain. You’ll receive a renewal reminder from us one month prior to your domain expiration.

B) If another company or person is listed (other than yourself or us), they are the ones who maintain your domain name. Hopefully, they’re terrific about letting you know when your domain is about to expire so you can renew. A smart thing to do is go back to your Whois listing and search for the ‘Registrar Expiration Date’ field. This tells you when your domain name will expire.

I would highly recommend putting a reminder in your own phone or office calendar so you can make sure this important component is taken care of. Make the reminder for a few weeks prior to the domain’s expiration to ensure you have enough time to take care of it (this goes doubly if the person/company maintaining your domain name is difficult to get a hold of).

C) If you see your own name, then either you registered it yourself, or someone did so on your behalf. It’s up to you to maintain your domain name. If this is your situation, look at your Whois listing again for the ‘Registrar URL’ field. This will tell you who your domain registrar is.

If you maintain your own domain name, pay attention to those domain renewal reminders!

Who controls your domain name?It’s incredibly important. Now that you know who your domain name company (registrar) is, keep your eyes out for domain name renewal reminders from them. When they send you a domain reminder, don’t hesitate – go ahead and renew immediately. You’re going to have to anyway, and delaying just increases the possibility of forgetting to do so.

Forgetting to renew results in your domain name lapsing, and when that happens? Your website will go down! Or worse – someone can grab your released domain name and either use it themselves or charge you a boatload to get it back. (Don’t get me started about those stinker companies who make money in this fashion… grrr.)

NOTE: Make sure the company sending you a domain renewal is the actual company your name is registered with. There are a few companies that send (usually by mail) a notice to renew your domain name. The renewal notice from your legitimate domain registrar should come by email and be the company listed in your WhoIs listing’s ‘Registrar URL’ field.

When Renewing your Domain Name – A Bonus Tip:

The next time you renew your domain name (no matter who maintains it), I’d strongly recommend renewing for 5 to 10 years, instead of one.

Here’s why:

  • It’s excellent for your SEO (search engine optimization).
    When search engines recognize your domain name has been registered for a longer number of years, they see the business as a valid, long-term business and are inclined to reward them with higher placement in search results.
  • Your price is locked in. If the domain renewal price goes up, it won’t affect you. You won’t have to worry about it for years!
  • Domain registration is typically inexpensive, and it’s so worth it to register for a longer number of years and avoid the pain of renewing each year!

Knowing who maintains your domain name can give you peace of mind about your website. I hope this helps clear up any questions you may have about the topic. If you do have other questions or concerns, please let me know in the comments below. You’re likely not the only one, and I can put Q and A’s in a future blogpost.

Best wishes!
Stacey

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Are you tired of your studio’s website? Ready for a website overhaul? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

How to Get Prizewinning Testimonials for your Studio

Through your website, you can (and should) give visitors information about your dance studio’s mission, history, upcoming events, and classes offered. When it comes to the big sell, though, it’s far better to let someone else do your bragging – namely your dance parents and/or the dancers themselves.

But how do you get testimonials that will benefit your school the most? Here’s how to obtain high quality testimonials that will draw more new dancers to your studio.

The first step to using testimonials on your website is, of course, to collect them in the first place. While getting testimonials is pretty straightforward (be bold and ask for them from your most satisfied parents & students), collecting the information needed for really persuasive testimonials requires a slightly different process.

Guide Dance Parents into Giving a Focused, Specific Testimonial

Although you can certainly ask a dance parent while they are at the studio, sending a testimonial request by email or personal note is more thoughtful. When you do this, be aware that the specific questions you ask your dance parents will play a major role in the quality of the testimonials you’ll receive.

For example, consider the following two testimonial requests:

“Hi Rebecca,
I’m so glad to hear that you enjoyed the recital! I’m always looking to feature feedback from happy dancers and dance parents on my website, so could you please send me a short paragraph describing what you like best about the studio?

Sincerely,
Elena (Studio Owner)”

vs.

“Hi Rebecca,
I’m so glad to hear that you and little Jenny had a wonderful recital experience this year! I would love to feature feedback from happy customers like you on the studio’s website.

If you’re willing to share your experiences, please send back your responses to one or more of the following questions (or feel free to write your own message).

  1. What about the recital did you enjoy the most?
  2. Has taking dance helped Jenny in other areas of her life? If so, what are they?
  3. What is Jenny’s favorite thing about coming to the studio?
  4. What have you enjoyed about your experience at the studio?

I’d love to use a photo of you and Jenny (which we can take in the studio if you’d like), or a photo of Jenny in a costume on recital night.

Thanks in advance!
Elena (Studio Owner)”

The second email increases the likeliness that a specific benefit or positive result will be brought to the attention of new prospects. These types of testimonials are much more powerful than generic compliments. To demonstrate:

The first request above might result in a testimonial that sounds a little like:

“We love Figtree School of Dance. It’s awesome in every way. Thanks Ms. Elena!”

The second request might result in something more like the following:

“Before our daughter Jenny began dance classes at Figtree School of Dance, she was shy and uncomfortable around other children her age. She has really blossomed through taking dance and has made many new friends. She is learning wonderful dance technique, but also is becoming a positive, confident young woman thanks to the staff and community at Figtree!”

Encourage specifics from your customers, and they’ll provide the much-needed social proof that can turn wavering prospects into new dancers in your studio.

You don’t have to use the entire testimonial!

Sometimes the kindness and enthusiasm of a customer results in a loooooong testimonial. As wonderful as testimonials are, to do their job they need to be readable. Nothing says you have to quote an entire testimonial on your site. Consider shortening it to five lines of text (or less). As long as you keep the overall impression the testimonial gives, it’s perfectly fine.

If a dance parent gives you a very long, but awesome, testimonial and you want to use more of the comments, you can break it up into several segments and scatter it throughout your site.

And the best spot to place testimonials is…

It’s an excellent idea to have a testimonials page on your dance studio’s website – having one can really impress parents considering dance studios in your area. In addition, though, add a testimonial here and there throughout the site. It increases their impact when you interweave them with the content on your webpages, giving them a better chance of being read by more of your site visitors.

If your testimonials are focused, specific, and well placed throughout your website, this powerful technique will convince new prospects of the benefits of their children taking class at your dance studio. Which means more new dancers coming through your studio’s doors!

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you tired of your studio’s website? Ready for a website overhaul? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!
3 Quick Tips to Optimize your Studio Website’s Title Tags

Did you get a chance to read my blogpost on how to improve your dance studio’s website ranking by optimizing your title tags? It gives you the lowdown on title tags, and an easy method to make them FABULOUS.

Here are 3 quick additional tips on improving your title tags:

Improve your studio's title tags1. Use a different title for each page
For best results, use a different title for each page. A good title tag for an ‘About the Classes’ page might be: “Ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop, and lyrical dance classes in Seattle, WA”. A nice title tag for an Online Registration page could be: “Register online for dance classes or summer dance programs”. You get the idea.

2. Don’t put your studio’s name at the front of your title tag
Putting your studio’s name in your title tags may be a mistake. Why? If your studio’s name is Figtree Academy of Ballet and that is the full title tag of your homepage, newbie parents searching for a studio in your area would have to type in ‘Figtree’, ‘Academy’, and/or ‘Ballet’ for your title tag to do you any good. If they don’t yet know your studio exists, how will they know to type your business name in a search query?

A better choice would be a title tag that says, “Dance classes in Springdale, CA – The #1 Dance Studio in Corvallis County”. You can certainly add ‘Figtree Academy of Ballet’ to the end of it, but those more important keywords should be at the front.

The exception to this would be those of you whose studios happen to have the exact same name as the keywords parents are likely to type in, for example: ‘The Dance Studio’, or ‘Roseville Dance School’.

3. Make sure not to keyword stuff!
Using keywords is fantastic. There is a difference, though, between using keywords judiciously in a title tag, and ‘keyword stuffing’. It’s pretty self explanatory, but a keyword-stuffed title might look something like this:

‘Dance with us in our dance studio – Dance classes for dancers who love to dance!’

Google might view that title tag as trying to manipulate a better ranking by just repeating the word ‘dance’ a lot. There’s no hard and fast rule as to how many times you can use a word in a title… a couple of times should be fine. Just use your common sense!

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you tired of your studio’s website? Ready for a website overhaul? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

 

How to Improve Your Dance Studio Website’s Google Ranking

SEO for Dance Studio Websites: Title Tags

If your site isn’t coming up as high as you’d like in Google and the other search engines, take a look at your title tags. A title tag is the is the main text that describes a webpage – it tells search engines what your page is about. Title tags appear in browser title bars/tabs, and on search engine results pages. Like this:

Title tags are the single most important SEO (search engine optimization) element besides your overall content, and so tweaking them can help your dance studio’s website ranking.

A great title tag includes the most important keywords for your site and is relevant to the topic of the page. In this context, keywords mean: “specific terms used by a person to search for something on the internet”.

Here’s an example of a good homepage title tag:

“Drop-in dance studio for adults in Seattle, WA – Westlake Dance Center”.

If an adult in the Seattle area is looking to take dance classes, she/he would probably type in words like ‘dance studio’, Seattle, and adults, and Westlake Dance Center would likely show up nice and high in this scenario.

In our experience, some of the most important keywords to include are: dance, dance studio, dance classes, dance school, your city’s name, your state abbreviation, and the types of classes you teach.

Here’s How to Re-Do Your Title Tags:

If you decide to redo your title tags, you can start by creating a fresh text document on your computer. Then go to each of your website’s pages, and consider their title tags – are they accurate and concise descriptions of each page’s content? Do they include the most important keywords for each webpage? The ones you feel good about, leave alone.

If a webpage has a title tag you think is sub-par, write the name of the page in your text doc. Next to it, write out a new title tag. For best results, place your most important keywords for the page as close to the beginning of the title as possible.

Repeat this process as you go through all of your website’s pages – those that have decent title tags, leave alone. Those that need a revamp, revise in the text document.

For example:

Revised Homepage title –
Drop-in dance studio for adults in Seattle, WA – Westlake Dance Center

Revised Class Schedule page title –
Dance classes at Seattle’s premier dance studio: Ballet – Modern – Hip Hop – Tap – Lyrical

 

You’ve Got Your New Title Tags – Now What Do You Do With Them?

You may be able to change your title tags yourself through a content management system, but if not, you’ll need to send them to your website designer. If you take care of re-writing your title tags and send them to your designer ready to go, it will be a relatively quick and easy change for them to make, and so shouldn’t cost you an arm and a leg.

You can likely also pay them for their input, and/or have them write optimized title tags for you, at a higher cost.

NOTE: If you’re a Studio of Dance.com website design customer, please note that changing title tags is not something you can do yourself with Simple2Edit, however, it won’t take long for us to update your title tags at our hourly rate (it would likely take just 30 minutes). Send your freshly optimized title tags my way, and we’ll get that done for you.

If you’re not yet showing up on the first page of Google with the keywords “dance studio” + your city (or are concerned that other studios may usurp your position), then it’s worth taking the time to revamp your title tags.

And the good news is – few studios are doing this, so it could really make a difference!

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you tired of your studio’s website? Ready for a website overhaul? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

 

Aack! Is No One Visiting your Dance Studio’s Website?

Is No One Visiting your Dance Studio’s Website? Here’s What to Do About It:

Many of us have the “build it and they will come” dream about our websites, but sadly this is not reality. The good news is that there are fairly simple things that can be done to raise your “visitor count” and “website stickiness”.

Visitor count refers to the number of people finding your website, visiting it, and returning, hopefully often. When your website is sticky, visitors stay on it longer and find it so informative and entertaining that they return time after time.

Here are 5 Do’s to Raise your Visitor Count and Website Stickiness:

Raise your Visitor Count and Website Stickiness1. Do keep it current:

The danger with using current information, such as a newsletter, current events page or even a class schedule page, is that when the info shown is no longer current, your website seems automatically dated and out of touch.

People are not likely to keep returning to your website in the hopes that it has been updated. So make it a priority! Put it on your calendar to update once a month or whenever the expiration date of your information is near.

2. Do develop a feeling of community on your site:

Photos from shows and competitions, current studio news, and announcements of the successes of your students will ensure that visitors will keep visiting. Posting these on your site will also will also reinforce for dancers and parents that they are part of your studio family.

Remember that letting your dancers and dance parents know when you upload new content means they’ll be much more likely to visit. Have your front desk person mention it to those waiting for class to start.

3. Do keep it clean:

Clean and simple, that is. Animation, backgrounds in loud colors, and music that loads automatically with no choice to stop it are some things that can distract visitors from the real purposes of your site. When a visitor simply wants to read the history of your studio, automatically loaded music can be downright annoying, and to annoy customers is probably not one of your site goals.

4. Do check your stats:

Which webpages are most visited on your site? Which are the top exit pages? Your traffic statistics are probably the most valuable feedback you will ever receive about your website, so analyze them!

Take a look at the content on the most visited pages – can you provide more on those subjects? Why are people leaving from particular pages? Links pages are often responsible for encouraging people to leave your site. If you have a links page and notice that people commonly leave from that page, consider eliminating it from your website.

Google Analytics is an incredible, free service that generates detailed statistics about a website’s traffic and traffic sources, but it’s also incredibly complex and can be difficult to work with. If Google Analytics is just too intimidating, the free stat counter called StatCounter.com is a worthy alternative. Either way, if your website is in need of an analytics service, you’ll likely need to contact your website designer to implement it.

5. Do put your website address everywhere:

True, this is an offline-online marketing tip, but it can not be overemphasized: Put your website address everywhere you can! This means on business cards, signage, flyers, postcards and all other advertising and promotional materials.

The only place you don’t need to put your website address is on your website itself, although even then you can lead visitors through the site by saying things such as “visit our Schedule Page to determine which classes you’d like to register for”. These internal hyperlinks not only make your website user friendly, they are excellent for your search engine optimization.

Alright, I’ll admit it. I get so busy running our ‘web design for dance studios’ business that I can fall short on executing some of these tips. Studio owners often tell me this is the case for them as well… between running the studio, managing the business, preparing for recital and competitions, and life at home, your website can be unintentionally ignored. Let’s resolve together to schedule in time for keeping our websites fresh and running well!

After all, what good is our website if no one visits it?

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you feeling that your studio website isn’t worthy of your amazing dance studio? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!
Top 5 Ways to Make Your Dance Studio Website ‘Sticky’

Keep visitors on your dance studio's website - Make it sticky!A sticky website is one where people stay a nice long while and come back regularly to see what’s new.

How important is it to make your studio’s site sticky? Imagine parents in your community visiting all the dance studio websites in your area to determine where to take their daughter for class. Would you prefer they linger on yours or that of your competitor(s)?

Making your website sticky means encouraging visitors to spend some time there, which is not an easy task with the myriad of distractions online. Using the techniques below, however, can help keep visitors right where you want them… exploring your dance school through your website, and giving them ample reason and opportunity to act upon their interest!

1. Content is King!

The easiest way to keep visitors around (and coming back for more) is to offer well written, interesting and relevant content. Offer both dry but important information such as your studio policies and recital handbook, and punchier, fun items such as latest competition results and studio news.
Your website will ideally answer visitors’ questions effectively, lead them to important points, and entice them with calls to action throughout the site. What is meant by ‘calls to action’?

Examples of effective calls to action are:

  • ‘Call us now for more information at (234) 555-6789’,
  • ‘Click here to register online now’, or
  • ‘Sign up for classes today, and receive a free studio t-shirt!’

Content is the key to a sticky website. If there is nothing there, then there is no reason for your audience to stay.

2. Keep it clean

What first impression does your website give? Although we’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover, appearance is the first thing people notice, and it sets the tone for their entire visit. Whether the tone is professional or amateurish, warm or cold, catering to adults or the younger set will make a real difference in the way people view your studio.
People will not remain on a studio website that is cluttered and confusing. We’ve all been on a site or two that overdoes it with colors, font styles, graphics and technical gadgetry. My personal first impression in such cases is usually irritation and a vague sense of disappointment… and I can’t get off those sites quickly enough.

It’s best to make your website clean, straightforward and consistent, with a uniform appearance. Using the same backgrounds, colors, navigation menu and site logo throughout your pages will help create a good first impression, and first impressions matter!

3. Make Your Studio Website Sticky, Not Stuck

A sticky website is one where a first time visitor arrives and finds it difficult to leave. You want people to spend time on your site, but not because it takes a long while to figure out how to navigate through it.

Ease of navigation is imperative and a vital component of a sticky site. Visitors will only click around so long to get the information they are looking for. Once they become confused or agitated, feeling ‘stuck’, moving to another site becomes inevitable. Intuitive and consistent navigation bars help visitors feel at ease with your website and, by extension, your studio.

Every part of a successful website functions like a well-oiled superbly made machine. If parents can register online through your website, facilitate their passage through the process. Make it clear, step by step, what they need to do to successfully register and/or make payments online.

How easy it is to maneuver through your website is an indication of how easy it will be to belong to your studio!

4. Keep Your Site Fresh:

Does your audience have a reason to return to your site? The first time someone visits your site, everything is fresh and appealing. If they come back to your site and nothing has changed, you’ve missed a vital opportunity to market to them. And visitors will not keep coming back if they feel they’ve already seen it all.

It’s super important to update and rotate your content to attract new visitors and keep them coming back for more. If you’re having a difficult time thinking of ways to do this, try offering a dance-related quote of the week or “Teachers’ Tip of the Month” on your news page.

Have a production coming up? Have your students just participated in a parade? Are you offering a discount for those who register early for class? Have new recital photos to share? These are all opportunities to freshen up your content.

And in doing so, you answer every returning user’s question: “What’s new?”

5. Make it personal

People are more interested in connecting with a person than a collection of content. You can bridge the gap and help first time visitors feel comfortable making contact with your studio by personalizing your website. Doing so also results in return visits from your current students and/or their parents. You are building community, and giving your visitors something to belong to.

Think of your website as a personality, and as an extension of your studio. Make it welcoming, accessible and inclusive. Your customers (and newbies) will love to learn about and see photos of a teacher’s newborn or the ongoing progress of a studio expansion. Adding faculty photos, writing your newsletters in a personal tone, using video and including personal details and stories of life at the studio will help you engage with your website visitors and help them feel connected.

Because the internet can be cold and impersonal, personalizing your website can go a long way towards making people feel part of your studio family. And when visitors feel like they are a part of something, they’ll stay on a website longer.

Create a warm community feel to your site – a sure-fire way to increase your site´s stickiness.


Do you have suggestions on how to create a sticky dance studio website? Please share any thoughts in the comments section below.

Best wishes,
Stacey

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Are you feeling that your studio website isn’t worthy of your amazing dance studio? Please take a look at our dance studio website design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

 

Why you Should Improve the “Contact Us” Page on your Dance Studio’s Website

The sad ol’ Contact Us page is usually the last thing on a dance studio owner’s mind when updating a website. Teacher bios are spruced up, and class schedules are, of course, consistently updated. News pages are kept fresh and Gallery pages made to shine. But it’s the Contact Us page that’s going to turn all that other website effort into new dancers coming through the studio doors. To make the most out of it, don’t simply throw a page up there and call it a day. Try these tips instead!

5 Tips for Writing “Contact Us” Webpage Content:

1. Greet people on your Contact Us page.

Depending on the search they did to get to your dance studio’s website, it’s possible for people to land on your Contact Us page without ever visiting another page of your site. Make it friendly and inviting by adding a welcome sentence or two, and prospects will be more likely to follow through.

2. Give people more than one way to contact you.

Some people email like it’s second nature, while others are more comfortable speaking on the phone with a live person. Some people prefer filling out and sending a contact form, and this can be really good to have on the page since it keeps people from having to launch an email program to communicate with you. Give visitors a choice, and you’re likely to hear from more of them.

Optimize the Contact Us page on your dance studio website

3. Include an interactive map.

Thanks to Google and Mapquest, it’s easy to embed a map onto a contact page. (Unless you have access to the coding of your website, though, you’ll need to contact your web designer with the request.) With a Google map, people can get an immediate sense of where your studio is located and customize it to get directions from where they are.

4. Add descriptive directions as well.

If there is anything tricky about getting to your dance school, for example, if it’s tucked behind another business or there are parking considerations, write down directions that will help newbies. This shows that you care about your dance parents and their experience, and really gets the relationship off on a good foot.

5. Include social media links… or Not?

The contact us page is a great place to list all of your social media channels in one place. People may enjoy seeing the different ways you connect with the public and even send you a message on Facebook. However, if your strong desire is for people to contact you from that page, social media icons can split their focus and thwart their follow through. Would you rather have them contact you, or follow you on Twitter?

Want a Facebook fan? Ask the person after they’ve submitted their Contact form. Your “thank you” page is the perfect place to share more ways to join your studio community.

In Conclusion:

Yes, you want your website to be warm, inviting, and informational, but its main purpose is as a dance studio marketing tool. If what is standing between you and new dancers is your Contact Us page, isn’t it worth a little attention?

Best wishes,
Stacey

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In need of a new website for your dance studio? Take a look at our dance web design portfolio, and see whether we’re a good fit!

 

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