For many business owners, building the perfect website can be one of the most critical marketing aspects of their business. A company’s website is often the initial point of contact for many consumers. Unfortunately, many business owners fail to recognize the importance of a website that not only markets their products and services effectively but also presents a user-friendly environment that continuously maintains existing traffic and generates new traffic.

To stand out from traditional websites, some businesses benefit greatly by creating a website that specifically focuses on the needs of the visitors rather than a marketing-based website. With the advancements in technology, many consumers find it more intriguing to visit a website geared specifically to their wants and needs. This increases customer loyalty and creates value for the customer. This results in the likelihood of them returning to your website, possibly referring friends and family members.

Some critical components for building the perfect website & retaining existing traffic include:

Homepage

Having a homepage is critical for any website. Many businesses fail to realize just how important a homepage really is. If your homepage is not constructed properly, then the likelihood of your website being a success is very unlikely. The homepage is the most important page of your entire website. It is the foundation to the online success of your business.

Your homepage has one purpose. It delivers what your company promised. Clients or potential customers visit your site for a specific reason. Whatever services or products your company offers should be clearly visible and attainable by visiting your website. While the history of your company and what you do may be important, it does not convey what you have promised.

One of the most important lessons of website designing is creating a consumer-friendly platform. Although this may sound a bit weird, it is important to understand that potential customers visiting your website are not really concerned with you, your company, or your staff. If your homepage contains a vast amount of information other than what your company promises, visitors are less likely to remain at your site.

What is the Purpose of Your Website?

You must have a purpose prior to building a website. The purpose of your website may be for the retrieval of information, increase sales or brand awareness. For a successful website, you must go beyond the basics such as geographic location, age, race, or gender.

You need to dig a little deeper to find out what your potential customers are into. For example, creating a reader profile is an excellent option for obtaining valuable information about your visitors.

Some targeted questions to help create a user-friendly site:

• What groups do you belong to?
• What radio station do you listen to?
• Are you married?
• What magazines and newspapers do you read?
• What books are you reading or have you read?
• In your spare time, what do you do?
• Where do you hang out online?
• Do you watch TV?

Asking questions like this can help you go deeper within your site. Develop a website primarily focused on your users. Without such data, it is difficult to create a user-friendly website. If you fail to acquire this data, you may find yourself requesting it in the future once your website does not produce the results you hope for.

Think Billboards

Websites are very similar to billboards. They are required to deliver on a single promise. It must be done very quickly. You may have noticed that billboards, when properly marketed, use words and images to convey a promise relatively quickly.

A successful website must be thought of as a billboard, with individuals racing through at a high rate of speed. This is very similar to the online experience. Your website has less than a few seconds to obtain the visitor’s attention. Therefore, it is important for your message to be concise, crisp, and clear.

Important Factors for Any Successful Website

Every website is different and can provide a unique user experience.

However, there are certain features that every website should contain:

1. Easy Navigation

All too often, many websites are not easy to navigate and create uncertainty for the user. This can ultimately hurt the productivity of your website. It can result in users not returning due to its complexity. The perfect website should be simple enough for a school-aged child to understand and navigate.

The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz discusses the importance of simplicity. After reading this book, you are sure to have a greater appreciation for simplicity and how simplicity can generate massive amounts of revenue for your business.

2. A Strong Call to Action

It is important that you tell your potential customers or clients what you want them to do. If you fail to do this, potential customers leave your website without taking any action. This can decrease the expected response that you anticipate.

3. Sign Up

It is very unlikely that a potential customer purchases an item from your website on the first visit. Having potential customers sign up for your newsletters, blogs, or announcements is a great way of staying in contact with them and existing clients.

By doing this, you are more likely to extend your customer base and increase sales revenue. Most visitors do not return to a website unless they have a compelling reason to do so. By keeping in contact with your website visitors, you give them a reason to revisit your website.

4. Contact Points

Surprisingly, there are still websites where users need to dig for information. The perfect website makes it easy for visitors to locate and retrieve their desired information. It should also be relatively simple for a visitor to retrieve your email address, mailing address, and phone number. Contacting your business should never be a difficult task.

5. Secure Shopping

If your website offers online shopping, it is extremely important to provide secure shopping due to an increase in online scams and identity theft. Many visitors verify that your website is secure prior to purchasing any of your products or services. Many visitors determine the worthiness of your site based on its security.

6. Testimonials

Potential customers often like to hear what other individuals have to say about your company. It makes the potential customer feel more comfortable about doing business with your organization. It would be beneficial for your company to have a page dedicated specifically to testimonials. Also, it is recommended that you have at least one testimonial on your homepage.

7. Easy Share

Create an online atmosphere that makes sharing data from your website with outside sources easy. This not only increases your brand awareness but also revenue. Many blogs now offer social media sharing links with each article.

8. Blog

With consistent changes in search engine algorithms, having a blog is no longer an option. To be visible online, a regularly updated blog is critical. A blog should be updated a minimum of twice a week. The content should not only be unique but also engaging to your audience.

9. Poorly Designed Website

Believe it or not, the design of your website can make or break your business. A poorly designed website can bury a good marketing technique. Consumers will not take the time to figure out how to navigate through a poorly designed website. If your website is poorly designed, your potential customer is likely to abruptly leave and land on one of your competitor’s web pages.

10. You Get What You Pay For

Many successful businesses realize the importance of having an online presence that not only drives traffic to their website but keeps existing traffic. Although there are many free website options, it does not provide many of the key elements needed for a successful online marketing campaign.

For example, many of these free websites do not offer e-commerce. Nearly all of them lack the capacity in establishing any type of search engine ranking. A free website is simply not an option when it comes to creating a website for the purpose of traffic generation.

11. Know Your Promise

Every business has a promise. Your customer should gain a clear understanding of your promise. Whatever you are promising your visitors, it should be clearly reflected on each page of your website. In addition, customers don’t always see your home page first.

Depending upon the keyword search, the customer may land on another page within your website and never visit your homepage. This is why it is so important to have your promise on every page of your website. To have the perfect website for your business, all of the topics discussed are critical for generating and maintaining existing traffic.

A successful website can consistently generate traffic over time. For more information on how to build the perfect website and generate massive amounts of traffic, please feel free to contact us at 207-947-4313.
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Links Web Design is a Website Design Company in Bangor, Maine.