Small Business Talk
The Podcast to Grow your Business Faster
Website Essentials That Your Website Really Needs with Cathy Smith
Show Notes
Background
Cathy Smith from CATCO Enterprises tells us about website essentials what your website really needs when the tables are turned and our host becomes the guest, thanks Tasha Kershaw for being our guest host.
Cathy is the Attraction Maven at CATCO Enterprises and helps thriving business owners break through the digital disconnect and attract more customers online easily. Cathy understands that only having a website is no longer enough to get Google to notice you. She has done the miles and knows how to help you translate your knowledge, experience and skills into the online space to attract your ideal customers. This will enable you to grow your business with a steady stream of customers who value your service and become raving fans
Learn some of Cathy’s insights on websites and after having run a successful marketing business for 19 years.
Make Your Message Clear
It is essential to ensure your website message is clear. There’s nothing worse than doing a Google search and ending up at a website and they’re not really being sure whether they can help you or not.
Easy Navigation
If your website is confusing, those viewing it will hit the back button and leave, so ensure it is easy to navigate and the listings that come under your main points are really clear and easy to find. Your navigation should have a home button, so once people are off the homepage, they can always go back.
Contact Information
A new trend over the past few years is to take off the contact button and hide it down the bottom. Unless you’re a really large website, Google doesn’t like this and it makes it hard for people to contact you.
Your contact information on your website should include how people can contact you. A phone number right up the top and preferably on the right-hand side is ideal. If you don’t have a website, you really need to be checking on what kind of design you’re going to put and make sure that you can add a phone number.
Promote the Products and/or Services You Offer
Most websites are found by Google search. If you haven’t got your products listed, then it is difficult for Google to send traffic to those products. Include the benefits and a brief description about each product. Google works on words and word matching, so it wants to make sure that whatever you’re saying will match peoples search. Google wants their customers, the people doing google searches, to have a good customer experience. If people are bouncing straight back out of your website, then Google will think that they’re not having a good customer service experience and direct them to a different businesses website instead.
High Quality Images
High quality images, clear images are important. You still need the words for Google and you still need the words to people who prefer to read, but high quality, clear images is missing from a lot of websites these days.
Ensure images are high quality in the format, but not the size, you don’t want huge far sizes, particularly now that we’re loading a lot on mobile.
What to Include When Updating an Existing Website?
If you have an old domain name that you’ve been using for quite a while, even though you want a brand new website, make sure you still keep using that URL because that carries a huge amount of weight with Google.
Keep the design clean and easy to read to ensure as soon as people reach your homepage, they know exactly who you are and what you do.
Ensure your website is mobile responsive and displays correctly on Android and iPhones. Check wording on images displays correctly on a mobile device view your website on a few different devices to see how it looks.
Website Essentials That Your Website Really Needs
Listen to Small Business Talk Episode 079 for the full episode.
