As an entrepreneur, we can assume you’ve got your own website up and running. Perhaps it’s in the works at the moment. This is a great first step. Existing online is the first step to making your business work. However, too many startups forget one essential thing when it comes to their website. User experience. As a startup, you are competing against thousands of others. You’re desperate to get your name and brand out there. Here’s how you don’t lose those potential customers at the first hurdle.
Brand and Mission
As a new business, you need to stake your claim. It’s time to plant your flag on the digital moon. You need to tell visitors who you are and what you do immediately. Keep it simple and straight to the point. If you can’t tell people why they should stick with you in the first 10 seconds, they’re gone. Build your brand and keep it consistent.
Call to Action
Great user experience always leads the customer to the call of action. It’s a simple process. You tell them what you do, you intrigue them, and then you convert them. It’s really important that you identify your call of action. As a new business, your first goal might be to build a community. Your call of action would therefore be to sign up to email alerts or social media.
Consistency
Build your website for the visitor who has never been here before. Would your site make sense to a new customer? Keep every page consistent through design and placement. Also, make sure that the navigation is consistent and they can always get back to where they came from.
Simple Sign ups
As a startup, you’ll be hoping to convert new visitors into paying customers. That means sign up forms for purchases etc. At this point, you’ve intrigued your customer enough to make that conversion. Don’t lose them at this stage! Keep everything simple. Use little tricks like a postcode finder API to automatically fill their address quickly. Don’t ask for too much information. Focus on making that conversion and not losing the customer in the process.
Responsive
This has become the number one consideration when building websites. A responsive design means that your site functions perfectly on mobile devices. More and more people are using tablets and smartphones to access the web. The vast majority of these are using them to buy products. Make sure your site works on a number of platforms and browsers.
Fonts
This may seem like a small thing, but it can make a huge difference – just ask a web designer. Stick to a large, clean font that is easy to read. Don’t try to be too fancy. Your goal here is mass readership. Simple fonts like arial work on every browser and operating system. They are familiar and perform best in this scenario.
The big takeaway from this article is to focus on simplicity! Stake your claim and inform new visitors quickly and simply. From there, waste no time in hooking them and converting them. You’ll be well on your way to getting your startup off the ground!
