What To Watch Out For When Building A Website For Your Business In 2022 [Benefits + Must-Haves]

A whopping 76% of consumers look at a website first before physically visiting a business.

In addition to building trust and credibility, it is essential for your business to have a website so your potential customers can explore your offering, get excited about your brand, and find out how they can interact with your brand in person through contact and location info.

Gaining access to this information, in addition to reviews and other forms of social proof, will help website visitors decide whether they will make a purchase.

If you’re not sure where to begin in building a website for your business, you’re in the right place.

In this article, we’ll share insights from website development consultants on why your business must have a website and the elements to look for when building your website.

Why Does Your Business Need A Website?

From ensuring your brand looks professional to increasing your rank on search engines, here’s why your business needs a website in 2022.

1. Makes Your Business Look More Credible

A website makes your business look more credible since it requires you to register your domain name, find a web hosting company, allocated a budget, and create relevant content your target audience can engage with.

If you’re not a pro at web design, it’s best to find developers are designers out there who are.

The cost of building a website will depend on whether you choose a custom or template approach, along with the hourly rates a web design agency will charge you, and the agency’s expertise.

While you can create a website using pre-designed templates, a custom website created by top web design agencies yields better results in terms of visibility, optimization, user journey and other key elements.

The bottom line? Creating a website provides more credibility for your brand.

2. Displays Your Social Proof When Building a Website

According to a recent report, nine out of 10 customers worldwide read customer reviews before purchasing a product.

Showcasing your best social proof such as user testimonials and media mentions on your website is a compelling way to build trust.

Your homepage is the best place to position your testimonials since it provides this social proof upfront and center.

While third-party review sites are often labeled as fake and inauthentic, user-generated content and real reviews help humanize your brand and are often a key factor in a purchasing decision for other potential customers. 

3. Drives Your SEO

When you have a website, you have a driving force that leads potential customers to your brand — as long as your site is optimized for search engines.

SEO increases organic traffic (or your site visitors who land on your website for free) by ranking your website higher on search engines such as Google.

You can create an optimized website by:

• Publishing relevant and engaging content such as blog posts
• Ensure that your site’s meta descriptions, title tags and headers are optimized for your target keywords

4. Showcases Your Brand’s Offerings

A website enables you to show potential consumers what you can offer them by displaying high-quality images and videos of your products and services.

If you own a restaurant, show mouth-watering images of the food and drinks you serve.

Even better, you can give them a glimpse into how you prepare your meals by posting an engaging video of your chef in action!

While visuals are already a powerful tool, don’t forget about the little yet meaningful details such as product descriptions.

Product descriptions educate your customers by providing the information they need to decide whether or not they’ll purchase your product.

5. Displays Your Contact Information When Building a Website

Your website is a valuable source to make your contact information known and visible.

Position your contact information or a contact button on a sticky navigation menu, so it follows your site visitor wherever they are on your page, always within reach.

Worried about spam submissions?

You can create a contact form and integrate reCAPTCHA, a security service that protects your website from fraud and spam, to prove your site visitor is a human who is genuinely interested in getting in touch.

6. Makes Your Location Easier To Find

If you have a brick-and-mortar store, embedding Google Maps into your website helps potential customers find your exact location.

Whether you operate a retail store, hotel, restaurant, event venue or something entirely different, a clear address and directions on your website are key to funneling people to your physical location.

7. Improves Customer Service

Your website should contain important details such as contact information, operating hours, pricing and customer service.

To make your customer service even better (think 24 hour-support!), you can integrate a chatbot into your website.

From making information accessible at any time to providing quick replies, a chatbot acts as your website’s gatekeeper in interacting with your customers.

9 Features And Functionalities To Look Out For When Building A Website

Here are nine insights we gathered from top web design experts to make your website drive conversions.

• Ensure your website is mobile-first since 79% of visitors say that they will revisit a website if they can access it from their phone
• Use a clean design to increase readability and allow your site visitors to focus on your content and brand
• Implement a color scheme that represents your brand, especially since colors can trigger an emotional response
• Utilize sticky navigation to ensure your user navigates your site quickly and can always access key points
• Use specific CTAs to guide your potential customer in taking the desired action (to convert) on your website
• Integrate artificial intelligence into your website and use a chatbot to provide 24/7 support for your customers
• Ensure your contact information is visible by positioning your contact details or a “Call Us” button in your sticky navigation bar
• Build trust and credibility with social proof such as testimonials and media mentions so you can showcase how your previous customers were satisfied with your offerings
• Use SEO best practices by optimizing headers, title tags and meta descriptions for target keywords, to improve your ranking on Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs)