As a business, you want to make sure your office or storefront looks professional. You may apply a new coat of paint, add lighting and signage where it’s needed. You do this because you know your appearance has an effect on people’s opinion of your business. Well, the same concept applies to your online business.
Below, we share 9 elements that every website needs to put its best foot forward.
A Clear Description
When someone visits your website, they shouldn’t have to dig through pages to learn who you are and what your business does. State your business name clearly and sum up your products or services on the homepage. Don’t put everything on your homepage, just enough to give visitors adequate information about your business so they can decide if they’re on the right site.
Easy Website Address
When choosing a web address, note two things: Make it memorable and keep it short. If your web address is complex and long, your visitors might forget what to type in or misspell it. Keep it simple and try to avoid dashes, if possible.
Simple Navigation
So you don’t know how to code or anything about web design. Great! Keep your website simple and easy to navigate. Worry less about how pretty your website looks; instead make it easy to navigate and chock-full of great information about your business.
Clear Contact Information
It sounds silly, but you’d be surprised how many websites don’t have a clear description of the business or any way to be contacted. Contact information should be one of the top priorities when building a website. A clear and obvious section that contains your phone number, address, business hours, and email info can make a huge difference.
If you can, add a contact form on your website to make it even easier for visitors to contact you.
Customer Testimonials
Establish trust and legitimacy with new visitors by adding testimonials to your website. People love to hear from other people about their stories and experiences with a company. If you don’t have any testimonials, start asking your current or past customers to leave one on Google or Yelp. In exchange, you can offer to link to their businesses website from the testimonial they give you.
Call to Action
Each page on your website should serve a purpose and that purpose should have a ‘call to action’. What is the purpose of your homepage? It might be to inform visitors about your business and give them a way to learn more about your products/service. So in this case, you should have a call to action that leads visitors to your product/service information.
If the purpose of your product page is to lead customers to your contact page, have a call to action that links them to the contact page.
Fresh Content
Updating your website with new quality content frequently will not only help your SEO, it will also give visitors the most up-to-date information. Websites that have old and outdated information reflect poorly on the business.
Links to Social
Your business should be on social media as another means to reach potential customers online. A great way to grow your social channels is to include icons on your website that link to your social pages.
Secure Hosting
Often overlooked, a secure hosting platform can make a huge difference when it comes to your website. Small businesses that collect user information need to protect themselves and their customers. It’s important to find a trustworthy hosting company that will keep your websites protected from hacker attacks.
Dreamersi is a product of PSPinc and offers secure hosting packages and SSL certificates that ensure your site is protected at all times.