Are you among those who are just starting up or thinking that 2018 is the year to take your business online? Either case, there are plenty of things to consider before launching your brand new corporate website. Joe Balestrino, Founder of 4pointdigital, takes you through 10 essentials to mull over as you start to get the wheels in motion.
1. What level of service do you want for your website?
Internet service providers ISPs (i.e. broadband providers) are companies that’ll give you a connection to the internet for a fee. Every internet user in the world accesses the web via an ISP. ISPs such as Virgin Media, Talk, BT, and Sky will all offer different levels of management, security and broadband speeds, so it’s best to do some in-depth research before parting with your money.
2. How much hosting space are you going to need?
A useful analogy to help explain what web hosting providers (WHPs) do is to think of them as the landlord you rent your office space from, but online. Without using hosting services you won’t have a place to house the files that live on your website.
It’s important to remember that other hosting services, like email, require additional storage so double-check that the space offered by your ISP will be enough, or whether you’ll need to arrange more from a WHP.
3. What will you name your website?
Selecting and securing the right domain name for your website is crucial and choosing your business name is definitely the best way to go. Taking this approach gives your website legitimacy, makes customers feel it’s a site they can trust and helps people to find you easily.
Moving quickly is essential too as domain names get snapped up fast. For more useful advice when deciding on your domain name, go through this Godaddy post.
4. What’s your website going to be for?
Whether you’re wanting to build your brand, sell goods or services, or expand your business, establishing the main purpose of your website is the perfect way to help you to decide how best to design and brand it.
The Singaporean brand, Smile Tutor that deals in home tuition segment, knows exactly how to keep a play with website for audience retention, conversion, and to build trust. They do have animated services explainer video, testimonials, CTA buttons (to help the audience), and informational module, everything in place.
5. How will you decide on the look of your website?
Think about your target audience when deciding this and remember: simple layout and easy navigation work best online. Try to steer clear of over-complicating things in order to avoid confusing your users. It’s also worth bearing in mind that you can either pay a designer to create your website or use free tools available on platforms such as Wordpress and Blogger to do it yourself. Once you’ve got the finished article, simply transfer it to your domain and chosen host.
6. Will social media play a big part in your online presence?
Channels like Facebook and Twitter are great for driving traffic to your website, but remember you don’t need to be on every platform possible. It’s essential to choose ones that suit your audience, so researching your target market is a good way to inform your decision. Then you can think about launching official pages for your company and how you intend to use them. To pick up more great tips about winning at social media, read this article from The Website Group.
7. Is being mobile-friendly important?
Given the current online climate, the answer to this is likely to be ‘yes’, especially as it’s predicted that the number of mobile users will soon overtake those using desktops. With more and more people using tablets and smartphones to view and buy from websites, it’s worth making sure yours is responsive and ensuring it can be easily navigated on these sorts of smaller devices.
Back in April 2015, Google has officially released its mobile-friendly ranking algorithm that was brought to give a remarkable boost to mobile-friendly pages in Google’s mobile search result. You can test your web page’s mobile-friendliness here - https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/
8. Have you thought about legality?
Visiting websites like yours that provide the same service as you or sell similar products is a great way to help you decide on what your own policies should be. For example, how you’ll use and store the data submitted by your customers. It’s also incredibly important to display your policies clearly and in an area of your website that customers can easily access.
9. What level of security do you need?
You wouldn’t leave your shop unlocked or the door to your office building wide open, so it’s vital to apply this same mentality to your website. Ensure you install security software and be sure to download all the latest updates. Having a back-up system in place is also crucial. Leaving your website vulnerable to viruses or hackers could lead to losing your entire website and its data, which could devastate your business.
10. How will you track your online success?
It’s incredibly important to know where you’re winning and losing online so you can adjust your strategy accordingly. Luckily there are plenty of online tools, such as Google Analytics, which can help with this by offering straightforward ways to measure key performance stats i.e. page view, bounce rate and a number of visitors, etc.
Conclusion:
Given these initial 10 aspects of planning a branded new website, it’s obvious that there are many other things to come across when actually designing and developing it. You’ve clear goals to increase online traffic (through search, social, email marketing, and other mediums).
Have you set goals for generating leads for your business? How will your site’s design, navigational structure, and web page copies play an emerging role in engaging customers? Do you have plans for leading further interaction with your Sales team? I’ll come closer to these related topics in my upcoming posts at Startup Grind. Stay tuned!
Feature Image Credit: https://www.pexels.com/@burst