Get the following 4 things right and understand why even though it’s easy these days to rely on Facebook Pages and Yelp listings to represent your company; every business must have its own website.
Rushing into building a site without a plan can leave you with something that might not fit your long-term needs. Whether you are doing it yourself or hiring someone to do it for you, here are four things to keep in mind when building your company’s website.
Running your own site gives your customers a central place to find everything you want them to, regardless of their social media preferences.
1. Design for Content and for Customers
There’s a well-known Internet marketing expression that says “content is king.” This also applies to the design phase of your website. It may seem obvious but it’s important that you consider what’s going to go on your site before building it. A service like WordPress can be great for building a blog, but if your business is a restaurant, it’s more likely your customers are looking for a menu or directions than an article about your business.
Think first about what your business is about. What essential information do you need to share, and what will your customers come looking for? While blogs, splash pages, and giant photo galleries might seem really fun, consider what information is most important to you customers and present it prominently.
2. Allow for Mobile Access
The mobile space is expanding at a dizzying rate. As of January 2012, there are now more iPhones sold each day than babies born world-wide! It’s a given that customers will be accessing your site from a mobile device. At some point in the not-too-distant future, that will likely be the way the majority of the world will access the Internet.
This means it’s time to stop building sites with Adobe Flash, which does not work on certain mobile devices and tablets. This is especially true for businesses like restaurants and photographers. Your customers are going to want to find you while they are on the go. If your site doesn’t work on their devices, you are leaving money on the table.
You should consider how to make the mobile experience great for your customers to begin with. Many of the conventions that work for a desktop browser-based site might not work so well on mobile. Because your designer will design for mobile first, he or she will need to focus on simplicity and ease of use. Those lessons learned can then be applied to make the desktop experience that much better.
3. Make Your Site Accessible
According to the Australian Human Rights Commission report of 2010, 1 in 5 Australians have some sort of disability. Also, the gross disposable income of people with disabilities is approximately A$55 billion, according to the Australian Network on Disability.
These individuals could be extremely loyal and passionate customers. When you create a new website, it’s to your benefit to think about accessibility. If you need an explanation of how to build with accessibility in mind, the W3C organisation has some great resources.
4. Incorporate Responsive Design Features
The basic idea behind responsive web design is to avoid having to build unique websites for different devices — such as smartphones, tablets, and desktop browsers. Instead, responsive design allows you to have one site that changes its layout in response to the size of the screen it’s displayed on.
For example, the Michael Anderson’s website was built using responsive design techniques. If you navigate there and change the size of your browser window horizontally, you’ll notice that parts of the page will change, hide, or reveal as you resize the browser. This type of design saves your customers the hassle of having to navigate sites that weren’t built for the screens they’re using.
While some of these suggestions might seem overwhelming to the non-technical, they are quickly becoming the baseline standards of the web-design industry. When looking to hire someone to build your online presence, make sure he or she is familiar with these concepts. If you’re building your site yourself, using responsive WordPress themes may be a good place to get started.
Get your digital marketing queries answered and challenges solved. Leverage the power of social media and design for your business. Drop me a line at Justin@StellarDigital.com.au.
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