Website Credibility Checklist: 70+ Checks and a Handy Spreadsheet

Website credibility checkpoint #2:
Make it easy to contact you

• Create a proper Contact page (not a popup or a Calendly page where the only thing people can do is schedule appointments)
• Link to your Contact page from your main website navigation
• Link to your Contact page from the footer
• If you’re using a contact form on your Contact page, make sure to use as few input fields as possible
• Make sure your contact form works
• Display a confirmation message after your prospects pressed “send” to reassure them that the message was sent
• If you think it makes sense for your business model, list your email address and a phone number as well, both on the Contact page and in the footer

Website credibility checkpoint #3:
Keep important information up-to-date

In the Stanford research, this credibility guideline is called “Update your website content often”.

But how often is “often”? Once a month, a quarter, a year? What if you have nothing new to say?

When should you update your website?

Can your website visitors tell if your content is old?

Your website visitors can’t always tell when you updated your website the last time. But they will consider your website less trustworthy if they see something they recognize as outdated.

3 ways to make the info on your website appear up-to-date (without an update):

• Don’t display any “published on” or “last updated on” dates on your sales pages. If your offer is still valid as it is, why should you update your sales page? But your prospects don’t need to know that the last time that page was updated was three years ago.
• If your recent blog post is from more than two years ago, remove all the dates on the blog posts.
• Remove any information that’s clearly outdated. For example, links to social medial platforms that don’t exist anymore (hello, Google+!).

Website credibility checkpoint #4 & #5:
Show that there’s a real organization or people behind your website
…and
that those people are trustworthy

These two credibility guidelines are closely related. So, let’s implement them both at once.

If you’re an organization:

• State your postal address on your Contact page and in the footer.
• Have an About page where, among other things, you feature several important members of your team, along with their headshots taken by a professional photographer.
• Put everything you want your prospects to know about your company on one About page. Your prospects don’t care that much about you to read a whole separate page about your mission, and another one about your philosophy after that.
• Nice to have: Use videos with real people on your website (for example, you presenting your offer or video testimonials from your customers) and place them on your homepage, About and sales page.

If you’re a personal brand or a freelancer:

• On your homepage, make sure to state your first and last name.
• Feature your photograph on your homepage. If you want more client inquiries, it’s really not the time to be camera-shy.
• Do not call yourself “we” if it’s just you (even if your designer/copywriter/business coach/uncle told you it will make you look bigger)
• Create an About page where you present yourself as a likable and professional human being your prospects can trust.
• When describing yourself, tone down the chummy. It may compromise the trust in your expertise.

A good idea for every business:

• On your Contact page, add a photo of yourself / your CEO next to a contact form to signal to your prospects once again that there’s a real, likable and trustworthy person on the other end.

Website credibility checkpoint #6:
Avoid errors of all types, no matter how small

Mistakes happen. We are all human, and you aren’t writing an essay for your English teacher to grade.

But first impression matters, and errors (even as small as typos) negatively affect it.

[Typos and other grammatical errors] are either immediately recognized and turn off readers, or they are subtle and slowly damage credibility throughout copy.

Source: Conversion XL

Website credibility checkpoint #7:
Make it easy to verify the accuracy of the information on your site

• If you’re using words like “best-in-class” or “award-winning”, make sure to provide an unbiased source that backs up your claims (a “best-in-class” award, for example)
• On your product pages, display high-quality product images
• In your articles, reference external credible sources to back up your claims
• On your sales pages, show customer reviews or testimonials to – you guessed it – back up your claims
• Bonus trust points if you can show some case studies

What is a credible source?

A credible source is current, accurate, and bias-free information published by a reputable author or organization that is concidered an expert on the subject.

How to check the source for credibility: a quick checklist

• Authority: Is the author of an article and/or the website/magazine the information was published in considered to be a trusted authority on the subject?
• Currency: When was the article published / data collected?
• Accuracy: Does the author support their claim with evidence? Are the sources they cited credible?
• Bias: Do the authors of the article / owners of the publication have personal stakes in a certain point of view? If it’s a study, how was the data collected? Is it possible that the data sample is skewed?

Caution: Not every positive testimonial improves credibility

“Loved it!” is one of the worst testimonials you can use on your website. It’s vague and unspecific. Which make it less believable and completely useless for your potential customers. Here’s what makes a client testimonial great.

A credible client testimonial:

• Is trustworthy:
  • Uses full names and, if possible, headshots of the clients
  • Is specific enough to sound authentic
• Backs up your claims:
  • Reinforces your unique value proposition, and/or
  • Uses data behind the value service / product delivers, and/or
  • Addresses initial fears of your customers and explains how they were eliminated

An example of a credible testimonial

Feeling uneasy asking for a testimonial? Not sure how to ask? Steal these two testimonial request templates.

Website credibility checkpoint #8:
Make your expertise clear

You know you’re great at what you do. But do your prospects recognize that?

Not if you’re using vague language filled with generic phrases, jargon and superlatives.

How to make your prospects trust your expertise

• Make sure the text in your homepage banner makes it crystal clear what you offer and why people should care.
• Always choose clarity over cleverness. Leave no sentence open to interpretation.
• Choose plain English over jargon. Use words and phrases your prospects use when talking about their problems and results they want to achieve.
• If using terms specific to your niche and industry, make sure your prospects understand these terms, too.
• Be as specific as possible, because specificity increases trust. Plus, if your prospects can’t imagine it, they won’t buy it.

Vague vs specific copy

Not sure if your copy is clear? Here are 6 quick ways to spot and fix vague copy.

Pay special attention to your navigation

☐ Make sure your website navigation is easy to use and understand

• Avoid drop-down menus
• Whenever you can, use typical navigation labels
• Make the rest of the labels succinct but clear

• If possible, make sure that navigation reflects your expertise. Having a label “Services” indicates that you offer services. “Courses” that you offer course. “Shop” that you sell stuff, etc.

Website credibility checkpoint #9:
Make your site useful and easy to use

How to make your website useful

To make your site useful, you need to make sure the prospects see the information on your website as clear, relevant and valuable.

Here’s how to achieve that.

• Identify your target audience and get clarity about:
  • who they are
  • what problems they’re trying to solve
  • what results they’re hoping to see from your solution
  • how much they know about their problems and the solution you offer
• Make sure your web copy is clear (we covered that under the checkpoint #8)

How to make your website easy to use

Making your website easy to use is about prototypicality, clarity and smooth user experience.

☐ Make your website look prototypical for your niche

Your website won’t be the first ever website in your niche your prospects see in their lives.

For example, when they think about a marketing agency, they already have a mental image of what a marketing agency’s website should look like.

This is called prototypicality – a mental image your brain creates to categorize stuff. If something is prototypical (i.e. matches the mental image people have for this category), it feels familiar and, thus, more trustworthy.

To make your design look prototypical:

• Check the websites of your competitors and note:

• How many colors / what color palettes they use
• How many / what labels they have in the navigation
• How the homepage is structured
• What kind of photos they use (explainer GIFs, screenshots, photos of people), etc.

• Make sure your website provides your prospects with the kind of information and layout they expect from the websites in your niche.

☐ Stick to the usability best practices:

• Make things that look the same function the same (for example, all phrases that are blue and underlined should function as links and never plain text)
• Make things that are the same look the same (i.e use the same styling for the section headings of the same level, same font size for the body text, same color for the call-to-action buttons, etc. everywhere on your website)
• Use enough white space to avoid clutter
• Use visual hierarchy to help your visitors scan and understand your pages faster
• Make sure your prospects know what to expect from every link, button or interactive element
• Make sure your navigation is clear and easy to use (see checkpoint #8)

Website credibility checkpoint #10:
Design your site so it looks professional or appropriate for your purpose

This one is probably the hardest.

What does it even mean, a website “professional or appropriate for your purpose”? Are there any objective criteria?

Your goal here is for your target audience to find that your website design matches its message and looks visually appealing.

You target audience, mind you. Not your colleagues, your best friend or your grandma who may neither understand nor want copywriting services, financial planning software or wooden key chains.

And making your target audience find your design appropriate is a matter of two things:

• prototypicality (expectations your target audience have on websites in your niche, which we covered under the credibility checkpoint #9)
• and visual appeal of your web design, which we’ll cover now 👇

How to make your design look visually appealing

“Visually appealing” design doesn’t necessarily mean “breathtaking” or “stunning”. Actually, you’ve done a great job if your prospects don’t notice your design at all.

“Good design is actually a lot harder to notice than poor design, in part because good designs fit our needs so well that the design is invisible, serving us without drawing attention to itself. Bad design, on the other hand, screams out its inadequacies, making itself very noticeable.”

~ Donald A. Norman, The Design of Everyday Things

In a nutshell, your visitors will find your design visually appealing if it:

• is balanced
• is free of clutter
• uses the elements in a consistent way
• doesn’t get in their way while they’re trying to read or accomplish a task

Specifically, to make your design visually appealing:

• Keep your design balanced
• Use grids – imaginary horizontal and vertical rulers – to compartmentalize your design
• Use not more than three base colors (but feel free to use several of their tints)
• Keep the graphics in the same style
• Improve your typography:
  • Every font has a personality. Make sure to choose fonts that fit your business message.
  • Make sure your fonts are readable (beware of script fonts!)
  • Don’t make your text lines too long
  • Avoid these formatting mistakes
• Use enough white space
• Make sure your design has:
  • unity and connects all individual elements into one big picture and unified message
  • consistency and uses the same colors, fonts and icons for the same kinds of elements

For more info see 7 key principles of designing visually appealing websites

And here’s a quick visual guide to help you spot web design mistakes fast:

Website credibility checkpoint #11:
Make your website secure & tell your visitors about it

☐ Use HTTPS

Starting 2018, if your website is non-HTTPS, your website visitors who use Chrome browser will see a big flashy warning:

In October 2019, Mozilla Firefox browser followed in Chrome’s footsteps. Meaning, if your website still doesn’t use HTTPS, roughly 67% of your website visitors see a warning about your website being not secure.

How to switch your website to HTTPS

Contact your website host and ask them about it. They’ll either to do it for you or will send you the instructions so that you can do it yourself. Unless you have a gigantic enterprise site, it’s a matter of 10 minutes.

☐ Display trust badges

Especially if you ask for sensitive data on your website, you need to put in extra effort to reassure your visitors their data is being handled in a secure way.

4 types of trust badges to display on your website

• Safe checkout badge (McAffee secure, Norton secured, etc.)
• Accepted payment badges (MasterCard, Visa, PayPal, etc.)
• Third party endorsements (BBB Accredited Business, Google Trusted Store, etc.)
• Money-back guarantee badge (if applies)

Example:

Not sure what badges are the most trustworthy? This study will tell.

And that’s how you make your website credible

Obviously, it’s not something you can do in an afternoon. Download this handy spreadsheet that lists all the credibility checkpoints as tasks in one place, lets you filter things and helps you track progress.