Business • Research •
A Blueprint for Small Business Success
A Simple Guide To Get You Started
Introduction
Did you know that 85% of consumers research a brand online before making a purchasing decision? This is why an online presence is crucial for any business to succeed. In this post, we’ll highlight some of the basic steps needed to create your website. Don’t be intimidated, every website goes through an incremental improvement process. You’ll need to have this mindset before moving forward. That being said, let’s get started with the basics.
What You’ll Need
Here is an outline of the most basic necessities to get your website up and running.
- Domain
- Hosting
- CMS
- Theme
Domain Registration
The domain is the URL that gets entered into the browser that points to your website. Think about what terms a customer may use to find your business. It is highly recommended to use your brand name as your domain ( ex. Synmek.com ). Domain registrations range between $4.99 – $100+ per year depending on the TLD ( domain extension – .com, .ca, .io, .biz, etc. ) At Synmek, we recommend registering your domain with a reputable registrar such as Namecheap.
Hosting
Hosting is the component that will house your website files and serve them to your potential customer when they visit your domain. Depending on the functionality of your website and how many users you are expecting, your hosting package may vary. For most small to medium sized businesses, a shared hosting package is both affordable and sufficient for your needs. Most domain registrars provide hosting. Namecheap has a great hosting package for starting your website. Look for packages that include unlimited storage and unlimited bandwidth.
CMS – Content Management Systems
There are quite a few CMS out there, with WordPress being the most popular. However, before you choose your content management system, you’ll need to decide on the use of your website. If you’re considering a full blown ecommerce website, then a system designed for basic content management won’t be ideal. For e-commerce websites, we recommend either Shopify or the Woocommerce plugin if you’re more comfortable with WordPress.
Recommended Reading: https://synmek.com/why-wordpress-cms-is-ideal-for-your-small-business-website/
Theme
Once you have your domain, hosting & CMS finalized, it is now time to choose a theme. WordPress offers over 40,000 themes that are designed with various functionalities and aesthetics. There are a variety of themes from premium paid themes to free ones. Keep in mind though, that the free themes usually don’t offer much functionality, customizability and might include malicious code. For the ideal website, we recommend having a custom approach. At Synmek, we design custom WordPress websites that are backed by user research. Other themes are cookie cutter approaches designed to just get you started.
Marketing Your New Website
Once you’ve selected your theme or had one custom designed, it is now time to move onto marketing your new website. The easiest way to begin driving traffic to your new website is through social media channels. Social Media helps drive traffic instantly rather than the search engine optimization route. However, this does not mean you shouldn’t pay attention to your SEO. Search Engine Optimization is the long term strategy, which will help drive traffic in the long term as you climb search engine rankings. Although social media will give you instant results, SEO will take much longer and have a larger commitment. Finally, there are PPC ( Pay-Per-Click) campaigns like Google’s AdWords. PPC campaigns are paid for advertisements that are placed either near the top or the bottom of a search engine when a user searches for the targeted keywords. For example, a flooring store may run a PPC campaign to target users searching for carpet installation or carpet stores. Depending on the competition, you should be able to begin a campaign for as little as $100.
Recommended Reading: https://synmek.com/best-seo-tactics-canada/
Final Thoughts & Recommendations
There you have it, a simple checklist to get you started with your online business website. Although hiring a professional designer or developer will get you better results, you can still start your website today. Keep this one rule in mind: Your website is always evolving and should be optimized regularly. Make sure you really understand your target customer to craft a website specifically for them. Ensure all of your landing pages and forms are tweaked to have the highest conversions. Finally, social media is your best friend to begin driving traffic to your website while your SEO efforts kick in.
Happy Building & if you ever need any advice or help, Synmek is here to guide you. Contact us today and our experts will be more than happy to answer any questions you may have regarding your website, marketing or design needs.
