There is a special soft spot in my heart for entrepreneurs, startups and small businesses. They are passionate, focused and driven which is inspiring and completely energizes me when I get the opportunity to work with them. Typically smaller startups don’t have a staff to handle their website and marketing needs. If this sounds like your company; then keep reading. Often businesses publish their website quickly with little time to devote towards research, design, creating content and functionality. Or worse, the business doesn’t put a website up at all. But, I’ve got something that’s a lot better than either of these options!
Here are a couple of questions you might have:
- How do I get a website that allows for customers to find me online?
- Can I get a website that doesn’t take a lot of time to maintain so I can focus on my business?
- Can I get a website that I can edit and update myself?
- How can I get a website that doesn’t hurt my checkbook and still looks professional?
Setting Up For Success:
If you are looking to build a website or considering a refresh of your current website; don’t frown! This is an exciting time for you and your business. Learning about how to utilize your business skills and employ them online is going to be a rewarding experience and a great investment for your business.
Don’t get overwhelmed, come talk to any of the thinkspace staff about the website and marketing packages we offer. We can talk with you about your specific needs, ideas and solutions.
Here are a couple of myths:
- The best websites are the most beautiful and have animated dancing unicorns.
- The best websites get millions of hits every day.
- The best websites are #1 in search results for Google, Bing and Yahoo.
- The best websites have the most keywords packed into their website.
- The best websites are the ones are esthetically pleasing to me.
The truth is that most successful websites are able to prove with their content, website design, and choices if images these three essential things:
- They know who their customers are.
- They understand their customer’s needs.
- They are qualified to meet their customer’s needs.
There can be many goals for a website. They can also serve many different purposes, from building the business’s brand, being a place to promote events, and sell products. My challenge to you is to create a website that is clear to visitors on what you want them to do.
- Make a purchase
- Contact you – Email, Phone, mail
- Share your content/products – through social media, email
- Connect with you – Social media, Events, Make an appointment
Building Content
To build content for your website start with making a list of all the most frequently asked questions by your customers. Try to be concise, stick to one to two sentences and answer each question like you would if the customer was in front of you. Then arrange your answers by level of importance to customers and the top four are most likely your static pages. The others make excellent content for your blog, social media channels and email newsletters.
Research & Finding the Conversation
Take some time to research similar businesses, locally, state, then nationwide. Take notes on what you do and don’t like about their website, what content you think was neat. One of the best ways to find out where conversations are happening about you, your business and your competitors is to use Google Alerts. You might find out that there are conversations happening about your business on Linkedin that you didn’t even know about.
The Summary:
- Focus on your customer, their needs and the solution you bring to the table
- Know what you want people to do when they come to your website
- Write content that answers common questions your sales or customer service representative would normally answer.
- Find out where the conversations are happening online and where you should be investing your energy
- Have a website built that is easy on your budget and staff
For more information about what thinkspace can offer you contact us! We would love to work with you.
