Is Your Website Prospect Friendly?

Your website navigation makes perfect sense—to the people who built it.

That does not mean it makes sense to your customer.

Most companies organize websites around internal departments, systems, and terminology. Customers arrive with a much simpler goal:

They want to find something.

In multifamily, that may be pricing, availability, floor plans, pet policies, tour options, or application information. When those answers are buried under unclear menus, multiple clicks, or industry language, the prospect does not assume the website is poorly designed.

They often assume the process of doing business with the company will be just as difficult.

Good navigation should feel almost invisible. A first-time visitor should be able to understand where to go without stopping to think about it.

A few questions worth asking:

• Can someone reach the most important information within one or two clicks?

• Are menu labels written in language prospects actually use?

• Is the next step obvious on every page?

• Does the mobile experience work as easily as the desktop version?

• Can a visitor move backward without starting over?

The best way to evaluate navigation is not to ask the team that uses the website every day. Give it to someone unfamiliar with it and ask them to complete a few basic tasks.

Do not guide them.

Watch where they hesitate, what they overlook, and where they get frustrated.

That hesitation is valuable data.

A website should not require customers to learn how your company is organized. It should be organized around how customers naturally search, think, and make decisions.