There are thousands of dreadful small business websites on the Internet. If your website is not user-friendly, how do you expect your customers to actually do business with you? Whether you’re looking to build a simple website or a more complex and customized website for your company, we can conclude that all businesses, large or small, need a website.
But there are elements you must take into account because your company’s online presence begins with your website, and sustains with your social media marketing. There are some things you should ask yourself before you start designing and building your small business website. If you can’t answer one of these questions, consider doing some research about the topic or find out from an expert.
Things to Ask Before Building a Small Business Website
What is my budget? Creating a website costs more than you really think it does. Not only is there a cost to build it, there are recurring costs such as web hosting, domain registration, software licensing, maintenance services, etc. A custom website can cost you well over $3,000.
What do I need my site to do? Of course, the answer to this is to make your company visible to customers. The design in your website plays a huge role on the engagement time of your pages. Keep your website user-friendly, don’t cluster it with information or insert distracting bells and whistles that can slow down the page-load time. Just a one second delay in your page-load can cause loss in conversion.
What will I put on my website? You’ll want to have sufficient information on your website as well as call to actions. Be sure to not pollute your pages with too much information, but also don’t provide too little information. You must have, at least, the following pages on your site:
- Home page
- About us
- Products/Services
- Blog
- Contact us
- Third-party validations: testimonials, reviews, etc.
- Site map
How will people find me? Search engines consistently archives websites so that people can find them easily. This is why it is important to keep your website optimized properly with SEO. Keep your on-page information optimized in the content and title headings.
Are there security risks? One of the best things to do to protect your website from hackers is to make sure the platforms and scripts you’ve installed are up-to-date, install security plugins, and lock down your file permissions. If your website has some sort of online payment for products and/or services, you’ll need to reassure your customers that your site offers protection. If your website is involved in e-commerce, you’ll need a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate in order to protect your customers’ personal and financial data. Otherwise, no one will make a purchase from your site if they don’t feel their information is secure.
In addition to these 5 considerations, keep these 3 main goals in mind while you’re creating a website for your company: accessibility, quality visuals, and mobile ability. Quality visuals attract your customers in, accessibility draws your customers to learn more, and mobile ability provides expansive access for mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones.
