One of the cardinal rules of marketing is that business owners must meet consumers wherever their attention lies. In today’s marketplace, that means the Internet. Consumers’ attention is largely focused online, which is why business websites are designed—and why businesses of all sizes must understand this fundamental shift in consumer attention simply in order to stay afloat. What’s more, business owners must understand that design, functionality, and performance are all necessary to ensure the website makes a strong first impression with consumers.

Why Websites Matter

Websites are important, something most business owners know—which is why they invest in having high-quality sites created. Given the ongoing investment most businesses have in their website, it’s important to ensure that the site itself is more than an online placeholder, a virtual business card, or a Yellow Pages entry for the Google era.

In a word, websites need to bring in results. How you define results is variable to some extent—online visibility, brand reputation, and user engagement are all worthwhile metrics—but at the end of the day a business website should be like a full-time, automated sales resource, continually educating leads and empowering them to become informed, long-term clients.

Websites That Get Results

Really, the website is the hub of all digital marketing of all digital marketing—the focal point at which all your blogs, PPC ads, and social media channels point. You want to get people to click over to your site to learn more about the brand and ultimately be led down the sales funnel—getting those all-important results.

But how do you ensure that yours is a truly effective, results-oriented site? A few best practices include:

• The site should be well-designed and organized in a way that makes it easy for users to browse and to find the information they’re looking for. A convoluted or poorly-conceived website is a major turnoff. Ensure that you have unfussy, uncluttered navigation, allowing users to easily get from one place to another. Also ensure responsive design—that is, a site that looks good on every possible device, including mobile and tablet devices.
• Your company contact information should be clearly displayed on every page, including your phone number—ensuring customers can easily reach you no matter where they happen to be in your website.
• To ensure customer engagement and search engine visibility, it’s important to update the site routinely and to add fresh content by way of a blog.
• To prevent against high bounce rates, most websites should be relatively short in length. No need to ramble; just get straight to the point and make a succinct value pitch.
• A good website uses photos and videos to capture attention—and all media is high-quality, properly sized, and positioned correctly.
• Call-to-action buttons should be employed—strategically, not excessively—to lead customers down the sales funnel. There should also be lead-capturing forms to ensure you collect information needed for customer follow-up.
• Finally, onsite SEO should be a forethought, and an ongoing concern.

The Website is Your Hub

In the end, what you’re looking for is a website that can function as a legitimately helpful resource for your clients, providing them the information they need to confidently and excitedly reach out to you—and in doing so, serving as a kind of central spoke from which all your other marketing efforts radiate, ultimately pointing the user right back to that all-important website.

All of this entails the work of a website-building professional, of course, but is ultimately pivotal for making your website an effective marketing hub—and a platform from which you can build successful marketing campaigns.

Check out the other posts in our Bringing in More Business series:

POST 1 – Digital Outreach Starts with Website Building
POST 2 – Why Content is Still King 
POST 3 – Why Your Website Needs Marketing
POST 4 – Why Your Business Needs to Get Social
POST 5 – Why Website Marketing is Integrative