Your Website Is Super Important For Your Business!

According to Forbes magazine, having a website is important for small business for many different reasons.  From building credibility with customers to capturing leads and web visitors, your website should be an accurate representation of your company.  And even more than just that, it should be a powerful money making machine that brings you leads and new customers.

However, most websites are lost online and do nothing for business owners.  Why is this so, you might wonder?  Many business owners ask the same questions.  Can my website make money and how can I be found on Google are common things that are asked very frequently.

However, the answer isn’t as simple as just improving the design of the site.  The problem is that most web designers don’t know a thing about digital marketing.

Hire A Designer Who Can Set Your Site Up For Success!

The majority of web designers don’t know how to create a dynamic and influential site that can make money for their clients’ small businesses.  The biggest tragedy of all is that small business owners are in the dark when it comes to digital marketing themselves.

They don’t really know what type of designer to hire and they hire a designer for the way the finished product looks (instead of the way it performs).  However, the performance of a website is what will determine your business’s success!  That’s why it’s important to hire a skilled design agency who are also marketing experts such as web design NJ Bizmap LLC!

‘

THE LOOK OF YOUR WEBSITE IS IMPORTANT (BUT NOT THAT MUCH!!!)

Although the structure and look of your website should be professional and in alignment with your branding, it is not the most thing your website should offer.  More than just style, your website should communicate your company values and motivate visitors to use your company or services.

Below we will get right down to it and discuss the real reasons your website is important for your small business.

12 Reasons Your Website Is Important For Your Small Business

1. ANSWER IMPORTANT QUESTIONS

Having a website is important for your small business because your website can answer questions.  Most of the time, customers would rather look online that call a business to find out basic information.  Not having a website would mean missing all of the potential customers who do not want to reach out and ask you about your services.

Additionally, your website can communicate basic and fundamental things about your business that the public would like to have on hand.  A website’s ability to answer consumers questions in just one of the many reasons your website is important to your business.  Without it, customers would be lost.

2. COMMUNICATE YOUR BRAND’S VALUES

A website can easily communicate your brand’s values to people who stumble upon it.  This includes style elements, target market, and other important things that can help visitors decide whether or not to choose your business.

Additionally, business branding signals to visitors that you are established and successful. This simple communication of your stature is enough to help you get new clients.

3. CAPTURE LEADS

A website should ideally capture leads of web visitors.  This is why having a website is so important for your small business.

Distinct and strategic calls to action should be placed on your site’s landing pages.  Structuring your site properly and placing CTA’s in the right places is the difference between a website that makes money and one that does not.

4. INCREASE TRUST

Most people in today’s online era would not trust a business (no matter what kind of business it is) if it does not have a website.  No matter what your business is, and no matter what your revenue, your website is incredibly important and there just simply is no excuse to not have one.

Without a website you not only don’t have the opportunity to get in front of potential consumers.  Additionally, most people would not think your business is legitimate or successful unless you have a website.

5. INCREASE EXPOSURE

Your website should increase the online exposure of your business which is crucial to continue to see growth. For example, if a customer does a search on Google, ideally you would want this potential customer to stumble across your business.

What most web designers don’t tell you is that no one will ever see your business unless your website is SEO optimized.  Hiring a company that is expert in business SEO services AND corporate web design is vital.  And if you’re not familiar with SEO, you can learn more about what SEO is here as well.

Having a website built by a design agency that knows SEO such as Bizmap LLC is incredibly important.  However, most businesses hire designers that only design their website.  And the result is that no one ever sees it.

6. FUNNEL VISITORS

Besides simply landing on a specific page, your website should funnel visitors to different channels.  This will ultimately increase your website’s relevance and value.

A skilled web design agency will understand this funneling process .  With the help of experts your website will send web visitors to different places to either make a purchase or improve your authority (or both!).

7. MAKE A PURCHASE

Your website should be an easy way for customers to make a purchase.  As you may already know, the buying process begins online most of the time.  What this means is that you have a very good opportunity, with a properly designed and optimized website, to make sales with your website.

In today’s world, people are very busy and a little lazy too.  We’re wrapped up in our jobs and want the instant gratification to click “buy now” from the convenience of our couch rather than go to a brick and mortar store.

It’s important to have a website that is set up to at least assist in the purchasing process.  And hiring a developer to build a custom website is an easy way to do just that!

8. SHOW YOU EXIST!

Your website is quite simply, proof of your existence as a business.  Without the powerful combination of a website and local SEO, your business would not show up online (or on Google maps!).

You can read more about how to get a business on Google maps, or you can just take our word for it and hire a company that can do that for you!  We know you won’t be disappointed!

9. 24 HOUR ADVERTISING

Your website is a 24 hour billboard for your business.  Now, I’m assuming your business is not open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  How can you advertise your business when you’re not open or available to take a call?  Your website, of course!

10. DESCRIBE SERVICES

Your website should clearly describe the services your business has to offer.  If you can do this well on your website, you will get more relevant phone calls and leads.

It’s important your brand identity and services are communicated online for many reasons.  And this is another important reason your small business needs a website.

11. BRAND CREDIBILITY

Your website will give you instant brand credibility, which will lead to more sales and customers.  This is a very important reason you need a website.

12. SHOW PEOPLE YOUR NAP

Your website should show people your name, address and phone number.  Most people wouldn’t know how to get in touch with you or where to find you without the convenience of a page or two online.

Having a consistent NAP on your website and other channels is also great for SEO and will boost your listing in local results . Now what’s not to love about that?

Conclusion

In today’s day and age, it is more than important to have a website if you are a small business owner.  Without one, consumers won’t know you exist and you will miss out on loads of revenue.

We hope this article taught you why website is important for small business.

Deciding between single page and multi-page design can be tricky. With mobile and social media browsing on the rise, simple, speedy and responsive single-page websites are among the most popular web trends to date. On the other hand, multi-page websites, defined by traditional navigation flows, are well-known and trusted by users.

It’s a tough call. The best way to choose between single page and multi-page design is to consider your site’s content and navigation flow. Is your site’s content quick and easy to browse, or is there lots of content that needs to be strategically placed for users to find? With a content-first approach to your web design, you’re more likely to pick the right navigation system for your website.

And if you’re still hazy on whether single page or multi-page design is the way to go for their web design, this post will help you weigh up the pros and cons of each. Read on to find the right navigation flow for your site’s content.

A single or one page website is simply a website that only contains one HTML page. There are no additional pages, such as an About, Features or Contact Us page.

As Awwwards explains, content on single page websites is fully loaded in the initial page, making the experience more continuous and fluid for the user. To navigate to different destinations on a single page website, users click navigation links that allow them jump to destinations on the page, or scroll down the page to reach different sections of content.

Single page websites aim to provide just the right amount of information for a user to make a decision and act on it. This is why single-page design is often used for landing pages, portfolios and event-related websites. This minimal web design removes any unnecessary noise from the interface, focusing the user’s attention on the most important content. Read more about the dos and don’ts for one-page web design here.

The pros of single page website design

Why opt for a single page design for your website over a multi-page design? For starters, successful single page websites are clean and comprehensible. A single page website, that splits content into small chunks and removes UI clutter, is easy for users to digest.

Single page design also contributes to an intuitive user journey. With no additional pages, visitors enjoy a linear navigation flow – which tells a story with a clearly-distinguished beginning, middle and end.

Another advantage of having a straightforward navigation system is that there is usually only one action to be taken by the user. Studies show that having a single page can lead to increased conversions (>37.5%) than multi-page sites because users begin the process sooner and move through it more quickly, with nowhere to get lost or distracted by another offer.

Did we mention single design great for responsive mobile websites? With small amounts content (and all fitting on one page), you can adapt single page websites to smaller screens and devices easily and consistently. Plus, scrolling is an easy and natural movement for touch screen mobile devices.

But that’s not all – there are some interesting benefits for designers too. For instance, with only one page, there are zero screen-to-screen links and much less content than on a multi-page design. This makes single-page web design generally easier to implement, iterate and maintain. Hurray!

The cons of single page website design

But it’s not all roses. There are a few reasons why single page design might not be right for your website.

Single page websites aren’t big on SEO (Search Engine Optimization). In fact, they could hurt your chances of ranking with Google and result in decreased conversions and user engagement. With so little content, target keywords often get neglected on single page sites. Moreover, siloing (the practice of structuring your website by main areas of interest to demonstrate authority in those areas) is a no-go. The good news is that there are workarounds, such as using the expandable div to include descriptions and additional imagery.

Additionally, the single page website isn’t the ideal candidate for a growing brand, as its ability to scale is limited. As we’ve already seen, single page websites tend to have a narrow focus and are therefore not well-suited for websites that require large, complex, and/or varied use of content. So even if you’re operating a small site, consider where you’ll be some years down the line and keep that in mind when choosing between single and multi-page design.

Finally, consider the fact that you’ll only have one URL to work with. This might not seem like too big a problem, but how about when you want to share something on your site with the social media community, or track a link in Google Analytics? Every link counts!

Single page v multi-page website design: the multi-page site

A multi-page website contains multiple pages and subpages within a menu. Unlike the single page website, the only way to navigate to and view pages in multi-page design is to click on the links within the menu.

The multi-page design is well-suited to nearly every type of project. Examples of multi-page web design can be found in eCommerce sites (such as Amazon), dashboards (such as Atlassian) and eLearning sites (such as Lynda).

The pros of multipage website design

There are three main advantages of the multi-page over the single page website.

Firstly, multi-page design offers unlimited scalability. Create as many pages as you like and expand the navigation system as needed. For instance, swap your top navigation bar for a custom mega menu with a search bar for endless navigation possibilities. Remember, the type of navigation design you opt for will depend on the depth of your website goes, the more a traditional navigation will struggle – learn more here.

Secondly, the navigation flow of a multi-page site is easy to follow. This type of website has been around since the 90s, which means that most users are familiar with it, and often expect to find multiple pages on sites. As long as your website’s navigation flow is easy to follow, you’re smooth sailing with a multi-page design.

Finally, sites with several pages have powerful SEO capabilities. We’ve established that multi-page sites are more likely to have larger amounts of content than those with a single page. And although the SEO potential of each website heavily relies on your digital marketing strategy, just having the content potential to optimize your SEO is a great start. Learn more about the importance of SEO on your website here.

The cons of multi-page website design

Multi-page websites seem to have worked for us up until now, but there are a few disadvantages to take into account.

For instance, consider how you’ll manage regular updates to your site. Don’t forget that all that content needs to be maintained by the design and content teams. When considering whether to design a one page or multi-page website, you need to think about whether having lots of content is cost-effective. As Undsgn says: “updating and maintaining a single page is easier than taking care of several – you can’t argue with math!” And remember that low-quality or under-optimized content is just plain bad for business.

Another thing to take into consideration is your site’s bounce rate. Websites with heavy amounts of content are often slow-loading, distracting, and can cause users to bounce– according to Search Engine Journal. And although not every multi-page website is content-heavy, with all that room to scale, it’s something to look out for. Read this post for more on optimizing your content and images.

Finally, multi-page design is harder to adapt to mobile. Unlike single page sites, where the same backend code can be used to develop the mobile site, multi-page designs need to be started from scratch to produce the mobile version. Not only is this more costly and time-consuming, but you risk losing design consistency across web and mobile platforms.

Single page v multi-page website design – what’s the best solution?

We hope our post has shed some light on the differences between single and multi-page design. To sum up: single page design is great when you’ve got narrow focus or you’re encouraging users to perform a specific task. It’s also ideal for mobile-first design. On the other hand, multi-page design allows you to widen your reach potential, stick to traditional navigation systems and optimize your SEO strategy.

When determining whether to design a single or multi-page website, there is no rule of thumb. The most important thing to do is to put your content first. Consider the information you need to get to your users and how to make that information as accessible to users as possible. And if you’re still not sure, let’s chat!

---

Today’s marketers need to do more with less. They needs to connect with their audience in a highly personalized way, while staying on budget. Marketers that can do this—connect with their prospects and customers in a highly targeted way—will be successful in delivering ROI and revenue back to the business.

As the VentureBeat report illustrates, no marketing category has the longevity of email marketing. While some marketing trends come and go, email remains the most powerful channel available to the modern marketer.

Here are 7 reasons why:

1. Email has larger reach.

With Facebook boasting over 1 billion active users and Twitter boasting 255 million, it’s tempting to believe that social media is the most effective way to reach the masses. These are impressive numbers, but what isn’t so frequently shared are the statistics on email usage.

The total number of worldwide email accounts was 3.9 billion in 2013, and projected to reach 4.9 billion by 2017, according to Radicati.

While this might seem surprising at first, think about your own online behavior: When you sign up for a website (like an online store), you have to enter your email address to create the account. You even need an email address to create a Facebook or Twitter account. What’s more, Facebook and Twitter email to notify users of activity, like when someone is tagged in a photo.

Email is the currency of the web, and anybody who’s online has an active email address. And while Facebook and Twitter might seem pretty ubiquitous, the ongoing struggle over data breaches and privacy means plenty of people are exiting some social media channels.

So when it comes to connecting with your prospects and customers, there’s no channel with a wider reach than email.

2. Email delivers your message.

If marketers have to choose between adding a subscriber to their email list, or gaining a new Facebook fan, they should go for the email subscriber every time.

There are two key reasons why:

First, 90% of email gets delivered to the intended recipient’s inbox, whereas only 2% of your Facebook fans see your posts in their News Feed. This is because Facebook limits the number of times your posts appear in the News Feed in an attempt to drive brands towards their paid advertising options.

This is a big deal when it comes to getting your messages in front of your desired audience.

On Facebook, if you post an update to your 10,000 fans only about 200 of them will even have a chance of seeing it in their News Feed. Alternatively, if you send an email campaign to 10,000 subscribers at least 9,000 of them will receive it in their inbox.

This means your message is 45 times more likely to be seen using email than Facebook.

Secondly, your email subscribers have explicitly told you they want to hear from you when they signed up for your email list.

There are strict laws and regulations around SPAM laws, so if you’re emailing a prospect or customer, it’s because they gave you their permission. Now think about the ads in your Facebook News Feed – did you ask those companies to market to you?

Probably not. More than likely, you performed a Google search or visited their website. That’s decidedly different than proactively signing up from an email newsletter.

Email is proven to ensure your audience gets your message.

3. Email drives conversions.

Most marketers are laser focused on driving conversions. Regardless of whether they do so in the form of leads, sales, memberships, or a metric unique to your business strategy, the ultimate goal for marketers is to turn potential customers into paying customers.

And when it comes to conversions, there isn’t a more powerful channel than email.

In fact, the average click-through rate of an email campaign is around 3% (of total recipients), whereas the average click-through rate from a tweet is around 0.5%.

This means you are 6x more likely to get someone to click through to your website via email than you are from Twitter. As discussed earlier, your email subscribers have told you they want to hear from you and this isn’t typically the case with social.

4.24% of visitors from email marketing buy something as compared to 2.49% of visitors from search engines and 0.59% from social media, according to a survey conducted by Monetate.

What’s more, email is highly measurable. Campaign Monitor customers have real-time access to metrics like opens, clicks, bounces, forwards, social shares, and more.

Additionally, those who integrate their email marketing into a CRM like Salesforce can see firsthand how their email marketing impacts business opportunities and deals.

As a marketer focused on nurturing leads and driving conversions—as most marketers are—email marketing trumps all other communication channels for business.

4. Email has a higher ROI.

Given email’s unmatched ability to drive conversions, it makes sense that email is also the most effective marketing channel to drive ROI for your company. In fact, email marketing yields an average 3,800% return on investment for businesses and for every $1 spent on email marketing, the average return on investment is $38.

It’s clear from these statistics that email is a cost-effective channel for marketers, but why does it outperform other channels so significantly when it comes to ROI?

It comes down to delivering highly personalized and relevant messages. Unlike social networks where you send status updates to every follower regardless of their location, interests & purchase history, email allows you to be hyper-targeted with your communications.

The more data you have about your customers in an email marketing tool like Campaign Monitor—including insights pulled in from integrated systems like your CRM, customer service solution, etc—the more targeted you can be.

Campaign Monitor customer Rip Curl utilized segmentation and dynamic content to deliver the right message to the right person. For example, they know the gender of their subscribers and where they are located geographically, so they can ensure that females in the United States receive a promotion about bathing suits during the summer months and males in Australia receive an email about wetsuits during the winter months.

This use of segmentation and dynamic content helps to ensure the content they send is relevant to every individual recipient and that relevance drives people to click-through, make purchases – and increase the ROI of their email marketing campaigns.

5. Email is the preferred communication channel.

For many, social networks are a personal form of communication used to keep up to date with friends & family. When people log in to their social media accounts, they’re there to see photos and updates from people they know and care about.

Email, on the contrary, is a much more professional medium and people expect to receive information about products and services through that channel.

In fact, studies show 72% people prefer to receive promotional content through email, compared to 17% who prefer social media.

6. Email is an open platform.

Over the past few years, many brands have invested millions of dollars into buying large social followings in order to be able to communicate and engage with an audience.

But while businesses are investing in various social media platforms, Facebook has frequently updated its algorithm to reduce the amount of followers who will see a brand’s post, unless those posts are paid advertisements.

This practice has become so prevalent that 98% of brand followers will never see the posts in their News Feeds. Twitter seems to be moving in a similar direction with the announcement it will introduce an algorithm-controlled feed as well.

The issue with channels like Facebook and Twitter is they’re owned and controlled by third parties which means marketers are at the mercy of changes the platforms make to their platform.

Meanwhile, email isn’t owned or controlled by any one particular entity. It’s an open communication platform and there are a multitude of services that provide access to send and receive email.

The diverse array of companies involved in email marketing ensures that no one party can make changes that would have a widespread effect, and unlike Facebook or Twitter, if you invest the time and money into building and cultivating a great email list, your subscriber list will be an asset you own. Thus you’ll be able to leverage your list without the threat of someone limiting its effectiveness.

7. Email will be around forever.

Remember MySpace? What?

The once-hot site was the largest social networking site in the world between 2005 and 2008, and in June 2006 surpassed Google as the most visited website in the United States. Yet where is MySpace now? All those users eventually moved on to other social networks, and the site is now the 1,500th most popular website in the United States.

Imagine investing significant amounts of time and money to build an audience on a platform only to find it a ghost town just a year or two later. The impact on your ability to reach and engage potential customers would be catastrophic.

On the other hand, email has a long history of stability. The first promotional email campaign was sent in 1978 to a total of 400 people and email has been growing consistently since.

Interestingly, the email space itself has evolved from a time where you needed a developer to build an email to today, where tools like Campaign Monitor empower the modern marketer to create and send beautiful branded emails with ease. This shift has put the power of business email into the hands of more people.

Building your email list, unlike building a social media following, is a stable long-term investment that will pay off for many years to come.