With the rapid advancement and booming of online resources, it is even more imperative to have a website for your small business. Customer engagement through your website will be the number one key to your online success. Learn how to engage with both current and future customers through your company’s website. Remember, your website is your newest store front and it is vital you use it to convert looky-loos into buying customers. Plus, customers will visit your website when it is inconvenient for them to travel to your physical location.
Of course you can hire a top notch web design team and use a top of the line web hosting company, but that can get expensive. There are ways smaller businesses can have a virtual storefront without breaking the bank.
Visual Appeal
Cluttering up your home page can discourage customers from continuing to other areas of your website. Make your website easy to navigate by using multiple pages instead of cramming everything on a single page. If it is too visually overloaded, customers will have trouble focusing on a specific thing and can make your website difficult to navigate.
Organization
Organize your website so it appears balanced and evenly weighted. You do not want to have one side appear heavier than the other. Balance your content evenly across the page. Organize your website into categories, including a home page, “About us,” “Shopping,” “News you can use,” “Contact us” and anything else you feel is important to your customers.
Ease of Shopping
Make your shopping page easy to navigate. Offer descriptions of items right next to the photos. Categorizing items is important, especially if you sell numerous products. Make your shopping cart clearly visible at the top of the page, so when you’re done shopping customers can make a single click and be able to check out.
Web Hosting
Decide between getting a free website or a paid one. This decision depends up on your budget. If you are on a tight budget, there are free web hosting sites available, however, you may find yourself a bit limited. Do some research to find the best web hosting site for your budget. Consider the amount of traffic you expect and the ease of changing and adding new content to it by yourself. Make sure the web hosting company you choose is reliable, offers backup protection and is fast enough for your customers. A sluggish site will get your customers moving on to the next company on the Google list. Also, watch out for any hidden fees by getting a list of all possible fees in advance.
Engagement
You must now engage with your customers. You have launched your website and in order to keep it high in the rankings and get all those referrals, you must take the time to know what your customers want. Reply to all emails and regularly post new materials on your page. Collect emails from customers so you can notify them of upcoming specials or the latest news about your company. Consider adding a link for a blog you write about the industry you are in. Be creative and make your page original.
Everything about your website must be visually appealing and easy to use. Especially if you want your customers to return to do some more shopping. Customer engagement is the key to keep them returning time and time again.