How To Create A Website For Your Startup Company
by Mike Khorev
Startup companies need increased visibility for them to make it big in today’s competitive market environment. One of the amazing and proven ways of creating significant online presence is having a business website. Forbes affirms that through a website, startup companies are able to connect and communicate with their target audiences efficiently. Given the high level of significance that websites have for new businesses, IT managers and directors have a huge role in setting things up for quality results. Certainly, they have to get the ball rolling when it comes to connecting startup companies with the digital space. Of course, creating a website requires a high level of understanding to get things right. The technical bit of building a website requires experts to be on top of their game. With this in mind, here are the steps required to create a business website for startup companies:
1. Get a Unique Address for your Website
This is the first step towards creating a business website. The technical term for a website address is the domain name. Since this is the first thing that potential customers connect with, it’s important to get it right. It’s the first impression that customers get of a business. Through the domain name of a website, potential customers are able to have a picture of the business they want to transact with. Since a website’s domain name carries a great deal of significance, experts in website development advise that it should be the same as the name of the business itself. This gives a business’ target market the ability to easily recognize what and who they’re dealing with.
The process of choosing a domain name should begin with thorough research. The reason for this is to eliminate the possibility of having another address like yours. Also, it’s imperative to avoid long and complicated names. If you want to do away with the potential of errors, just make it short and less intricate. A valuable tip when picking a domain name is to avoid abbreviations or needless hyphens. The goal of an IT manager during the creation of a business website is to ensure that customers can easily find their favorite brand. Hence, make sure that the name is easy to find.
Moreover, get all the information you need to know about the cost of a domain name. There is a registration amount and money that’s paid annually. Finally, as you think about a domain name, you should think broadly to consider the possibility of business growth. Don’t be restrictive. It’s paramount, therefore, to work with all business stakeholders to find out the right domain name for the website.
2. Identify the Right Website Builder
This is an instrumental step when it comes to the creation of a business website for a startup company. From the onset, you should know that there are different website builders to choose from. Depending on the needs of a business, it’s possible to know the right website builder to use. For example, the website builder that’s good for a restaurant might not be the ideal one for an e-commerce store. Remember, choosing the right website builder goes a long way to create a suitable website for a company. Perhaps, a major point to consider here is that you’re creating a business website for a startup company. Thus, as you search for the best website builder, it’s advisable to settle for one that has the pricing, features, and design to fit such a company. “When creating a website for a startup, it’s crucial to prioritize customization and scalability from the beginning. It’s essential to focus on building tailored web solutions that evolve alongside the business, ensuring that the platform not only meets current needs but also supports future growth efficiently.” – says Bartosz Wrobel, CEO at Gorrion.io
One of the popular website builders today is Wix. As earlier mentioned, each website builder has features that a particular business would like to have. For example, Wix is a great option for users who don’t have high technical knowledge in regards to design. If you would like a website builder that will offer assistance in design, Wix is the way to go. Also, if you need a website builder that will give you flexible tools for specialized functions, Wix will come in handy. For example, if you have a restaurant business and you would like to have an ordering app, you can consider going for Wix. Therefore, take time to understand your startup business in order to choose the right website builder for it. Keep in mind that there are also other options. You can choose to create your web solutions using CMS systems like WordPress. Also, you may hire fullstack developers to create a custom website.
3. Pick the Perfect Template
After choosing the ideal website builder, it’s now time to settle for the perfect template as well. In technical terms, a template is the foundation of a website’s design. If you get it right in the template part, you’ll be setting the right pace for a superior website design. An IT manager should be able to apply creativity while choosing a template. The website builder you’ll use will determine the template you choose and the freedom of applying creativity.
For example, if your website builder is Wix, you’ll have much freedom to customize the templates available until you get one that fits you well. There are other website builders that do not give users much freedom to customize. For example, Squarespace doesn’t offer users much capacity to customize. However, this isn’t necessarily a disadvantage because their templates are great. If you’ve chosen Wix as your preferred website builder, you have more than 800 templates to choose from. Make sure to select an accessible theme. Otherwise, you should invest in a third party Wix accessibility solution.
Picking a template for a business isn’t always an easy thing. It’s possible to get lost in the choices available to you. The best advice that website designers give to users is to settle for a template that’s in line with your business goals. Here, you need to know what your business stands for and what you want to achieve. Since a template brings out the creative side of your website, you should go for one that speaks to your target audience. For instance, if your startup is about health and fitness, you should pick a template that resembles a health and fitness website.
4. Work on the Content Part
In regards to content, creating a business website for a startup company requires you to put in mind the pages that people will visit for content. Content is what target audiences will be looking for to learn more about a business and transact with it. For a startup company, a website will need the following pages:
· A homepage: A striking and well-designed homepage is necessary for a startup. Visitors should be in a position to understand what a business offers within the shortest time possible, and then move on to other pages on the website. IT directors should make sure that the homepage is strong enough to provide the information required.
· About Us page: The About Us page should be informative. This is where a business should tell the story of their brand. It should be captivating and informative enough for visitors to understand the journey that a business has taken and the history behind its existence. It’s instrumental to include the team that leads the business on this page.
· Contact page: The contact page should be clear. This is a valuable page as it communicates to customers on how they can get in touch with a business.
· Product/services page: This is an important page as it tells customers what a business offers. The different products and services in a business are displayed on this page.
· Blog: This is where a startup demonstrates its level of expertise to its target audience. This page contains articles related to what a business does. Your target audience has questions concerning what you do and offer. This page gives you an opportunity to answer their questions and provide solutions to the problems they have. It’s also a brilliant way of helping your website to rank well with search engines and attract the much-needed traffic.
5. Integrating Relevant Features
Once you’ve made sure that there is content on your website that your target audience can interact with, you also need to add features that will add the functionality of your platform. This is where apps and extensions come in handy. They increase the features of a site and makes it more functional. This is great news for startups. As a startup, there is freedom to choose the applications that are most applicable to a brand. The following are good examples of applications and features that startup companies can consider when creating a business website:
· Google Maps: For a startup company, this app plays an integral role in allowing potential customers to find you. Since you’re not yet known by a good number of your target audience, this app comes in handy to connect you with them.
· Forms: With this app, you’ll have a viable alternative for customers to communicate with you. You’ll be able to get your enquiries organized. Additionally, companies use this feature to motivate customers to apply for email messaging.
· Live chat: This feature is valuable as it helps to interact with audiences in real time. As a way of getting feedback, this is an increasingly popular feature.
· Social media integration: Social media is a vital tool in the growth and development of startup companies. That’s why it rewards to put it in mind when building a website for a new business. Integrating this app into your website goes a long way to expand the reach of your company.
· Customer testimonials: Customer feedback on your site helps to build a strong relationship with your customers. As a startup company that wishes to build a high level of trust with customers and potential customers, integrating customer testimonials on your site is a big plus.
6. SEO Optimization
Having an amazing website is important for a business. Also, designing a captivating homepage carries a great deal of significance. However, unless a website is able to appear among the highly ranked websites after search engine results get displayed, it won’t add much value. In other words, you need to make sure that the visibility of your website is a priority. This is where search engine optimization comes in. There are factors that contribute to a site being ranked highly by search engines. It’s these factors that an IT manager should put into consideration when seeking to optimize a website for SEO or going for SEO services for startups.
One of the things to factor in is the speed of your website. Users don’t have the luxury of waiting for websites to load. Normally, if a website doesn’t load within 3 seconds, most users will abandon it and go to another. According to the New York Times, if your website is slow, it won’t perform well in SEO. Therefore, you need to try out strategies that allow you to fasten the speed of your site. For example, you can avoid having heavy images that make it difficult for your site to load faster.
Another factor that helps with startup SEO optimization is putting into consideration the need for mobile responsiveness. Not all Google searches are carried out by desktop users. There are those who use mobile devices. Therefore, it deems it necessary to format content in a way that such users are able to receive content in an effective way. This goes a long way to improve a site’s SEO performance.
Another strategy of SEO optimization is using the right keywords and using them appropriately. For you to know the right keywords, it’s prudent to conduct detailed research to establish what people are looking for. This will definitely give you a clear picture of the keywords to use and how to use them in order to rank higher after search engine results reflect.
7. Publishing and Regular Updating
After doing all the above, the last step is to publish the created website. This allows the world to get in touch with your brand. Once the website is up and running, you need to keep monitoring it so that you identify the areas that need improvement. As a startup company continues to grow, there are needs that will arise. It’s at this point that one needs to update apps and features to meet those particular needs.
Undoubtedly, in an age that’s technology-driven, startup companies need websites to be competitive in the digital space. This is increasingly becoming a priority for many businesses, and that’s why IT managers are constantly updating their knowledge on website development and maintenance. This goes a long way to attract optimum and quality business outcomes.
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