Even if you are a small business, having a website in your promotions will impact your business positively. However, before that, you need to ensure that you have the essential features of your website for it to be effective and efficient in helping your business grow. You need to incorporate some specific rules to have a well-executed website. Some of these rules are a visible search button, not text-heavy pages, and easy navigation.
Most of the successful business websites are incorporating the top features needed in a business website. Here are some of the best practices and features you need to include in your site even if you are still starting:
1. Detailed Home Page
The home is the first thing that your visitors will see when they enter your page. It should be fascinating and should pique the attention of your potential customers. It should display your brand’s image and personality. You can show it with the content on what your business is, who is your target audience, how did it start, and why your customer should buy or purchase from you.
Most of the successful marketing blogs have a stunning homepage. You should be creative in this page. You may include different visual contents such as your logo, photos of your products. You can also put your business’ description and a navigation bar to access your page easily.
Around 68% of people from USA access through their smartphones. You need to optimize your site to be mobile-friendly, which we will go into later. Keeping your website optimized for mobile encourages your customers to stay on your site instead of leaving.
2. Specific Call to Action
Call to action can be in the form of visual content or text that persuades your visitors to do a specific action. It can help your people throughout their customer experience and guide them in their next steps in their journey in your site. Call to action or CTAs can be a request for more information on your products or services, buy a specific product, or contact details where they can talk to you. CTAs should be relevant on where the page is. For example, if you are on the ‘contact us’ page, you can put a ‘send message’ button to deliver a message efficiently for their inquiries and questions.
3. Engaging Video
Simple, engaging content can lead your page to different places. Most businesses nowadays are using videos to be featured in their homepages. Videos can be a medium to introduce your business, to share your aim as a business, and to let your audiences know different stories about your brand. You can also showcase your products here and will make them look for more by visiting the pages of your products. It is safe to say that videos and other engaging content are a necessity for small business websites.
4. Credibility-building Elements
There are lots of credibility-building elements or trust elements you can put on your website to make your brand trustworthy. It can be logos, trusted partners, or seals of accreditation. It can also be in the form of showing your positive customer reviews that your audience would like to see. These will easily rank you higher in building trust and credibility among your potential customers.
Security measures are also trusted elements that can ensure the safety and protection of your users and their information. Putting up privacy seals, compliance seals, and other seals are one way. Hiring the right hosting service provider can help you choose what your website needs. Another way is obtaining an SSL certificate to secure the details sent between the user and the company. Credit card numbers, transaction data, and other personal information will become encrypted and will become safe. Lastly, it can boost your rankings in search engine results pages.
5. New Content
Putting up new and fresh content on your site is necessary. Never make your contents stagnant so make sure to change it every once in a while. You can put a widget of your social media page on your homepage where it shows new content. New contents are a sign of being an active company and a creative seller that executes fresh ways to reach new customers.
6. Featured Products or Services
Making sections in your page of featuring your core services or products and services is a must. It should also incorporate a short description and high-quality product photos. Each of your core products or services will most likely have its pages in your site, but it will be more effective if you can allow a place in your homepage to reach more people with fewer clicks.
The benefits of creating a website are continuously increasing especially in the age of technology. It can give you a more significant reach via the internet while still being cost effective. However, to reap the full benefits, your website must be well-thought-of to ensure a positive reaction from your customers. Just incorporate these seven features in your site and watch your business grow.
7. Mobile-Friendly Version
As we said before, most online users today are using their mobile devices to access the World Wide Web. You should incorporate this trend in your site by making it mobile-friendly for your users. The design should be responsive depending on the device they are using. Also, the content and design should not be compromised and warped on whatever device they might be using. You can take advantage of the Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test if you are uncertain if your site is mobile-ready. From there, you can make the necessary tweaks in your website.