It is 2017 and if your business doesn’t have one already, it needs a website! It is becoming more and more crucial for customers to find your company information online and on the go. In fact, research shows 81% of shoppers conduct online research before making big purchases. If you’re ready to create a site or just upgrade the one you have, here are 9 must-haves for a professional business website from Mashable.
9 Things a Professional Website Needs
A Logical Roadmap
A website should be aesthetically pleasing, but it’s more important for it to be useful. Before you even pick a server or type an HTML tag, you should map out how you’d like the website to work. This is important both for user experience and for SEO, since Google considers the content and structure of a site when it ranks for search.
Crucial Business Information
Think about what your business is all about and what people need to know. It may be tempting to share the entire history of how your company started and every milestone along the way, but you may neglect the important aspects, like what you do and what you offer. First, write down all the essentials and if there is room, add secondary information that may still be interesting to your customers.
Contact Information
TMake your contact information front and center; this should be the easiest thing to find on your site. Have a phone number, email address, mailing address and contact form easily accessible and visible. It makes a difference because there’s nothing more frustrating than being unable to get in touch with a needed business or service.
Clear Navigation
A map is useless without a legend and a website is useless without clear navigation. Make sure you use easy-to-understand and logical names for the various pages of your site — contact, about, FAQ, etc. Being clever or cryptic will just be confusing and a turnoff for users.
Security
If you’re selling anything online, you need to put some effort into securing your site with an SSL certificate. The SSL will encrypt communications between you and your clients (e.g. a credit card number, Social Security number), which will allay their fears of providing such information, since there’s so much identity theft on the web.
Social Media Integration
There are a lot of social platforms out there; promote your presence on them on your website because social media is critical part of marketing your business. Make the social media icons prominent and correctly linked to the pages so customers can click on them to connect and follow you on your pages.
A Mobile Ready Version
Smartphones and tablets are driving an increasing amount of web traffic, and the numbers are only going to grow as mobile devices become cheaper and more mainstream. Responsive website design enables you to use fluid widths, so your website layout will adapt to the screen on which it’s being browsed. You can enter HTML code so your sidebar takes up, say 20% of the screen width, and the remaining 80% is reserved for the body of your website. Layouts are adjustable and images are scalable to make for a better web experience on myriad devices.
FAQ
People have a lot of questions. As you hear concerns from customers and receive feedback, gather up the most frequently asked questions into a list and offer clear, concise answers. Questions often revolve around materials and ingredients used (for allergy reasons), shipping information, company history, sizing (for apparel brands) and cancellation or return policies. Have a section that is available to answer the most common questions you hear.
Good Hosting
Not having a good host can cost you in many ways. A slow website is frustrating, one that fails to load is obnoxious and both could turn off customers. But beyond annoying your users and increasing your bounce rate, poor hosting can also affect your rank in search engines, since many search engine algorithms detect webpage loading speed.
2017 is the time to create or upgrade your website to benefit your company and customers. Review our list of services to see how KooSwift can help you with each and every must-have your website needs; click here for more information.
About KooSwift
KooSwift is an all-in-one service operator for the web. KooSwift not only provides great domain names, they can create top-level websites that are customizable for your brand. Whether you are a small business or a student looking to create an online portfolio, KooSwift has something for you. Visit our website today to learn more.