subject: Building Your Business Website With Search Engine Optimisation In Mind [print this page] Building Your Business Website With Search Engine Optimisation In Mind
Considering so many people have internet access, a website is a very valuable and useful tool, maybe even the most useful, for businesses. They are used by nearly every type of company you can imagine, from restaurants to garages to laundrettes and are a surprisingly effective small business advertising technique in the long run. If you haven't got any idea how to put a business website together, there are internet marketing professionals and companies that you can use to get you on the net. There are however, a few things you need to remember.
Here is a simple plan to get you started.
Registering Your Site
You will first need to register a domain name for your site. Great domains are ones that have your main service or product type and your location in them. For example if your main service is the provision of liposuction and your clinic is in Dublin, the perfect web domain would be LiposuctionDublin.ie, or a variation of this for search engine optimisation. You may have to do some digging to get a good domain name. Another alternative is to see if the name of your business is available as a domain name.
Hosting Your Website
If you are a local business and your business is based in Ireland, you would be best advised to opt for an Irish hosting company. This is because when it comes to search engine optimisation the location of your web hosting servers are taken into consideration.
Registering with a hosting company is like buying land on the net. It's your own little space where you can put your website on. Prices vary depending on the host but because of the sheer numbers of people who use the net, it certainly will not break the bank.
Website Content
Here is a quick outline of the most important pages your business website will need.
Homepage:
State what your business does, your location and a brief summary of the services you offer.
Contact Page:
Here have all of your contact details such as your email addresses, phone numbers and a fax number if you have it. You can also have a link on Google Maps to show your exact location, making it easier for people to find you.
Services:
Have a more detailed overview of what exact services you offer for Search Engine Optimisation so when your potential clients search for your services they are more likely to find you.
Testimonials:
If it's appropriate for your business, have a page for testimonials. These are powerful online business marketing tools, as people have a preference for listening to other 'real' people who have experienced your service or product. If you can, have video testimonials rather than text.
Blog:
Blogging is a great way to keep in touch with your customers and provide them with timely, useful information. Blog posts can go viral, bringing you in new leads.
F.A.Q:
Have a page that's dedicated to answering the most commonly asked questions your business gets. You can link back to your 'Contact Us' page to encourage the reader to contact you if their query isn't answered on the page.
Keep Your Site Simple
When you are ready to start building your site, overly complex web design is a major flaw as it takes pages a lot longer to load on browsers. You may have a fantastic page but people will often not bother to wait for it to load, they can either get bored or assume the website is broken. The whole point of a site is to provide information and a simple layout will do that much better.
Another important thing you remember with internet marketing is that the internet is no longer limited to computers and hasn't been for a while. Phones have had internet service for a few years now but recently with the new generation of touchscreen models (such as the iPhone and Google's Nexus One), people are using them more than ever. It's great to think that your online business marketing efforts will reach people's pockets but their limited screen size can cause problems with extremely complex sites and rich advertising, further encouraging the need for simplicity.
This is the core of getting your small business site up and running. Keeping it maintained and real search engine optimisation is a different story but for now, you need to actually create it.
