What makes a good business website?
As the popularity of the internet soars around the world, more and more businesses, from small mom-and-pop shops to big corporations, are beginning to recognize that a good business website is essential.
A good website helps you maximize the number of potential customers that become purchasers, improve the quality of your leads, target specific audiences, and increase awareness of your brand.
Related post: Why Your Website Says Not Secure?
Securing an attractive URL is the first step to setting up your business website. Just like naming your business took some reflection, you should spend some time finding the right URL. In many ways, your URL represents your business as surely as the business name does.
Designing Your Website
A good business website features an attractive design and an intuitive interface. You want your customers to understand what they are looking at when they visit your website. As part of their brainstorming process, professional web designers sit down to “wireframe” a website. “Wireframing” can be thought of as a map or an outline of what you want your website to look like. Just like you design your business space to enhance your customers’ experience, it is important to design your website to help your customers feel comfortable. After you spend some time wireframing, ask your friends and employees to look at your ideas and tell you if your ideas make sense.
Do you want help with your website? Contact us now.
Crucial Content
Remember that your website’s number one goal, just like your business’s, is to encourage potential customers to become purchasing customers. With this in mind, you need to ensure certain information is displayed on your website. Probably the most crucial information to include in a good business website is your contact information – especially if you run a brick-and-mortar business where customers come to buy your products at a physical location. Without important information like your address, email address, fax number, telephone number, and hours of operation, customers will not know where to find you and consequently will not be able to buy anything at your business. Even if your business is strictly online, you need your customers to know how to get ahold of you with questions and complaints. You must also give customers the means to buy your products.
Your target audience is always underlying your website’s content, appearance, and function. For example, if you are a restaurant, your target audience might often visit your website to find your hours of operation and browse your menu. You will want to make this information very readily available. If you sell products that must be shipped, you will want to address frequently asked questions about shipping and handling.
Security
Many people are still wary of online shopping because of security concerns like identity theft. If your website features a way for customers to make purchases online, you will need to secure your site with an SSL certificate. An SSL certificate encrypts communications involving credit card numbers, checking accounts, and Social Security Numbers that are exchanged during the purchasing process. Luckily, very strong security programs have been developed over the years to protect your clients from online crime. Check out GeoTrust, TrustE, Entrust, and VeriSign to encrypt your website.
Do you want help with your website? Contact us now.
photo credit: wireframe working
photo credit: Coding the Next Generation of Social Media