Building and owning a website is becoming more common these days. That’s because the world is going digital and if you don’t have a website, it might be difficult for your business to thrive. Owning a website increases your online presence, enables you to get in touch with your customers, sell your goods and service online and other benefits.
Are you in Connecticut and you’re wondering how to go about building a website for your business? Worry no more as this article will give you a step-by-step guide on how to build a website for your business in Connecticut. You can contact Connecticut SEO and we can take care of it for you or follow the steps below.
Step 1: Get a domain name and URL
The first step to building a website is to choose a domain name. The quality of your domain name affects how easy it is for customers to locate your site and it affects how customers trust and rely on your brand. So when choosing a domain name, you have to:
- Understand domain names and URLs.
- Keep it consistent with your brand.
- Make it easy to remember.
- Check the availability of social handles and domain names.
- Decide on a domain name extension.
- Buy your domain name.
- Remember to renew: your domain name needs to be renewed consistently.
Step 2: Set up an email address to match your domain name
The second step is to set up an email for your business. When you’re doing this, you need to use one that aligns with your domain name. It gives your business a more professional outlook.
Step 3: Find a web hosting company
Before your website can be published and accessible by your customers on the internet, it must be hosted by a web hosting company. This company creates space for your website on its servers so that all your website content can be secured.
When choosing a hosting company, you can choose the same company that registered your domain name or you could opt for another hosting company.
You’re at liberty to choose any company that benefits your business better. The fees for web hosting services may vary according to the company and also how big your website is.
Step 4: Design your website
When it comes to website design, you have to put your customer’s interests above your choice and preference. When designing your website, you should consider the following factors:
- The information you want to expose your customers.
- You should consider what you want your customers to do on your site.
- Consider the questions they might have.
- And how they may ask their questions.
Design your website in such a way that your users will find their way around your website easily. To do this, you can check out other websites that are into your type of business.
Study how they’ve designed theirs, and check out what should be added or removed to make your website top-notch.
When your website is well designed, your website stands out from others in your niche.
Step 5: Build your website
When you want to build your website, you should consider the maintenance factor. Do not make it so complex that you can’t make changes. At one point or the other, you may need to effect changes to your content. For instance:
- You may need to add more information on sales and offers.
- You may need to change or update your contact information.
- You may need to update the time when you’re open for business. You could update opening time, closing time or public holidays.
If you’re in Connecticut and you want to build your website, you can either do it yourself or employ the service of a professional web designer.
Step 6: Add and manage your website content
After building your website, it’s time to add quality content. You can either buy content or create content. These contents could include videos, images, tools like calculators and landing pages.
Adding quality content to your website will give your business a professional outlook and it’ll make users feel comfortable carrying out transactions with you.
Your content should be able to hold customers’ interest and sell your product or service effectively.
From the wording on your website to the image and videos, it should be able to communicate with your customers. When adding content to your website, remember to:
- Prioritize the most important information.
- Use simple language.
- Ensure the content is easy to scan.
- Use clear headings.
- Make sure your paragraphs are kept short and simple.
Step 7: Publish your website
Once you’ve gone through the following steps, it’s time to publish your website so that your customers can access it. Your website may take a day or two to appear on the internet, so keep that thought in mind when you’re making your plans.
Reasons why you should start a website in Connecticut
There are various benefits to building your website. Check them out below.
- E-commerce
The world is evolving and many people are adopting new ways and cultures. So long as technology keeps improving, E-commerce will always be relevant.
Every day, people buy things from the internet as that’s preferable and safer than going to the market. It’s much easier to make transactions online and this facilitates the buying and selling process.
The key to getting more financial breakthroughs in your business is by engaging in E-Commerce. But this is only achievable when you have an active website where you can run these transactions.
- Business presentation
Another reason why it’s important to start a website in Connecticut is the presentation of your business. No matter how big your business is; your business could be a one-page website that gives a simpler description of your business. Or it could be a complex web platform that’s providing myriads of the business information on different web pages.
The difference between owning a website and when you don’t own one is that customers can easily go online to find more information about your business.
You can make a presentation about what your business is about. Exhibit your goods, services and products on your website as well as how your customers can get them. This is the function that owning a website or a landing page performs.
- Sharing information
By owning a website in Connecticut, you can share more information with your customers or users. Check out recent blogs and websites, they refresh the information they post so that they can keep their users posted and updated. The same applies to your business. Uploading information on your website is a way of sharing new information with your users and customers.
- Education
Another reason to start a website in Connecticut is so that you can educate your users. You can achieve this by posting materials or information on your website to educate your audience. These materials could include online courses, interactive encyclopedias and what have you.
- Communication
This is another reason to start a website. Through your website, you can reach out to more users and customers through online discussions and forums and social networks etc.
- Self-expression and practice
You could start a website so that you can express your creativity or a particular skill, for instance, creative writing and graphic designing.
The quality of your website may vary from others, depending on how you want it to be, but the common factor that runs across all types of business websites is self-expression and growth.
How SEO impacts your website
There’s more to building a website than just buying a domain name and publishing it on the internet. For you to get massive traffic to your site, you need to optimize your website for SEO.
Incorporating SEO into your website increases your online presence and helps your website appear at the top of search engines. Check out how to improve your website SEO below. How to improve your website’s SEO in 5 steps:
- Choose the right URL
- Create titles and descriptions for each page
- Utilize anchor text
- Add alt text to all your images
- Give your site structure with the right headers
How social media marketing helps your website
There are many statistics to prove that social media is an effective tool when it comes to marketing.
- In the US, the average adult visits social media for at least 2.25 hours a day.
- When people patronise your business through social media, about 70% refer others especially if they had a good experience.
- 81% of people research most of their products and services on social media.
- 80% of Twitter users feel inclined to patronise a business if they get a reply to their tweets.
The point is through social media, you can reach out to a larger audience. So between the posting of your goods and services on your social medial posts, you can include the link to your website. You can add your website link to your bio. That way you can convert visitors, family and friends on your social media to your customers.