It is very important to have a website for your business because a good website is an easy way to attract and retain more clients. Using a site like WordPress helps you build a quality site very quickly, and as you familiarize yourself with the platform, it becomes that much easier to tweak the site to meet your clients’ needs. That said, the first thing to do is get started, so here are 5 steps to creating your WordPress website or your business.
Step 1: Securing a Domain Name
The first thing to do is buy a cheap domain name, and then find a hosting space. There are several hosts available but Bluehost is one of the best in terms of value. Choose a domain name that is catchy, not too long, and reflects the ethos of your business. Once you check the domain’s availability, make sure to pay the fee to secure it.
Step 2: Select Free Design Reflecting Your Profession
WordPress is great for building a business website and it is available at the right price – Free! There are lots of reasons designers love WordPress – there are tons of available themes, relevant plugins, and easy to update. The other benefit is WordPress is open source, which means it can be altered as needed with some adjustments to the base code file.
Choosing a theme is very easy – there are many free themes and several of the themes are designed for specific businesses. So, if you are a plumber, search for plumbing themes and you will see many professional themes that cost absolutely nothing. This is the case or pretty much any conventional business.
Step 3: Start the Edits and Templating Content
At this point you will put placeholder information and data where the theme requires it. There are some themes that let you insert sample data with just a click of a button, this is the “lorem ipsum” text that is seen with new sites and their prototypes.
The reason you want sample data on your site is so you can see how everything looks before you insert the actual data. You can make changes to the copy and settle on an appearance before you have the site go live. Everything – including making the widgets find their proper place – is completed in this part of the build.
Other things to do at this point is get your branding right. Make sure you have a good logo along with a proper slogan. Plugins like iBusiness are great for helping you create and upload new logos.
Also, don’t be afraid to play with the colors – WordPress themes are designed to be beholden to your creativity, so if you don’t like the colors, then change them to what you do like.
Step 4: Input Your Business’s Information
At this point you have figured out the site’s layout so now replace the sample data with the actual data relevant to your business. At this point, you will have different pages that need content and it is in this area where your site begins to take shape.
An important thing to do is create intuitive menus on the site. These menus should have links to all the important pages, such as the “About Us” and “Contact” pages. The menu lets site visitors move through the site easily. It is also a good idea to have lots of internal links as well, so your visitors need not go to the menu if they want to just click a link within the text.
One of the most important things you can do is have a thoughtfully designed homepage. Use the editing options to make your homepage inviting and helpful. The homepage must reflect the ethos of your business along with giving customers reasons to check out other areas of the site.
Your service page(s) are important as well. This is where you demonstrate your proficiency at what you do. Make sure to explain things in simple terms. If you get too “inside baseball” on how plumbing works, for example, your customer will not understand why they need your services; they will know you have a lot of plumbing knowledge.
The About Us page tells the story of your business. Make sure this is not a stroking of your ego, but rather telling your story in a way that connects to a customer’s pain points and shows how you found the solution they are looking for.
Finally, make sure you have contact forms on the site. This is a great way to collect information and then get connect with the potential customers interested in your business’s services. Avoid having too many places, just simply have their name, phone number, e-mail address, and reason why they are contacting you.
Step 5: Promotions
There are several ways to promote your site, and those include old-school and new-school ways of doing so. Business cards are great because they are a tangible connection that people will have to you, so make sure your site is on the cards.
For more new methods of promotion, a great idea is using social media. You should have twitter, Instagram, facebook, and SnapChat connected to your site. This will attract more people across many different demographics. And, guess what – social media advertising is remarkably cost-effective.
Another thing you need to do is make sure your site is properly maintained. Keeping old content in place does nothing to help your site move up SEO ranks and as the business world changes, your site needs to be agile and reflect those changes. When you update with the latest information about your business, this helps your SEO.
Speaking of SEO – make sure to keep track. You should always know where your site is on the SEO rankings and work towards building it up with internal and external links, relevant content, and proper SEO features such as meta-descriptions, relevant H1’s, alt-tagging of images, and several other small but helpful elements. Yoast SEO is a great tool for that.
Having a site for your business is critical, and with these 5 steps, your business will have a great site quite quickly.
