These Resources Can Help Take Your Website to the Next Level
Do you feel like your web-based projects aren’t getting the traction you’d like to see? Then maybe it’s time to enlist some essential resources to make a difference. Below, Throlson Web Design Services shares some tried-and-true strategies for online success.
Start a Blog
Many small businesses overlook blogs as niche areas of the internet. But the truth is, blogs are very effective at driving traffic to websites. If you don’t yet have a blog, it’s time to get on board and pump out readable content on a regular basis.
You may need to hire a freelance blogger to help you maintain it, but the benefits will far outweigh the costs. An experienced blogger will know how to use SEO to tie in with your website content for optimal search results among visitors.
It’s worth pointing out that if you’re posting and sharing images online, you must use high-resolution imagery. Do not make the common error of compressing JPGs in order to save space; they will look too low resolution if you do this.
A JPG-to-PDF converter is better, such as Baltsoft’s Free PDF Converter. If you have large files to deal with, you can combine multiple images into one PDF, thus reducing the file size.
A small business website that is highly successful will have SEO as an integral part of its regular strategy. If you aren’t sure where to begin with SEO (Search Engine Optimization), MOZ has a comprehensive guide that will tell you everything you need to know.
Engage Your Visitors
A web store is a great way to increase sales if you’re a retailer without a viable online presence. After you have received enough customer emails, create an email campaign to keep your message front and center for your customers. Be sure to make use of social media, too.
Online-only businesses should consider direct mail campaigns. This campaign could include a catalog with your top sellers to help you prospect new buyers. You will learn which channels are most effective for reaching your sales goals by testing different approaches.
Test and Measure Everything
Accounting software is essential for any business. After you have mastered the basics, you can start to measure other things. Understanding your inventory and cash flow is key. This is the right time to begin to measure your business and to use metrics to propel your business to new heights.
Use Security to Your Advantage
Businesses must prepare and strengthen cyber infrastructure to avoid being vulnerable to the next threat. However, this will also position them to capitalize on the information security opportunities that exist.
As a small business owner, you are constantly being reminded of the danger that cybercriminals and malicious software pose to your digital security. You must now challenge yourself to improve your information security infrastructure.
This will position and strengthen your business for government and corporate requirements. Information security should not be viewed as a means of protecting against threats but rather as an investment in the digital economy.
Create an LLC
You have many responsibilities as a business owner that can distract you from your web-based projects. By forming an LLC, you can save time and enjoy benefits such as tax breaks, reduced paperwork, and more flexibility.
However, LLC regulations can be different in each state. So always make sure you check their laws and familiarize yourself with them.
Enhance Your Business Skills
Enrolling in online courses can help you improve your online skills. With enough training, you can easily manage your web-based projects without hiring a professional.
Many of these online courses are flexible and can be adapted to your schedule. As a result, you will be able to take your company to the next level with the knowledge and skills that you acquire.
In the world of modern business, it is essential to be represented online through your own website. It isn't enough to simply have a web presence, though. To promote the future success of your business, the website that you use to interact with clients should be built and optimized with growth in mind. The built-in tools and overall layout of a business website should inherently facilitate customer convenience and encourage repeat visits. Entrepreneurs who fully understand a website's role in business growth are poised to seize greater success in the digital age of marketing.
Crucial Website Tools
The first step towards laying the foundation for business growth through your website is to optimize the essential business management tools that every online service utilizes. A customer relationship management tool is a vital resource for storing important customer data and facilitating client relations.
Another crucial element of a business website is an enterprise resource planning system that manages typical administrative activities such as accounting and supply chain operations. To establish the groundwork for future growth, consider increasing your website's efficiency by integrating CRM and ERP tools into one convenient suite.
Accessible Payment Platform
Out of all the tools built into a business's website, the payment system that connects clients to your service is perhaps the most important. Implementing a payment platform that works well for both yourself and your customers will go a long way towards future growth. Prudent business owners should conduct market research to determine which platform their target audience prefers. Popular online payment tools include Plaid's balance API feature, which allows users to avoid expensive credit card fees and ensure they always have funds available to make payments and purchases.
Observant web admins pay attention to key statistics including their website traffic and conversion rates. These metrics illustrate the site's ability to be found through search engines and retain an audience's attention. With such data to provide a benchmark, you can try out various methods to improve the efficacy of your website. Utilizing tried-and-true search engine optimization techniques and adding attractive logos or imagery can help with boosting engagement.
User-Friendly Design
Another method for improving a website's engagement stats is to focus on developing a user-friendly experience. Maintaining a clean and attractive appearance on all web pages ensures that users can navigate around the site without frustration. When potential clients are able to achieve their goals without hassle, they are more likely to return and interact with your products again. Mobile accessibility is also key, as people increasingly browse the internet on phones rather than computers.
Entrepreneurs who are not versed in web development or graphic design themselves can work with professionals like Throlson Web Design to create a site that accurately represents their business and brand.
Statistics and expert opinion all point to the importance of a powerful website for small business growth. For an emerging entrepreneur who relies on their online domain to make contact with potential audiences and clients, it goes without saying that a website should be conducive to prospective growth. A thoughtfully built website is a crucial stepping stone on the way to further financial success.
When you build or update your company’s website, you need to keep growth in mind. The wrong approach when creating your site can hinder sales, causing your company to stall or fall behind competitors.
By using the right approach, the opposite can occur. You can create a growth-oriented site that boosts your brand, increases sales, and operates seamlessly. If you aren’t sure where to begin, reach out to Nick for a free quote on web design services. Here are some tips that can get you headed in the right direction.
Enhance the Visual Aspects
Many prospective customers’ initial interactions with your company happen on our website. As a result, how your site looks matters. If the colors are chosen haphazardly, the pages look cluttered, or the pages don’t display correctly on the visitor’s preferred device, there’s a chance they’ll decide to go with a competitor.
Luckily, many web design best practices are easy to keep in mind. First, choose a simplified color scheme that fits your brand – usually featuring no more than four main hues. Next, balance text, images, and videos with whitespace, reducing visual clutter and improving readability. Finally, choose a responsive design, ensuring your site adjusts to a wide range of screen sizes and device types.
Another excellent option for improving the look of your site is an eye-catching banner. If you’re worried about the cost of hiring a graphic designer – which can easily run between $100 and $850 per project – consider going the DIY route. With an online banner maker, you can start with an attractive template and customize details like the text, colors, and font. Plus, you can even add video or animation, all while getting the perfect sized banner for your website, Facebook profile, Twitter page, or YouTube channel.
Embrace Integrations
Few things can streamline company processes quite like integrations. When you implement the right ones, you centralize activities that usually take place across multiple systems, allowing you to handle various tasks with greater ease.
Ideally, you want to integrate your customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools as a starting point. Then, by adding in your website, you can optimize a range of tasks by eliminating cumbersome data entry and ensuring activities can occur through a single portal. Customer management, inventory tracking, purchase processing, and order monitoring can all happen through one application, boosting productivity and organization.
Be SEO-Friendly
If you want to capture organic traffic, Zenbusiness emphasizes that you need to keep SEO best practices in mind when creating your site. That way, you can increase your position among search engine results, increasing the odds that prospective customers are more likely to engage with your company.
There are several components to SEO, including page speed, authority, security, word count, keyword selections, keyword density, and more. Often, the easiest parts to control are the content-oriented portions, such as keyword selection and use.
Try the Google keyword planner tool if you’re not sure which keywords can improve your site’s position. It will help you identify opportunities and enhance your website’s position, increasing your odds of securing organic traffic.
Make Purchase Easy
Abandoned carts can be a bane for any company. If you want to reduce the abandoned cart rate, making purchases as easy as possible to complete is a great start. Consider adding “Buy Now” buttons to make single item purchases incredibly quick. Additionally, reduce the number of pages customers have to navigate between entering their cart and completing the transaction. That way, they can finish up in the fewest number of clicks and pages possible.
When creating an online presence for your new business you may be first thinking about how to create the perfect website. A website provides a window to your business in the same way as a shop window would. It allows people to browse and see what you offer as well as what you stand for, and they can make a decision here whether or not to give you their business.
Creating a good website for your brand is so important and it can have a huge impact on the success of your company. This is why creating the best website you possibly can to showcase your company is crucial and today we want to discuss how you can do this for your audience.
A web developer is someone who will take a brief from you and create a website that meets your needs as a company. A web development professional will be able to use their tools and know how to make a stunning landing page to showcase your brand the best way, and ensure that customers will choose you over other brands. Today we want to talk about some of the reasons why you should take advantage of using a web development company for your website design this year.
It’s easier
If you have never made a website before, the prospect of doing this can be daunting, and it can soon become difficult for you to do it on your own. There are a lot of moving parts involved in creating a great website, and although you can use pre-existing templates to get you started it can be difficult to get everything moving the way you want it to. By using a web developer to do the job for you, it takes the stress away from you and it will make your life much easier.
They are experts
It is so important that you create the best possible website for your users, and that it runs smoothly and loads quickly when people visit. By using a professional WordPress web developer, you will have an expert in the field on hand to take on the task for you and they will be able to easily deal with any obstacles that might come their way. It will be much better than you struggling to make a website yourself and making mistakes along the way that cause issues on your website.
You’ll save time
One of the biggest plus points to using a web developer to create your website for you is that you will save a lot of time. For those who are inexperienced in creating a website, this process can take a long time and it will eat time out of your day where you could be working on other things. By trusting a web development professional to take on this task you will instead be able to benefit from free time to spend on other parts of your business that need your attention.
Use these great reasons to hire a web developer for your website this year.
When creating your own website, there is so much that you need to take into account. Are you building this website as a part of your business? Is it a passion project? Are you just wanting a platform where you can post your ideas? Portfolio maybe? Regardless of the reason, you’ll need to know where you’ll want to have your website (such as WordPress), the hosting company, and most importantly your domain. Your domain name is very important because this will be a part of your brand. This domain name will be how you can establish your website, but also yourself online.
When deciding on a domain name you’ll need to do a lot of research. This domain needs to be available online unless you’re willing to pay a hefty amount to purchase someone else’s domain. But your domain name should also be something that is easy to remember and doesn’t come off as spammy.
If you’re interested in having your own website, be sure to take a look at the infographic below. This will help give you an idea of what your name should be as it must tie into your brand. This infographic is a fantastic way to demonstrate how the domain name for the website should be something easy to remember, that sticks to your brand, that’s SEO friendly, and overall just a name that will help you reach the traffic your website deserves. Be sure to check it out below to learn all the ins and outs of choosing a domain name.
Professionalism is a big thing in the online game. With so many websites competing for traffic, you need to stand out from the rest and prove your professionalism. If people think your site is professional, they are more likely to click on it and see what's going on. Once there, a professional-looking site will keep people on it for longer and boost your chances of converting users to leads or customers.
Building a professional site is crucial, and here are three easy steps that will instantly make yours look a lot better:
Build on a reputable platform
Firstly, build your website on a reputable platform that people trust. Users know a few of the big website-building platforms around, like WordPress, Magento, Shopify for eCommerce, and so on. Having a site on one of these platforms instantly ensures it looks the part. You will enjoy modern web design, but you also benefit from the authority that these platforms provide. If people see that you're using them, they instantly find you more trustworthy and professional.
Well-known platforms are also becoming a necessity of business as more and more companies undergo data migration (read more) to cloud-based microservices over traditional monolithic applications.
Get HTTPS on your domain & get a professional domain name
Your domain name impacts professionalism massively. It's the address people see when they go to click on your website in the search results, and it's at the top of their screen when they're on your site. Even if you've built yours on a trustworthy and professional platform – and it looks amazing – people will think less of your site if the domain name is unprofessional. It should relate to your business, and shouldn't contain any numbers (unless they're in your brand name). The ideal domain names are just that; your brand name. Don't overcomplicate things here as a good domain improves professionalism.
Likewise, you need to use HTTPS on your domain as well. This basically shows that you have an SSL certificate, which is fancy talk for saying that your website has a secure connection. Anyone that uses it will feel safe knowing that their information is protected – particularly if they have to pay for something on your site. A lack of HTTPS on your domain looks unprofessional, so make sure you acquire an SSL certificate.
Optimize title tags and meta descriptions
If you look at the anatomy of a search results page, you will see that all of the organic results follow a similar structure. You have the title of the page being displayed, the URL, then a little snippet below. Here, you can make your site look more professional by optimizing your title tags and meta descriptions. Doing this will make sure that you have eyecatching titles for every page, drawing the user in. It will also ensure you have a useful snippet providing more information for them to see. Both of these things are basic SEO techniques, but they make a website look far more professional in the search results – particularly if other results don't have optimized titles or descriptions!
Want to make your website look more professional in a matter of minutes? Try any or all of these ideas, and watch the benefits flow.
