Creating A Website For Your Business.
If you are serious about business these days you need to have a website both as a contact point and another route to market.
You will probably find that most of your competitors have a website and are already enjoying the extra income it provides.
Building Your Website
The first decision you need to make is whether you hire a local person to design your site or whether you hire it out to foreign developers. This being the internet it is very possible to hire programmers from Eastern Europe or India for a very competitive price.
One thing to consider with this though is how easily you will be able to communicate your designs and vision for your website.
On the whole I feel it is better that you at least get your first site or first few pages written locally. That way you get a chance to talk face to face with the developer and give and receive immediate feedback on what works and what does not.
Later on if you wish to make modifications then by all means hire the work out abroad, you will already have a design and concept to show at that stage and communication of ideas should be a lot easier.
Provide Valuable Content
The purpose of a website is not just to reach people who were searching for your type of business, you are also trying to get people to read your latest news and offers, and make an enquiry or buying decision.
The best way of doing this is to have fresh and useful content on there. Write short articles about the kind of things your customers might be interested in.
If your home business is computer repair, for example, you could keep track of the latest virus threats on your site and offer help to anyone affected.
This not only provides useful information but also displays your expertise and gives your business credence.
Learn Some Basic Search Engine Optimisation.
One thing you have to learn early on is what phrases or keywords people are typing into the search engines to find businesses like yours.
Your website developer should be able to help you here as they will usually have software available where you can generate a list of keywords relevant to your business.
People who do not know your business name will not search for it in the search engines. Therefore you need to know what keywords they are trying to search on and build pages on your website that include those keywords in the title of the page, the article title and several times in the article body.
Summary
This is just a short guide to building a website, there is so much more that you could learn, if you have the time.
However, the best tip we can give is to have a clear vision of what you want your website to look like and its composition.
Once you have this, as is usual good business practice, make sure you get several quotes before committing yourself to a particular website designer. You will probably find that quotes will vary quite considerably and it is best to shop around.
About the Author
Trevor Sadowski has been building ecommerce web sites for several years and has built up a wealth of experience.
Visit his website at http://www.ecommerceintro.com to pick up your copy of his free 7 step ecommerce guide.
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