EthnoHub is a tool for collecting data of human experiences, collaborating in analysis, and sharing insights with clients.
1. User Experience and Design
According to one of our speed tests, Ethnohub.com took 1.4 seconds to fully load. Decreasing the page load time would allow for a bigger number of visitors to reach the site and a better user experience.Studies show that 40% of people abandon a website that takes more than 3 seconds to load and 47% of consumers expect a web page to load in 2 seconds or less.
According to one of our tools, the average time spent on site by visitors is 3 minutes and 23 seconds and the bounce rate is 88.20%. Increasing the time spent on site and lowering the bounce rate can positively impact multiple metrics such as search rankings.
Design – In general, the site looks dated and like it hasn’t been maintained in a long time. The most obvious weakness is that the content isn’t displayed in the order a user expects his or her questions to be answered, lacking a visual story.
There is a strong need for convincing copy and examples, emphasizing the benefits, selling the service. What will it do for the customer? Adding testimonials and insight about who is behind the service will add credibility and trust.
It’s also difficult to navigate the site, with unclear funnel and page flow. The intended user journey needs to be mapped out with clear goals that can be tracked with data analytics.
Some of the pages have little to no information, leading to dead-ends which may cause users to bounce and force them to hunt around for more information. This is especially true for the sign-up and contact pages.
The design is made for desktop only, which will cause most mobile users to bounce. Most people need to interact multiple times before investing in a brand, often first engaging on mobile and then making a higher commitment (purchase) on desktop later.
Lastly, the Help subdomain already contains good examples of features to build on. The gradient in the header is much more subtle, which doesn’t distract as much as the main site. The sidebar used here is a good navigation tool to use on the blog as well. The breadcrumbs aren’t needed here but would be a good addition on the blog though.
Mobile Friendliness – The site is not responsive. Viewing on a mobile device requires the user to pinch and zoom. Usually users will be frustrated by this behavior which means it’s less likely to engage with visitors who view the site on their phone or tablet.
Why is mobile important? A study by Google claims: “in the USA, 94% of people with smartphones search for local information on their phones… 77% of mobile searches occur at home or at work, places where desktop computers are likely to be present.”
First impression – Users make judgements within the 3-seconds of clicking a link, which comes down to how fast the site loads and their first impressions once it does load. Once the site has loaded, the first impression is that it looks dated with a color scheme that doesn’t match the brand. The Help subdomain uses a gradient that is much more subtle and suitable to use site-wide.
The site uses above-the-fold real estate for important content, which is great. However, putting all the content there overwhelms the user because most elements are competing with visual hierarchy – the user doesn’t know what to pay attention to first. Effectively making use of spacing and content breaks to guide users in the order they naturally want questions answered would craft a more clear visual story, which the site currently lacks.
Page flow and structure
Above the fold: Within the first 3 seconds a user should know what this business does and who it is for. The top area, for example, can have a hero image of a happy customer, your ideal avatar of the people you want to work with. They need to relate to this and say “hey, that’s for me.”
Features: The format the features are currently displayed in requiring too many steps to view—it should be scanned in a few seconds. Associating each feature with a relatable image or graphic icon that illustrates the feature can be effective. The objective here is to sell your customers with benefit-driven copy. Rather than focus on what your service does, emphasize why it’s valuable to your customer and what they will get out of it.
Examples: People want to see what this service providesbefore they commit even to a free trial. Use examples or case studies to show them what the final deliverable or result is from using the service.
Pricing: This section needs a dedicated section or row to emphasize what $99/mo gets them. The hover modal that appears over the “unlimited” elements are a nice touch by assuming people don’t know what they are immediately. The green checkmarks are a great visual indicator—keep using these. If you add another plan, incorporating red Xs to compare plans is an effective way to distinguish plans.
FAQ: The FAQs are thorough and do a good job of getting ahead of potential questions users may have. Having an image of the credit cards in the Amazon payments work well. It may be beneficial to consider removing the external links to the browsers since they do not contribute to the user’s understanding of the service. It may also be beneficial to add security seals under the section for “Is the research data safe and secure?”.
About: The users only goes this far down the page if you’ve sold them on everything so far. This is an opportunity to introduce the company, provide backstory, or anything that will make the company more relatable to them.
Call To Action
Offer: Signing up for a $99/mo software without any refund policies is a difficult sell to a visitor just getting associated with the brand. Getting them to sign up for a free trial lowers the barrier to entry, gets the foot in the door, and allows to close the deal once the EthnoHub hase their contact information for a paid plan.
Layout: EthnoHub may consider moving the primary call-to-action from the pricing section; it deserves it’s own section immediately following the pricing.
Copy: This section’s headline should reiterate the main question the customer has in their mind that you’re aiming to solve/answer. The subheading should push the action to click on the button.
Button: “Sign up Now” isn’t bad but there is room for improvement. “Start understanding your data”, for example, or something along those lines.
Visual Aid: Using an arrow or something similar to guide users where they should look can be beneficial. If they are scrolling through the page quickly, this will notify where they should stop, if anywhere.
Branding
Color Scheme: The gradient is distracting and a bit jarring. The gradient in the header of the “Help” subdomain is much more subtle and appropriate for a tech brand. Colors have associations, feelings, emotions tied to them. The site is already doing a good job of consistently applying the same colors. It would benefit most from another color pallette. The color of the call-to-action should stand out the most.
Logo: Tech specs – It looks a bit placed or dropped on the site, exported with a default white background from the image editor. At minimum, the background should be transparent. Different versions would need to be created for light and dark backgrounds. The logo is quite abstract. In our opinion, it doesn’t allude to what the company is about so the marketing/branding strategy would have to accommodate the customer base associating the image with the service through marketing efforts.
Tagline – The main tagline is underneath navigation, within the page’s main content. We recommend to have it in the header instead, with enough whitespace around it so that it’s the first thing a visitor sees when the page loads. The subheading is currently underneath the logo but it would do better underneath the main tagline if the main tagline was moved into the header. In general, the tagline needs to answer “who is this service for” and/or ask any qualifying questions that a visitor can automatically answer “yes” to in their heads.
Navigation – There are 2 navigation menus, which confuses users. Secondary navigation (top right) is very unclear what its purpose is. The “account” page is redundant since it links to a page that instructs to click on another link to sign in.
The Twitter handle is in an uncommon place for social media icons, which may result in users navigating away from your site. It’s best to put these in the footer or floating on the side of the page. External links like the Twitter handle should always open in a new tab, site-wide.
We recommend considering removing the “Status” link. “Help” may be another tab, along with your services, blog, etc.
“Contact” only appears while on the help subdomain; it may be a tab as well. It also goes to a page that says “Access denied” for public users without any other information. If there is a special contact info for account-holders, it should appear in the private side of the site. There should still be a public facing contact page.
Tabbed navigation is reminiscent of office folders so adding the above recommended sections would make it appear more “full” since there are rarely only 3 office tabs in a real office.
Broken Links – The main CTA, “Sign up Now,” goes to your sign-up page, which has an “Access denied” prompt with no other information or action. The contact page has no info, either. The link to the creator of the site, Tumbling K, in footer is not SSL encrypted so users get a warning when navigating there.
2. Blog & Content Marketing
EthnoHub does not have an active blog on their site. The layout lacks organization. Incorporating a sidebar for post/search navigation may help users navigate better. Creating and publishing blog posts would be a good way to increase organic traffic while at the same time increasing EthnoHub credibility. This traffic would be evergreen. According to our experience, the best results are achieved if at least one piece of new content gets published every week.
EthnoHub does not publish content on Medium.com. Publishing more often on Medium.com would be a good way to reach a bigger audience, drive traffic and increase brand awareness.
3. Email Marketing Teardown
EthnoHub collects visitor’s email addresses on their website. This means they’re building a targeted email list. Email marketing has been proven to deliver the highest return on marketing and engagement investment out of all digital marketing channels.
4. Social Media Teardown
Twitter: @ethnohub
EthnoHub currently has 43 Twitter followers.
In the last 6 months, they tweeted 0 times per day. By being more active on Twitter they can acquire more followers and grow their audience.
Retweets makeup 0% of all of their tweets – Putting out more original content can create more engagement.
EthnoHub replied to 0% of their tweets – a higher number would indicate a better user interaction.
EthnoHub uses 0 hashtags in their tweets on average – the higher this number, the more likely their tweets are to be found in search.
1% of EthnoHub tweets get retweeted and 0% of their tweets get favourited – the higher these numbers, the more more will EthnoHub be considered a valuable source of information by others.
EthnoHub does not have Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Linkedin, YouTube and Pintrest, accounts. Creating additional social media presence can increase web traffic and enhance brand awareness.
* For a full report with graphs, stats, key data, and suggestions please contact us directly.
5. Video Marketing
EthnoHub does not have an explainer video or any form of digitally produced video on their website. Adding videos is a good way to increase conversions, credibility and improve user experience. Videos have also been proven to increase search engine rankings and can also be used effectively for paid advertising.
EthnoHub does have a YouTube channel. Publishing videos consistently is a great way to drive additional organic and free traffic to EthnoHub website.
6. Search Engine Performance
According to one of our tools, Ethnohub.com has 31 backlinks from 15 referring domains. It’s organically ranking for 42 primary keywords.
EthnoHub currently receives about 787 organic clicks each month. Building more backlinks would likely increase this number.
EthnoHub’s domain authority is 18/100 and page authority 29/100. Domain authority predicts this root domain’s ranking potential, page authority predicts this page’s ranking potential. The higher these numbers, the higher 60db-s chances to rank organically. These numbers can be increased by building additional backlinks and enhancing search engine optimization.
The top 5 keywords that bring most of EthnoHub’s traffic are: aeiou design, aeiou, aeiou framework, the aeiou, aeiou theory. Some of these keywords can be ranked higher to gain even more traffic. Additionally, EthnoHub would maximize it’s organic traffic by targeting keywords with a higher search volume.
The majority of the keywords EthnoHub is ranked for do not rank on the first page of search engine results. Research has shown that more than 90% of traffic comes from first-page search results and that over 80% of clicks come from first four organic listings. A good strategy for increasing traffic would be to work on increase the rankings of those specific keywords.
Most of EthnoHub traffic is coming from Mexico, United States, Netherlands, Poland, and Switzerland. Expanding to additional countries, whether with SEO or paid marketing, would be a good way to build additional traffic and audience.
* For a full report with graphs, stats, key data, and other suggestions please contact us directly.
7. Affiliate Program
EthnoHub does not seem to have an affiliate program. Having an attractive affiliate program would be a good way to rapidly increase sales while at the same time keeping costs under control. EthnoHub would only pay affiliates if the referral takes the desired action.
8. Paid Advertising
EthnoHub is not using Google Adwords paid marketing service. There are numerous keywords EthnoHub should consider bidding on. Increasing the number of paid keywords would be a good way to increase paid traffic.
According to our data, EthnoHub is not using Adwords alternatives. EthnoHub should consider diversifying and expanding to other Paid Advertising Channels. For example, we’ve witnessed great results with Facebook Ads, Bing, Taboola and Outbrain ads.
9. Security Teardown
EthnoHub does not have known malware and it’s not blacklisted.
The site does not have a firewall. This poses a medium security risk as it makes EthnoHub website considerably easier to hack.
EthnoHub is using an SSL certificate issued by Let’s Encrypt Authority X3. This means data and sensitive information are more protected.
10. Media & Press Releases
According to our data, EthnoHub has not received noteworthy media coverage. Getting more coverage from the media can boost EthnoHub brand awareness, website visitors and increase search traffic.