This is a great question, and there are many things to consider. Before thinking about what makes a great website though, we need to talk about what we need the website to do. What are the priorities?
- Does your business have to look great on mobile devices?
- Does your business have a lot of traffic?
- Do you need better SEO?
- How about fast hosting?
The answer to all of these questions is YES for everyone. But the way we achieve this can be very different.
A New Restaurant
Restaurants are a great example of sites that “need it all”. They need to be visually compelling, extremely mobile ready for visitors on the go, and amazing SEO to get found- especially when you’re just getting started. Restaurants can also benefit from regular blogging to boost results in Google.
- You need best in class hosting. Your website needs to be full of fun photos- which can slow down a site. Proper hosting will improve load times, thus improving SEO. One of the MAIN factors in SEO is having a speedy site… so do not try to save a few bucks with a cheap web hosting company. We only use top tier server technology as budget providers will only hurt the build in the end. However, because we’re leveraging a top tier server package- your site will utilized all the same resources we have.
- It needs to be mobile friendly! Your customers are on the go, looking for places to eat. If you loose one customer a week because your site doesn’t look right or work on mobile devices, it adds up. 70-90% of all restaurant website traffic is estimated to be on mobile devices- so this is critical to make sure it’s done right. Every site we design is made with a “mobile first” approach to comply with the latest in Google’s standards for web building. We also integrate features into mobile designs like the “call now” button, or a button to launch google maps for directions.
- SEO. It’s got to be found! There’s a lot of ways to go about “good” SEO, but what it really means is all the parts to a site need to be constructed well, the server has to be quick, and you need good content. Not necessarily a ton of it, but GOOD. You also need to engage your backlinks- like with social media. The more you can push your URL online, the better! Also a simple blog can go a long way. We start every website build with basic HTML coding optimized for search engines, then layer all the things that create a highly visible website.
A Professional Page
Professional pages are generally used to build confidence that you know what you’re doing. Most of the time folks will find you on social media or by referral. People are already interested in working with you, so the goal is to provide a “hub” to showcase what you do. This can be done in a number of ways;
- Blogging. Talk about what you do and how you do it. Customers will want to research you before making contact, so this is a great way to tell people what you’re all about.
- Social media feeds. Social feeds are a quick and easy way to show people you’re active online. It’s also a quick way to keep your website looking fresh if you’re already using social media to attract business.
- Professional photos. It pays to have professional photos whether it’s a head shot, art, or crafted items. You want to get people excited to work with you, so hiring a pro is definitely recommended to put your best images forward.
Selling Products Online
Some of the more complicated sites on the globe deal in ecommerce- how complicated is an extreme variable for each project. Some ecommerce sites focus on a small handful of products, while others have thousands. Things to consider when building an ecommerce solution:
- Who will you use for processing payments?
- How will you calculate shipping rates?
- How will orders be fulfilled, and how will your customers stay informed on their order status?
We can handle all of these complex scenarios and more, get in touch to learn how we can build your home base on the Internet!
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Pete has been in the world or web design and graphic production for over 15 years, and with Influx since 2018.
