Small Business Web Design

The Recipe for Small Business Website Success

What is the best recipe for attracting visitors to your small business website and how can you convert a high percentage into paying customers?

Photo by Muffet

Establishing a small business website requires a strategic business plan that most small business owners are unable to develop without professional help or guidance.

Together with knowing how to plan your small business website effectively, it’s important to avoid the common pitfalls that could lead to failure. In today’s competitive market small business websites need to be designed well and promoted effectively in order to produce the desired results.

The most common objective of any website is to generate business transactions. There’s no magic formula, but there are three key ingredients that form the basis of a good recipe.

Mastering the Design of Your Small Business Website

The first ingredient is a website capable of receiving, engaging and satisfying visitors who are interested in your product(s) or service(s).

In an attempt to satisfy potential clients that visit their company website, business owners often put their time, thought and effort into creating a website that is designed with far too much emphasis on their own personal preference or the web designer's artistic aspirations.

This is the reason so many sites look good but fail to produce worthwhile results. I’ve noticed that the instant gratification enjoyed by owners of such sites is quickly forgotten when they realise that the appearance of their site will not bring a stampede of hungry customers rushing to see their masterpiece.

Sure it’s important that your site looks good and portrays a professional image, but not at the expense of other key areas that help to provide visitors with an enjoyable experience. Mastering the look of your small business website is an ongoing process and like a new house, you can always decorate it later.

Concentrate on delivering information rich content that will engage your audience, provide good navigation that enables visitors to move around your site with ease and make sure your website is optimised so that it gains higher visibility across the major search engines such as Google and Yahoo.

These areas need to be considered and you can make good use of resources such as Google's Webmaster Guidelines, Yahoo's Search Content Quality Guidelines and the standards framework set out by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

Developing Your Strategy to Attract Website Visitors

Having a strategy to attract targeted visitors to your website is the second key ingredient in the perfect recipe for small business website success.

However well designed your website is it needs to be found so attracting visitors will always be a vital part of its success. Failure to recognise this is arguably the most common reason for small business websites that fail to achieve their true potential.

If you provide unique content, rich with information and related to your niche, you will benefit over time because human visitors and search engines both love it! However, initially you need to spread the word a little and let people know that your small business website has arrived.

Hordes of random visitors will rarely produce many worthwhile inquiries so your marketing strategy needs to include a variety of techniques aimed at attracting targeted visitors. Observe methods being used by your competitors and adopt a broad approach rather than relying too heavily on one or two techniques.

Search engine optimisation (SEO) represents a cost effective marketing strategy for small business owners. As major search engines find more advanced ways to help people find products and services there's much to be gained by appearing prominently in the search engine results pages.

The initial budget that you have for establishing your website should include some that’s earmarked for website promotion. Adopt a mixture of both paid and free marketing methods to attract targeted visitors.

Making It Easy For People to Do Business with You

Finally you need to make it easy for people to do business with you, this could have been included in the first section that addresses the design of your website but warrants recognition on its own.

Having designed a small business website capable of greeting, engaging and satisfying visitors and a strategy to attract targeted visitors, you also need to make it easy for them to take action and part with their hard earned cash.

The structure of your website should make it easy for people to find your sales pages. These need to convey your message clearly, have a strong call to action and include any relevant information that helps to make the buying process smooth and uncomplicated.

Unlike traditional shops, online stores don’t have sales assistants to guide customers through the buying process, although web video presenters come close. You can lose visitors at any time if they experience doubt or confusion so you need to make it as easy as possible for them to do business with you.

Display relevant contact details prominently throughout your website and if possible include a map that shows your exact location. Include a help page to address potential issues and encourage visitors to contact you if they need assistance or require more information.

Make visitors aware of any guarantees that you offer, certificates you hold and payment options you provide. Include information about your terms and conditions, privacy policy and anything else that adds to your company’s credibility. The more barriers you remove the higher your conversion rate will become.

This is by no means an exhaustive list of ingredients for small business website success but if you examine small businesses that are enjoying the fruits of their online activities, you’ll find each of these key ingredients included.

Do you have any tips about how to establish a small business website?