Studies show that 70 to 80% of consumers research a company online before visiting them or making a purchase with them. A well-designed website is essential for convincing people that you are credible and worth their time and money. Here are just a few ways in which you can design the ultimate company website.
Maintain your own brand identity
Your website is an extension of your brand – it needs to contain the same colour schemes and logos that the rest of your marketing possesses. There needs to be a consistency throughout your website in the fonts you use and the colours you use. If you don’t feel that you have an eye for visuals and are yet to establish your brand, it could be worth getting help from a professional web designer who can come up with a unique UI and brand. You can also hire graphic designers separately for creating logos and infographics. All of this will create a good visual impact.
Keep text clear and concise
Any text featured on your website needs to be easy to understand and snappy. You should try to avoid big walls of text on your homepage at all costs – sticks to a small block of three or four sentences at most and use bullet points and charts to display stats. It’s okay to have bigger blacks of text on other pages if you feel you need to elaborate on information, so long as you’re regularly using paragraphs breaks, images and infographics to break up the text.
Try to keep the wording in layman’s terms. Some companies feel they have to use overly technical language such as ‘human resources procurement’ instead of ‘recruitment’ in order to impress clients, but this can have the opposite effect and drive clients away who won’t know what you’re talking about. Unless your client is likely to be knowledgeable within the niche, stick to language that’s easy to understand.
Use simple navigation
Visitors need to be able to get around your website easy and access the information they need. You should always place a navigation bar on your homepage (your visitors shouldn’t have to scroll down to find it). Use labels that make it clear where to find information such as ‘contact’ and ‘about us’. If there’s lots of products on your website, it could be worth adding a search bar. Try getting strangers to test your website and report back how well they feel it is to navigate.
Lure people in with deals
If you’ve got any discounts or limited time offers on, make sure to display these boldly on your homepage. People are instantly drawn to deals and the opportunity to save money – displaying these promotions could turn more of your visitors into leads. You can even design PPC ads displaying deals to lure people to your website – just make sure that these ads lead to a page on your website where information of this deal is displayed.
Use videos
Many modern sites are now embedding videos on their homepage. Videos allow you to give lots of information in a fun and engaging way rather than having to clutter your homepage up with text and infographics. Avoid setting your video to autoplay as this has been shown to annoy most web visitors – allow visitors to click on the video to play it themselves. It could be worth hiring a video production company or animator to put something professional together.
Link it up with social media
It’s worth adding a social media plug-in that can allow you to quickly follow you on Facebook and Twitter. You can even show a preview of your social media feed. This will help to build your social media following. You should also link to your website on you social media channels so that the two feel completely integrated – try to use the same colours and branding for a feeling of consistency.
Boost your credibility with testimonials
Testimonials are positive quotes from previous clients that show proof that you have good reputation. You can display these anywhere on your website – most companies set up a separate page for listing testimonials, but it could be worth displaying one of your strongest testimonials on your homepage. You can collect testimonials simply by asking every client you work with for feedback – if somebody has lots of praises, ask whether you can then use this as a testimonial. You may also be able to quote positive reviews on sites like Trip Advisor and Trust Pilot. On top of quote from customers, make sure to boast about any prestigious awards or achievements that are likely to win over customers.
Monitor your web traffic
Monitoring your web traffic can allow you to get a clear idea of who is visiting your site, how they are getting there and what they are doing once they’re on your website. There are various analytics plug-ins and programmes that you can use to give you information on your visitors. You can examine the trends of visitors than become customers and optimise your website for these types of visitor in order to get more leads from your website. On top of this, you can deter visitors that aren’t likely to become leads who may be using unrelated keywords.
Keep your website regularly updated
Updating content on your website can help to give your site a fresh feel. It can also have other advantageous such as ensuring good search engine rankings. The best way to add new content is to add a blog to your website – you can keep publishing new posts that will draw extra visitors in. You can also consider seasonal deals and content themed round current events.
