At DotMD, we have come across many businesses who have needed help updating and developing their company website. Working with our clients, we have developed websites for them that show their business in a great light, but also promote enquiries, engagement and credibility.
When building a website, it goes far beyond just the look. And a website that looks great, may market your brand well, however it acheives nothing in the long run. There is a triage of boxes you have to tick when building a website that our team at DotMD live by everyday when speaking to clients about their website. This triage consists of: Look, Credibility and Engagement.
The 5 things that are a must-have on your website fall under the triage above, and help to achieve the sweet spot between all three points. Continue reading below to learn about the 5 things you must have on your company website.
1. Multiple points of engage-ability
To your customers, you want to be available as possible and make it as easy for them to get in touch with you or engage with your services as easily as possible. These days, companies are investing a lot into finding ways that minimise the amount of effort customers put into finding information and filling out information. For example, these days when you buy something online, often your browser or the ecommerce website already has your payment information pre-filled. This makes the purchasing decision so much easier. Almost as if you are already standing over the EFTPOS machine at a store.
How this can implemented in your company website is by the use of interactive forms, attractive “call-to-action” buttons, multiple and abundant use of contact information, live chats and quote buttons. Your aim is to make your business seem as available as possible to potential prospects.
Multiple points of contact falls under ‘Engagement’ on the above triage. And specifically “What is driving your customers to use your services?”
2. Review, reviews, reviews
Reviews are an absolute must have. Not only do they instantly increase credbility ten fold, they also are very simple to implement on your website. You can either connect google reviews of product reviews to your site, or even just copy paste your business reviews from elsewhere online and display them on your site.
Reviews taps into the ‘Credibilty’ portion of the Triage above. It is essntial to have, and instantly builds reputation and trust as a business who knows what they’re doing. Not including business or products reviews is seriously missing out on some great marketing you could be doing.
Give your potential future customers a reason enquire about your services. Show them that without you, they will be missing out.
3. Mobile friendliness
Yes, we know some of you reading this one are saying “well isn’t that obvious?” Well, it should be, but you’d be surprised with how many websites. wecome across that look fantastic on a desktop, but are seriously lacking on mobile.
It is all well and good that the webpage is responsive for mobile, and that is basically a given in this age, however there are several practices that you must implement that caters specifically for mobile web use. For example, real estate on a mobile phone is scarce. That’s why you should make your navigation menu as small as possible, or possibly don’t even display it. you can simply have a ‘burger’ mobile menu button whereby the user clicks the burger and outslides the menu from the side of the screen. Too many times have we seen websites that try to include their full menu on mobile where one third of the screen is taken up by the menu.
There are several practices that you can implement that will help make your website ten times better for mobile. These practices fall under the “Look” part of the triage above, and we highly recommend utilizing mobile friendliness in your webpage designs.
4. Social Media Linking / Embeds
This one may be for the younger generations, but do you come across people in your personal life who have no social media whatsoever? While there is no criticism of that choice whatsoever, it creates an element of mystery amongst that person. Having social media profiles these days is just the norm. Being on social media is the thing to do, and a default these days.
Same goes for your business. If you’re not on social media, it’s a thought that passes through potential customers minds. “Why aren’t they on social media?” “I would like to see examples of their services on instagram however they don’t have an isntagram account?” Linking social media to your website or embedding your instgram feed, youtube videos or twitter feed, can serve as and extra marketability factor for your potential customers. It shows you’re engaging with your audience and that you’re active trendy. You need to take full advantage of the free advertising you’re able to do online, and link that advertising to your website to enrich your company and brand.
We have come across many businesses that even when they do utlise social media, they aren’t linking that social media to their website, meaning that potential customers are missing out on seeing engaging content that you are creating. Point number 4 falls under “Engagement” on the triage above and specifically “How are you appealling to your potential future customers?”
5. Capturing Analytics
This also falls under the “Engagement” section of the triage above. Taking advatnage of analytics is one of the most critical things you can do as a business. Once again, we have come across so many business websites that do not capture any analytics.
Analytics is incredibly important because it tells you exactly where your customers are coming from, why they are coming to you, and at what time. This is absolutely critical for your business in order for you to grow. If you can understand information about your potential customers, you can create business objectives tailored towards those target customers and/or you can focus your efforts on the potential customers that are not currently finding their way to your site.
We highly recommend using Analytics to track your user data, and it is absolutely free to do so no matter what kind of website you have.
Conclusion
So there is 5 things you must have on your company website. We at DotMD absolutely believe that these 5 things are imperative to have on your site, not only because they are relatively easy to implement, but also because they cost virtually nothing to do. Why not take advantage of all the potential business you could be getting when it costs very little to do so?
