If you have just launched a brand new start-up business, you may feel as though you need an all-singing, all-dancing website, with exciting features, bright colours and lots of images.
If you have just launched a brand new start-up business, you may feel as though you need an all-singing, all-dancing website, with exciting features, bright colours and lots of images. However, unless you are a gifted web developer, a website of this calibre is going to massively eat into your start-up budget. Below are some tips on how to create a website that promotes your brand, whilst attracting and engaging potential customers.
Speed
G-Design found that an important element of a successful website is its loading speed. They found that users expect a website to load in two seconds, and 40% of people will abandon the attempt after three seconds. You may know yourself, if a website isn’t loading instantly then you will click the back button to find another site to get your information from. While two seconds may seem very speedy in relation to everyday life, this can seem like a lifetime in terms of a website loading speed. Try not to include too many images, elements that require Flash Shockwave Player or embedded videos.
Contact Information
How frustrating is it when after browsing a website for a considerable time, you find that you have a couple of questions you would like to ask before you buy? You search the website for contact details for the company, only to draw a blank. As obvious as it may seem, some people do still make the error of not making their contact information easily accessible, meaning that they could be missing out on future sales. Make sure that you are easily contactable by potential customers – display your contact information plainly on a page that is easily found, and even consider putting some details, such as email address and phone number, on every page.
Text
You need to strike a fine balance when creating an interesting website. Whilst you need to use enough text to describe your business and your products, you do not want to run the risk of boring people! Make sure that information on your site details all the necessary information, but keep sentences brief. Ensure that you use interesting language, and consider breaking large chunks of text into separate sections with their own headers. When listing the details of a product, consider using bullet points to show the information clearly.
Personality
The websites of many big businesses often have a corporate look and feel to them, as they are attempting to appeal to a mass market. Being an established brand, they do not have to try and win their customer over, as they will most likely already have a strong client base. With a small start-up business, you may be starting from scratch, meaning that you have to prove to your customers why they should use your company. Here is where you can use being a small business to your advantage, as you can use your website to introduce yourself and any staff members you have working for you. This allows you to show that your company will award clients with a more personal touch than some of your big competitors.
Images
If you are selling products on your website, it is important that you display them in the most attractive ways possible. Taking dark, unfocused or even blurry pictures does not showcase your product well, and will not help you to sell any! Make sure that all pictures taken are on a light, clean background, are well lit and are in focus. Also make sure that your images are large enough to see clearly, no-one wants to have to squint to find out what your product actually is. Multiple images are helpful to people who wish to buy a product, but don’t go overboard! Make sure to take enough pictures to cover all viewpoints of necessary products, but you don’t require 300 pictures of the same product in the same position. Not only is this annoying for the website user, it also works to slow your website loading time down.
If you master all of the above, your website should look more professional, and be more appealing to customers. Below is a quick check-list of 5 more things you should definitely avoid, in order to keep those browsing your website happy!
5 things to avoid:
Pop-up windows: everybody hates irrelevant pop-ups interrupt their website browsing, and trying to hunt down the ‘x’ key to close them.
Music: Most people have had the shock of un-knowingly being subjected to music on a website that you’ve just clicked on. Steer clear of automatically playing music, if you must have music at all make sure that you have the option to turn it off quickly and easily.
Too much colour: Stick to a simple colour scheme, using a whole rainbow of colours makes a website annoying and difficult to read.
Terrible spelling: Lots of typos and errors in grammar can make a website look unprofessional, and put users off trying to read information.
Unreadable font: Make sure that you use a clear font, which is accessible across all platforms and browsers. Alongside making sure that the font is legible, make sure that it is a size that is easily read, normally between 9 and 12 pt.
Nick Cooper
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