A website is one of the most essential marketing tools available. Customers for many products will want to look at company’s website before making a purchase.
Creating your own website is relatively simple, involving the following four steps:
Step 1. Buy your domain
This step is very easy and should be done as soon as possible before someone else buys the name you are looking for. If the name you want is not available, you might want to look for creative alternatives.
Step 2. Write the content
While there are a lot of pages and a lot of content you could have on your website, the main five content pages are:
The “Home” page – Gives a brief introduction of the company indicating how customers benefit from your products or services.
The “Products and Services” page – Offers a description of the products or services you sell along with photos and pricing.
Don’t overwhelm readers with to much information. If necessary, have a sub-page with further details. Keep in mind that the reader may only spend seconds on the page.
A good idea is to use a bullet list detailing up to six or seven products or services. More points than that on a bullet list is visually unappealing.
The “Clients” page – Simply lists your past and current clients. It demonstrates credibility that you have a professional history. If you don’t have any customers yet, just omit this page.
The “About Us“ page – Tells the reader who you are, your philosophy and your way of doing business. It helps build legitimacy and rapport with the reader. It is also appropriate to include a Bio of the business’s founding members or the current president or CEO.
The “Contact” page – Explains how people can find you. It may seem obvious, but it amazes me how some companies fail to provide complete information in this important section. If customers can’t find you how can they buy your products?
Be sure to include:
The business name
Logo
Mailing address
Telephone number
Fax number
Email address
The contact page should include a “call to action” statement, which encourages the reader to contact the company.
The typical “call now!” line seen on television commercials is a perfect example of this. If worded and placed properly, the call to action statement should create a sense of urgency to contact the company. Some examples that might work for you are:
Call today to start enjoying…
Click here to visit our store:
Receive a free sample by clicking here:
There are many other pages you could include, such as a testimonials page or a career opportunities page, but with these basic five pages you have everything you need to have an effective online presence.
Step 3. Design the look of the pages
After your content has been prepared, you’ll want to establish the layout of the page. Most of the host providers listed above provide templates to help you arrange your content, as well as countless other providers you can find online. They are a great option in terms of the time and cost required to develop a decent page. Of course, hiring a professional web designer is always an alternative and can help you to get more professional-looking page.
Step 4. Publish site with a host
The domain providers listed above, as well as many others, can provide a hosting service, which is the actual service of publishing your site to the internet and making it available to be accessed 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Many hosts also offer additional services, such as email and blog hosting, online sales options as well as domain name registration and design templates, as mentioned.
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