Any business can benefit from developing and maintaining a website. Whether you’re a small company that’s just branching out of social media or a larger company that’s undergoing a rebrand, making sure your website is built to bring in business is a constant effort, but it is an effort that is well-rewarded.
Here are a few tips to make sure that your website will always generate business for you, no matter at what stage your business is at.
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Keep it simple.
While it’s tempting to opt for the most complicated design that your web designer can stretch to, keep in mind that the more complicated your website, the longer it will take for your consumers to find what they’re looking for – and with websites, every second counts towards making a good impression. Opt for easy-to-read text, clean visuals, and a simple design that lays out everything you want to showcase as plainly as possible, and make it easier on your consumers to answer their questions about your business.
Stick to your brand guidelines.
Your business does well for a reason: it’s recognisable by your consumers. People won’t buy a product unless there is a reason for them to buy that product and, over time, consumers will develop a relationship with the company that makes their favourite product. Whether it’s because they like the look or the build of this product, it’s likely that one of the things that they’ll look for on your website is your branding.
When you build your website, the templates you have available to you are only meant to be used as templates; they should be customised according to your brand’s guidelines and aesthetic. Take the time to really hone out a voice for your brand that is approachable and friendly, and reminds your consumers what exactly they like about buying from you. Additionally, make sure that the visuals you use are in keeping with your brand as well, and give your products and services top priority on the page.
There’s another reason why it’s important to customise your website and make it look like your own brand, and it’s this: websites are inherently suspicious if they have no proper branding, especially if they’re claiming to be a reputable business. Making sure your website is in line with what your brand guidelines suggest is important if you want to make sure you can retain the same consumers that helped you build your business.
Make it easy to buy.
It’s tempting to opt for a complicated purchasing method, especially given the risk of having your payment methods hacked or your customers’ data stolen, which can be a death knell for a small company. That said, consumers are above all driven by convenience, and so having a complicated purchasing process might not necessarily help you boost your business: in fact, it’s likely to have the opposite effect, with consumers choosing specifically not to buy from your business because they either cannot, or don’t want to, spend the extra time understanding how to purchase from your business. Plugins exist to help make your purchasing process easier, but to ensure full security, always keep your website’s digital certificate updated.
Add a chat support bot.
A chat support bot can ensure that you don’t spend your limited free time answering support questions or questions about your products; simply plug in answers and questions as you desire, and have the bot take over the basic enquiries that don’t require a human touch. This is not only a time-saving convenience for you, but also convenient for your consumers, who will likely not want to wait until a human agent can respond to their questions. Of course, you can always give your customers the option of sending you an email that you can have a look at in your own time and respond to in more detail.
Optimise your website for search engines.
You don’t have to write for search engines to do this! Your website just needs to be SEO-optimised enough to rank on search engines: this is what will help new customers find your brand, and what will help you generate repeated business. On the internet, a website that doesn’t rank on the first page of Google will struggle to get the same sort of reach and attention that other websites that rank first do, so making sure that your website is easy to find is important if you want to grow your business.
Creating a website for your business is an important key step for your business journey, and understanding where you need to focus on to make sure that the website is a success can be complicated if this is the first time you’re investing in a website. From copy to visuals to the code that runs the website, doing it on your own or with an out-of-box solution might not give you the results you’re imagining.
If you’re struggling with building your first website and you want advice, here’s some of our other resources to help you:
