Virtually every business has a website; it’s no longer the early 2000s. However, having a successful, professional-looking website is all the rage and a little more difficult to achieve than your bog-standard WordPress theme.
At Adopt the Web (my web hosting company) and our partnership with Liquid Web, we understand just how important your website is. It’s often the first thing a visitor sees; it needs to be user-friendly, leave a lasting impression, and, most importantly, stand out from the rest.
This article will provide five tips for creating a successful small business website, beginning with de-cluttering.
Keep it simple, de-clutter your site
Often, the most user-friendly and well-received sites are those that are simplistic in nature, not full of clutter.
Strip it back to the basics, avoid any rainbow-like backdrops, unnecessary graphics, and big blocks of text. Instead, only include the essentials – what a visitor really needs to see.
Your website should be user-friendly
If a visitor lands on your site and spends the next twenty seconds wondering how to find the ‘home’ page, you’ve got a problem. Your website should be user-friendly, so simple that even the most uneducated person can navigate it.
Tip: include a navigation bar to increase usability, this can either be at the top of the page (in the banner) or towards the side.
Text matters… a lot
We’re not saying include paragraphs upon paragraphs of text; however, your text should be meaningful, easy to read, and professional. If the text on your website contains grammatical errors, additional spaces between words, and generally, does not read well, then this gives off an unprofessional feel to your site.
It goes without saying, this is bad for business. If you’re not quite the wordsmith, consider hiring a freelance writer to help you with this process. Remember, first impressions matter, give off a bad impression and it’ll be the last impression you make.
Optimize for mobile
More than five billion people use mobile phones every day. Let us repeat that for those at the back: FIVE BILLION. If you’re not optimizing your website for mobile, then you’re missing out on a lot of traffic and potential conversions.
If you don’t know how to do this yourself, ask your webmaster or consider hiring a professional web developer.
Keep up with the trends, don’t fall behind.
Create a landing page
Landing pages are your opportunity to shine, gathering visitors’ email addresses, and contact information. This allows you to email them future products, updates, and discounts and deals.
Platforms such as Mailchimp are a great place to start for small businesses.
