A business today is nothing without a website. No matter what you’re doing, a website will point people to you, either in an online sense or at an actual physical location. These days, when people Google a business and don’t find a website, they’re likely to assume it has either closed or just doesn’t exist.
Also, building your website is one of the first things you’ll do that makes your business “real”. This is important in terms of your own morale and in terms of the seriousness with which others treat you.
How do you go about creating the ideal business website? First, you’ll need good web hosting. Go to host advice for the best hosting sites comparison. Then take the following 3 steps.
1. Design a logo
A logo is an important first step for a number of reasons. For a start, designing a logo forces you to hone in on what your business is all about. It should reflect what you’re trying to achieve, and anyone who looks at it should get an idea of what sort of company you are.
Furthermore, it gives you a design basis. Rather than building a website and then trying to fit your logo in, design your logo and base your site design off that. Use the color theme, as well as the style to design a website that is, essentially, in line with your core themes.
Sites like Wix even allow you to automatically do this, generating a website theme based on the logo you create with their online tool.
2. Write concise web copy
Do you know what can ruin any website theme no matter how attractive? A huge wall of text. Unfortunately, many people vaguely familiar with SEO think that getting as many keywords on the landing page is necessary for a successful website. SEO no longer works in this simplistic way, and all you’re achieving is that you’ll drive many visitors away the moment they land on your site.
Decide what information is most important to share with visitors. This should simply be what you do and your USP. Give yourself some freedom to write, and then go through it carefully and chop it down. Alternatively, hire a copywriter to do this step.
3. Render it for mobile
Most people use the internet on their smartphones these days. Which is a problem if you design your website for desktop only. It’s tempting to do this, as it’s easier and you have a lot more leeway to include some mess. However, you absolutely need to focus on mobile in particular if you want to be successful.
Think about the last time you visited a website on your phone that didn’t quite fit. That was clearly designed only with desktop in mind. It was probably a pretty bad experience that led you to navigate away from the website unless you really needed something from it.
If your website isn’t optimized for mobile, you are going to lose potential clients. This is as crucial as any other aspect of your web design, if not more.
