It’s becoming easier every single day to put a website up! However, there is one problem – many small business owners are missing out on the fundamentals that create a strong online web presence!
According to HubSpot, 57% of businesses have acquired a customer through their company blog!
Unfortunately, that means that there are many companies that haven’t received a customer through blogging, or even online at all. This brings us to our first point!
Here’s the problem: Many business owners expect their life to be easier once they put up a website. Simply hire a great designer, put up a wonderful looking website, and you’re done! Unfortunately it is no longer this easy. Major search engines such as Google, Bing, & Yahoo are ranking websites that consistently update their content. This means that having a company blog is crucial, otherwise customers will not be able to find your business beautiful website through the search engines when they type in a keyword! Update the blog regularly or have someone do it for you! To increase your efforts, make sure you include quality content that adds value to the reader’s experience. They’ll see you as an authority and gain a great deal of trust for you!
What determines if you spend too much or too little on a website? The end result is the only thing that can possibly determine that. Every single business has different needs, standards, and competitors; however, when you fork money for a web design, you have to realize if you’re spending too much. Before you accept your web designer’s proposal, here are some questions you want to ask yourself:
By asking yourself these questions, you can ensure that your money will be wisely spent. Also, on the flipside, it is very possible that you can spend too little! If you put up a quick website using a basic template – many consumers can see right through it!
The trust for your business will reduce & they’ll be slightly more hesitant to hand over their money for your goods – no matter how excellent your services may be!
In order to find the balance between spending too much and too little, it is critical for you to ask yourself the above questions and to budget accordingly. You should be able to get a decent website and design for anywhere around $2k to $10K depending on your needs. Enterprise solutions are obviously going to be more!
Believe it or not, many websites fail to include even their basic contact information! Things like phone number, address, e-mail, and even the name of the CEO/Owner/President are great things to include in your website. How can a customer trust a business that doesn’t even include the basic “contact us” information? Include this basic information and you’ll already be ahead of many services.
Let’s say a customer goes to your website. What action do you want your customers to take? Do you want them to sign up to a newsletter so that you can e-mail them on a regular basis? Maybe you want to simply purchase a product. If there is no call to action button, many consumers will subconsciously leave your website without worrying about anything else.
Search engine optimization, or SEO, is one of the most important aspects of a website. Your website should have the ultimate goal of ranking for a specific keyword. If your website sells baby toys, then you will want to rank for relevant keywords. For example, if a potential customer uses Google and types in “Buy Baby Toys” into the search engine – you want your website to show up first in the search engine result pages! SEO is a science and usually requires the help of an expert, and although it’s not as mainstream as web design – it is just as important!
In order to avoid the common pitfalls of web design, it is critical that you update your website regularly, avoid spending too much (or too little), include a call to action button (register here!), and SEO optimize your website so that it can rank for a major keyword. By doing this, you can establish a strong online presence!
