Launching a small business website from scratch involves a lot of moving pieces. In fact, there is so much to worry about that it’s easy to miss out of important details or variables that you should have focused on from the start.
Since you as small business owner are concerned with turning in a profit, you may not have the experience or knowledge about the other cogs that make your business spoke up and running. This is perfectly normal, which is why you should get all the help to set your website up the right way. After all, if you don’t do it right then it’s not worth doing!
Below are crucial factors that you need to worry about to build a website that captures the essence of your small business.
Platform
If you ask around for the best platform where to run your site on, then most would probably answer WordPress. With over 75 million websites running on this CMS and thousands of third-party plugins to help supercharge your online business, it’s hard not to like the platform. However, regardless of the number of people saying how great WordPress is, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s the best one for you.
Since you are the owner of the small business, you need to find something that you will find easy to use. Aside from WordPress, there are lots of other platforms where you can set up your website.
Website builders like Wix and Weebly will help you create a beautiful website without writing any line of code. Squarespace and Joomla are WordPress alternatives that offer something different to the table without compromising usability.
Hosting
Your hosting is where you store the files on your platform and set up your site. Self-hosted platforms like WordPress and others require a web host, so you need to choose the web host that suits your needs and wants.
Initially, you’d go with a hosting provider with the most affordable overhead. However, the cheapest one also runs on the least optimal hardware and resources, which means less than optimal performance for your site. If you choose this hosting type, there will be times when your site will load slower than usual and won’t be available for your browser. This could pose a problem for your business if this persists. An inaccessible site means no leads or sales to your business, which leads to your downfall as a business owner.
SEO
Optimizing your website to rank on top of Google search is an art. A lot has been said about SEO in growing your business. It offers the most efficient way to drive traffic to your site without breaking the bank. It also puts you on par with bigger competitors with deeper pockets if you do SEO the right way.
Therefore, it is crucial that you form a solid foundation for your SEO strategy, from your plans for content rollout all the way to which .com domains you want to purchase in order to stand out and become memorable to potential customers. It’s also worth considering if you’re going to use traditional methods or use some of the more modern tools available for SEO. Similar to website platforms, there are lots of tools specially made to perform SEO tasks like keyword research and tracking, competitor research, and so on. It’s easy to get lost with SEO if you choose tools that you feel uncomfortable using.
Before settling on any tool recommended by the experts, it’s best to comb through this list of tools that will help you rank on Google organic search. It would be ideal to sign up for a trial of the tool and spend time using them to come up with an informed decision for each.
Employee advocacy
An exceptional small business is composed of employees who believe in the goals and objectives of your brand. As a loyal soldier, they are willing to dedicate themselves to the ideal espoused by your business. To get to this stage, however, you need to learn how to mobilize your employees correctly. You must get your employees on board with your business so they can help you not because they have to, but because they want to.
One of the tools that will help you achieve this is EveryoneSocial. The tool allows you to curate content for your employees to share so you can track and measure team members who are the most active. Having employees share content on social media benefits your marketing and sales strategy. More importantly, they create buzz to your website like no other method or technique can do for you.
Motivation
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The lack of focus among your employees is an issue that you need to address immediately. Putting your feet in the shoes of employees, it is all too easy to become jaded at work due to a lot of factors beyond your control. However, a factor you can manipulate is making your objectives clear enough for them to follow and perform. Most importantly, you need to empower them to do what you want instead of imposing your will.
One way to get people on board with the vision for your business is through project management gamification. Doing so allows you to engage your employees by turning business tasks into bite-sized goals and incentivizing their performance like you would in an actual game. An example of this tool is Habitica, a tool that recreates your business tasks in an RPG environment. While it may appear to some that gamification is a gimmick, these little things can go a long way, especially when making your employees care about launching your website.
Conclusion
A small business website is never determined by its size. By creating a site with a solid foundation from the tips mentioned above, you can expect to overcome the size deficit and compete with better business. As a result, you can focus on more pressing matters in growing and expanding your business.