Do you want to create a website that people will love? Create a tutorial.
People love tutorials. Many online publishers and website owners are now creating dynamic tutorials for their website to drive more targeted traffic. Tutorials serve as an introduction to any topic that you wish to draw attention to. They can focus on a specific product that may need additional instruction to operate or any other topic you choose.
As an Add-On Page to a Business Site
Some people who create a website, add a tutorial later on and provide a link to the tutorial on another page. Others decide to make the tutorial website as a standalone site, where the focus is simply to provide valuable information to viewers. If you have an online business, you would not want to make the website all about the tutorial because your ultimate purpose would be to sell something. In that case, create a website tutorial as a separate page that you link to from your main site.
As a Standalone Tutorial Site
If you only want to inform people about an important topic, you could just create a web tutorial as your primary page without other pages surrounding it. It depends on your purpose and what you want to do with the tutorial page.
The Magic of Explainer Videos
These tutorials, when done in video format, are sometimes known as “explainer videos.” Explainer videos show, rather than tell the viewer the information they need to know in order to operate the product or use it correctly. YouTube has experienced a huge rush of traffic over the past few years as a direct result of the rage over tutorials.
So how do you create a great tutorial for your website?
Decide on the purpose first
First, you should decide if you are going to create a text-only tutorial and just focus on the content you are wanting to put out, or create a video tutorial that appeals to people who love videos.
Text or Video
Words are worth a lot but a picture is worth a thousand of them. And moving pictures, even more. The truth is a lot of people prefer video. According to one study on consumer behaviors online, people are at least twice as likely to purchase a product if they watch a video prior to buying. Also, over 65% of online shoppers who buy a product stated that they watched a video prior to purchasing.
Give Them Something Free
We realize that not every website is designed to sell something. But most websites do have as a goal to promote or sell either a product, service, or idea. But even if that is not your goal, a tutorial serves a purpose: it gives consumers what they are wanting. If you give visitors something free, such as a tutorial, without asking for anything in return, it will often pay off greatly later.
How to Create a Tutorial that Will Draw Views
A tutorial can be done in a number of ways. There is no exact what to do it. But if you have never created a tutorial before, this list will serve as a guide to take you through the steps of putting together a winning tutorial for your website.
- Ask yourself the purpose of the tutorial. Is it strictly for information or do you want to ultimately sell something? You need to have the purpose in mind before you start if you are going to follow through with your goals of communicating what you want to.
- Focus on the information. Even if the purpose is to sell, the tutorial should emphasize information, not sales jargon. If you try too hard to sell within the information, people will start to distrust the tutorial. Remember the key in creating a winning tutorial is to focus on the information you are offering people without expecting anything in return. You are building credibility and respect. Later, you will see that these same people will return to do business with you if you give them something free at first.
- If you decide to create your tutorial strictly with text, make sure the content is highly engaging and interesting to read. Consider yourself like a magazine writer and provide entertaining but useful information that people will want to read. You can sprinkle keywords among the content naturally but don’t overdo SEO. Google wants relevant, high-quality content with no keyword stuffing. And using “Black Hat” techniques only drops your credibility with clients as well. If you want to be in business for the long haul, stay honest.
- Consider using video. As this has proven to get much better results with both people and search engines. It is estimated that YouTube now sees around 6 billion views per month on their site. Animated video, whiteboard video, and other types of video can create a hype around your brand that you cannot create with text alone.
- Once created, place your video in a prominent place on your main page, such as in the middle of your site so that it is in clear view and attention focus on your visitors. Remember too that video is shareable so make sure and include a Twitter and Facebook button. If you are using YouTube to house your video, the share buttons are already embedded within the player.
Summing Up
We hope these tips and bits of advice on tutorial creation will help you build your online tutorial. It’s important to know your audience and who your target market is before you start. Let’s face it: you won’t catch the right fish if you use the wrong bait. So consider doing surveys or some other form of data collection before launching your tutorial. But if you think you know what your visitors want, go for it. As long as you provide something of value, it’s sure to pay off in spades.
But if you still need more tips, consider watching a tutorial about creating a tutorial. I’m sure there are plenty of them out there!
