46: Five Not Linked Pages Every Squarespace Site Needs
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[00:00:00] Music
[00:00:04] Have you ever felt like there just aren't enough pages on your Squarespace website? Probably not, but not every page belongs in your main navigation. There's some pages that I recommend my clients have in the not linked section of their website. And in this episode of Think Inside the Square, you'll learn what those pages are and why they're important.
[00:00:24] Welcome to Think Inside the Square, a podcast full of tips and tricks to help you create a Squarespace website that you're proud of. I'm your host, Becca Harpain, Squarespace expert and creator of InsideTheSquare.co. In this episode, you'll learn about five important pages that I recommend every Squarespace user create in the not linked section of their website.
[00:00:42] This way, the pages do exist, but they aren't a part of your main navigation. For a transcript of this episode, along with the links to any resources mentioned, visit insidethesquare.co/podcast
[00:00:53] the term Squarespace is a trademark of Squarespace, Inc..
[00:00:56] This content is not affiliated with Squarespace, Inc.
[00:00:59] Just before I hit record on this podcast, I did a quick check, and I have a little over 30 unlinked pages on my website. Some of them are landing pages for Lead Magnet, some are sales pages, and some of them are training videos or articles that just didn't quite fit into a blog post. But five of those pages are the subject of this very episode.
[00:01:20] The top five not linked pages that I think every Squarespace er should have, including you. Now to be clear, before we get into any of this, this is not legal advice in any way. Just a suggestion from one Squarespace er to another. Okay? Okay. Let's dive in. I'm going to kick this episode off by talking about two pages that might not sound the most exciting.
[00:01:41] Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy. These pages serve as legal documents and they play a vital role in protecting both you and your website visitors. Your Terms and Conditions is kind of like a user manual. It lays out the ground rules for how visitors interact with your site. It includes things like what kind of content is allowed, how they share information, limitations of liability, lots of legal jargon here.
[00:02:06] Having a clear Terms and Conditions page can protect you from legal headaches if a dispute arises down the road. Now there's also your Privacy Policy. This is a separate document that's all about transparency. It explains to visitors how you collect, use, and store any data that's transferred on your website.
[00:02:26] This could be anything from email addresses collected through forms to cookies and different website traffic data. A clear and concise privacy policy is important because it shows your visitors you respect their privacy. It builds trust in your brand, but also it's often required by law. So again, not legal advice, but I strongly recommend that every Squarespace user, even if you're not selling things on your website, you should have a terms and conditions page and a privacy policy page.
[00:02:56] I will have a link in the show notes for the resource that I use to grab this [00:03:00] information for my own website. One more time for those in the back. Not legal advice, but strongly recommend it. All right, let's go ahead and keep going here. The next page on our important not linked pages list is a custom 404 error page.
[00:03:15] In Squarespace, you can create a custom page that is shown to people who reach a page by mistake. Maybe they go to an incorrect URL or they misspell something. They'll be served a 404 error page. Now, Squarespace does have a default error page, but I recommend that every Squarespace user create a custom one.
[00:03:34] When you create a custom one, you have the opportunity to keep your visitors engaged. You can include a search bar to help them find what they're looking for, showcase your most popular recent content, and direct them on what to do next. This shows your visitors that you care about them. care about their experience, even when they stumble upon a broken link.
[00:03:51] And I genuinely think that everyone should create a custom 404 error page in the not linked section of their site. Now in the show notes for this episode at inside the square.co/podcast,
[00:04:02] I'm going to include a link to a tutorial that will teach you how to assign this custom page as your 404 error page in Squarespace.
[00:04:09] It's super easy to do, but just in case you want a visual, I'll pop that into the show notes. Alright, moving on to the next important, not linked page. This one is a concept that's used by a lot of e commerce companies. And I think it's ideal for any website, not just folks who sell things. Do you ever feel like you're answering the same questions over and over and over again in emails or forum posts?
[00:04:32] It is so much easier to have a bank of responses ready to rock or better yet. An easy to remember link that you can send people to that will answer all of their questions. I recommend creating an FAQ page in the Not Linked section of your site to help. An FAQ page, or Frequently Asked Questions page, is exactly what it sounds like.
[00:04:53] This is a dedicated space to answer those common questions that your website visitors will have. Questions about your business, your products, or your services. By compiling these questions and providing clear, concise answers, You can empower visitors to find the information they need quickly and easily.
[00:05:11] This will reduce their frustration and keep them engaged on your website. But the benefits of a stellar FAQ page extend way beyond their user experience. Search engines love well structured, content rich pages, and FAQ pages perfectly fit the bill. By incorporating relevant keywords into your questions and answers, you can help improve your website's rank in search results by demonstrating your expertise.
[00:05:37] This means more potential customers finding their way to your website organically, all thanks to the power of that FAQ page. Plus, it's a handy reference point for yourself! It'll save you time by centralizing your answers to common questions. This means you can refer visitors directly to the FAQ page with internal links, and you can easily copy and paste these responses yourself into emails or into online forum posts.[00:06:00]
[00:06:00] It can save you a ton of time if you have this response bank ready to go. So the next time you find yourself answering a question that you know you've answered before, Consider adding it to an FAQ page in the not linked section of your site. The next page on our list has to do with your social media strategy.
[00:06:17] Many creators rely on LinkedIn bio tools to connect their social media followers to their website. And yes, Squarespace has its own feature for this called bio sites. Personally, I don't use it, and let me tell you why. These tools might be convenient, but they have some limitations when it comes to design and data.
[00:06:37] If you visit insidethesquare. co forward slash social, you'll see my very own. I created a blank page, and I used the page settings to toggle off the main navigation. I don't need a header or a footer taking up a ton of space. Instead, use a Fluid Engine page section to display whatever you want, in whatever order you want, in a way that looks like the rest of your website that's designed for mobile.
[00:07:01] We've got buttons, videos, images, you can even add a contact form. Any contact block you want can be added to that page section so it matches the design of the rest of your site. But it's optimized for anyone that visits this page directly from your social media profile. Now, aside from design, the biggest advantage of a social links page?
[00:07:22] Data, my friend. When you link to your Squarespace website directly from your social media profiles, you can leverage the power of your website analytics. This means you can track exactly how many visitors are coming to your website through specific social media platforms. And you can see where they go and what they do when they get there, tracking the whole journey.
[00:07:43] Now to be clear, you might be limited by the program you're using to track the data. I've installed Google's G4 Analytics on my website, and it has a lot of power, and it can help me track the full page path from traffic source all the way to a conversion. Squarespace Analytics, it's a little limited in the data that they're actually tracking, but you'll still be able to see what platform people came from.
[00:08:05] This is valuable information. It's going to help you understand what content resonates the most with the audience on a specific platform. It could be really cool to correlate some data between, A TikTok marketing campaign and an increase in blog views, or maybe a carousel post on Instagram that drives up traffic for a new offering that you have on your website.
[00:08:25] Maybe even increases conversions. You can track this data directly from the traffic source to that page on your website when you set up a social media page in the not linked section. There is one more important page that I think everyone needs to create in the not linked section of their website. And this page has absolutely nothing to do with your website visitors.
[00:08:46] This is a page that exists on my website, and this is a page I've created on every single client site I have ever built on Squarespace and on other platforms. It's actually a leftover technique from my WordPress days, and I like to call it [00:09:00] an elements page. On this page, I have a main page section, and in this page section, I have a text block.
[00:09:07] In that text block, I have every single type of font. H1, H2, H3, H2, H3, H4, Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3, Monospace, inside those text blocks for each one of those text types, I have a full sentence. One of the words is bold, one of the words is italicized, and one is an active link. I have buttons, small, medium, and large, or primary, secondary, and tertiary, still not quite used to saying that.
[00:09:32] Then I also have a contact form. A newsletter form, an image, I have any type of content block I might be using regularly for that client. For a musician website I recently built, I made sure to put an audio block into this page section. And after I've added all of these content blocks into this page section, I then duplicate it and I change the color theme.
[00:09:54] And then I duplicate it again for the next color theme. I try to focus on three main color themes and I've created an elements page. The whole purpose of this page is for me to see how the design works together. How the font styles, font families, color space, and all of that stuff works when all of these content blocks are on the exact same page.
[00:10:17] This visual overview really helps me make sure that the design is cohesive, that things look great together. When I add custom code to this site and I want to do something like maybe create a custom, Submit button for a contact block or change the heading for text to be all capital letters with a little bit of space between the characters themselves.
[00:10:35] Adding this custom CSS while looking at this elements page can help me make sure that all of these elements still look great in the design when they're placed next to other elements. It helps me make sure that everything is cohesive about the custom code that I'm adding. Now, I had a training on this that I released a couple of years ago.
[00:10:55] It's been a long time. At the time of recording this episode, I don't have an updated training on how to create an Elements page in Squarespace, but I probably should. Send me a DM with the word Elements on Instagram. I'm at thinkinsidethesquare. And if I get more than a few folks looking for this training, I'll host a free class, okay?
[00:11:12] DM the word Elements to at thinkinsidethesquare. Alright, I think that was it for my list of unlinked pages. Ready for a recap? Let's do this. Alright. First up are the legal pages, terms and conditions, and privacy policy, protecting you and your visitors. Again, this is not legal advice, but something I recommend all my clients look into.
[00:11:32] This is going to be different for whatever region of the world you happen to be in, and I'll link to a few resources in the show notes for this episode. The second page we talked about is your 404 error page. This is a chance for you to take a frustrating situation and make it easier for your visitors to interact with your content and find what they're looking for.
[00:11:51] Again, inside the show notes, I'll list some resources there that you can use to create a really cool custom 404 error page. I also recommend creating an [00:12:00] FAQ page. This page will be an excellent resource for anyone that has questions, but also a great resource for you. So you can quickly send off a link to this page to help people if you've already written a detailed answer that you know they could use.
[00:12:12] You can also copy and paste the content out of this page when you're interacting with people in forums. I think it's just a really helpful thing to create. So I recommend making an FAQ page with your most common questions and detailed answers to go along with them. The next page I want you to create in the not linked section of your site is Is a page for you to direct your social media traffic to you'll have a lot more flexibility over the design of this page and the content of this page, but most importantly, you'll be able to track some analytics.
[00:12:42] These detailed analytics will tell you what platform people came from and what they did once they reached your website so you can create this in the not link section of your site and link to it from. Your Instagram bio, TikTok bio, threads, whatever the heck people are using these days. I recommend creating your own social links page instead of using any link in bio tools that are out there.
[00:13:03] And last, but certainly not least, we talked about creating an elements page. This page is a crucial step in my design process, and I strongly recommend Squarespace website do this. And honestly, if you already have a Squarespace website that exists, but you plan on doing more with the design, I recommend creating that elements page in the not linked section of your site.
[00:13:24] Create one page section that is most of the content blocks you're going to find yourself using over and over again, and duplicate that page section, update the color theme. This way when you add your own custom code and make some design changes, you'll be able to see how the elements look together and whether or not it's got a cohesive design.
[00:13:41] Although none of these pages belong in your main navigation, they all belong in the not linked section of your Squarespace website, they're still incredibly important. They can play a vital role in making sure that your website isn't just beautiful, but also functional, user friendly, and legally sound.
[00:13:58] That wraps it up for this episode of Think Inside the Square, but I know I mentioned quite a few resources for you. Please head over to insidethesquare.co/podcast to find all of the links that I mentioned and a full transcript.
[00:14:10] If you enjoyed this episode of Think Inside the Square, be sure to subscribe to this podcast wherever you happen to be listening to this episode.
[00:14:16] Thank you so much for tuning in. I hope you learned something awesome and most importantly, have fun with your Squarespace website. Bye for now.
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404 error page tips: insidethesquare.co/resources/404-page
My affiliate link for legal pages from Boutique Lawyer: https://the-boutique-lawyer.myshopify.com/insidethesquare
My social links page: https://insidethesquare.co/social
EPISODE SUMMARY
While it's tempting to cram everything onto your main navigation, there's a better way. In this episode of ThinkInsideTheSquare, you’ll learn about the important pages you need to have in the not linked section of your website.
Legal Protectors: Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy
These might not be the most exciting pages, but they're crucial for protecting both you and your visitors. Think of your Terms & Conditions as a website user manual, outlining ground rules for visitor interaction. It covers things like acceptable content, information sharing, and limitations of liability. A clear Terms & Conditions page can shield you from legal headaches down the road.
The Privacy Policy is all about transparency. It explains how you collect, use, and store visitor data, whether it's email addresses from forms or website traffic cookies. A clear and concise Privacy Policy shows you respect visitor privacy and builds trust in your brand. Remember, in many cases, a strong Privacy Policy is legally required.
I use the Boutique Lawyer for my legal pages. This is an affiliate link to the Boutique Lawyer store; I may receive a commission if you make a purchase after clicking this link: the-boutique-lawyer.myshopify.com/insidethesquare
Error Page Hero: The Custom 404 Page
Imagine a visitor clicks a broken link and lands on a generic error page. Frustration sets in, and they might leave your site altogether. But wait! A custom 404 Error Page can turn this situation around.
By creating a custom page, you can keep visitors engaged. Include a search bar to help them find what they're looking for, showcase your most popular content, or even add a call to action. This shows you care about their experience, even when things go wrong.
Here is an article with more info about creating a custom 404 error page in Squarespace: insidethesquare.co/resources/404-page
User Experience Champion: The FAQ Page
Ever feel like you're answering the same questions repeatedly in emails or forums? The FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page is your time-saving superhero! It's a dedicated space to answer common questions visitors have about your business, products, or services.
By compiling clear and concise answers, you empower visitors to find the information they need quickly and easily. This reduces frustration and keeps them engaged on your website. Here's the bonus: FAQ pages are loved by search engines too! By incorporating relevant keywords into your questions and answers, you can improve your website's ranking in search results.
Social Media Powerhouse: The Social Links Page
Many creators rely on link-in-bio tools to connect their social media followers to their website. While convenient, these tools often have limitations in design and data tracking.
Squarespace offers a superior solution: the Social Links Page. Here, you have complete control over the design and content. But the biggest advantage? Data! When you link directly to your Squarespace website from your social media profiles, you can leverage Squarespace Analytics. This allows you to track exactly how many visitors come from each platform and see their journey on your site. This valuable information helps you understand what content resonates most with your audience on each platform.
Here is a link to my social links page. Thanks to analytics, I’ll be able to tell this traffic came from my blog and not Instagram 😉
Design Cohesive Hero: The Elements Page
This hidden gem is a secret weapon for Squarespace designers. The Elements Page is a visual library where you can store and showcase all the content blocks you use regularly. Think of it like a designer's swatch book!
Here's the magic: you can create different block layouts in various color themes, allowing you to see how they work together at a glance. This ensures your entire website maintains a cohesive design aesthetic, no matter how many pages you create.
If you want me to create a free training about elements pages, let me know! Send me an email (support@insidethesquare.co) or DM me on Instagram.
While these pages might not be seen by visitors, their impact is undeniable. They're the unsung heroes that elevate your website, streamline your workflow, and ultimately deliver a polished and visually stunning Squarespace experience.
