smallbusiness.co.uk: Helping your business think big

Having a well-designed website can be crucial to the success of your business. Here are some top tips on how to secure your visitors’ interest and get ahead on the web, from SmallBusiness.co.uk and Bea Hatherley, co-founder and director of online specialist Mr Site.

1. Think About Your Audience

Tailor the look and feel of your site to the customer who will be buying from, browsing or using it. Consider tailoring content for different countries, as this will yield positive results in terms of repeat visitors and sales.

2. Keep Your Web Name Simple

Keep your website name short (15 characters max), simple and easy to remember. If you’re a UK-only company, get a co.uk website name, as this tells potential visitors you’re based in the UK. If you trade internationally, use a .com or .net name.

3. Design it Right

Use consistent colours with good contrast. Red text on a green background is a bad idea as ten per cent of the UK population is colour-blind. Clean, simple colours are essential. Keep text to at least point-size 12 and animations to a minimum.

4. Don’t Overwrite

Overcomplicated terms and words will put people off. Ideally, there should be no more than one paragraph on your homepage. If you need to include more in-depth material, situate it deeper within the website.

5. Get On Google

Let Google know about your site at www.google.com/addurl. Add META tags to your pages and give each image an ALT tag. These are descriptions for images, within which you can use your 'keywords' and 'phrases'. ALT tags can also make your website more accessible to those who are visually impaired.

6. Keep Your Website up to Date

Use relevant, fresh and up-to-date content. Consider adding a news or events page. Aim to update content at least every two weeks. This will also improve your ranking on Google.

7. Don’t Plagiarise

Images, music or text which are not your own may lead to getting sued. So write your own copy and book your own photographer. Alternatively, use royalty-free images from stockists such as istockphoto.com or www.sxc.hu.

For more information about Mr Site, go to www.mrsite.co.uk

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