Having a website for your business is a must in this digital day and age, but it’s important to note that simply having a website is not enough to propel your company forward in a competitive industry. No, you need to have an amazing website. You need a site that brings form and function together and embodies your brand and its unique identity, while at the same time providing a stellar user experience to your potential and existing customers.
Having a functional website that’s also visually appealing and boasts a contemporary design will not only make your brand more memorable, but it will also help you rank higher in the SERPs, and will help with brand visibility in general. With all of that in mind, let’s go over the five key features that you need to have on your website.
A branded website experience
A brand is not really a website feature per se, but it’s still one of the most important elements of your digital presence as a whole. In a saturated online world, your customers need a way to differentiate between businesses that operate within the same niche, and they need to figure out which brands are the most trustworthy. This is why you need to brand your website and weave your unique identity into the design and the narrative.
Marketing your brand to your online audience will elevate your standing in the industry, build brand authority, and help you improve all of your website metrics. In turn, this will help you take lead generation as well as customer retention forward.
SEO-friendly content
Speaking of brand visibility and authority, another key element of a winning website is, of course, search engine optimization. If your goal is to drive organic traffic to your website and get quality leads, then it’s important that you optimize your website and its content for all relevant search engines, such as Google or Bing.
To achieve this, you will have to research the relevant keywords and integrate them into your site’s copy, articles, and blogs, product descriptions, as well as images and video descriptions. That said, be sure to avoid keyword stuffing and other common SEO pitfalls if you are to stay on Google’s good side and actually reach the top spot in the SERPs.
Tools and features that build social proof
One of the most powerful marketing and brand-building tools in your arsenal is social proof because nowadays customers are taking their sweet time researching numerous brands until they find the perfect one that’s deserving of their trust, loyalty, and money. Needless to say, you need to build social proof on your website by integrating a reliable social proof tool along with a set of website features that will empower visitors to trust you, buy from you, and disseminate your brand on social media.
Be sure to use a tool that will display notifications to new visitors whenever someone buys something from your site, and integrate product reviews, ratings, testimonials, and user-generated content in general that will help push potential customers through the sales funnel.
CTAs and contact information
Of course, you can’t expect to convert potential customers if they can’t reach you, or if your website is so confusing that they have no idea where to find your contact information, or how to place an order. You need to simplify the buyer’s journey as much as possible, and you can do that by strategically placing CTA buttons on every page, and making your contact information easy to find.
Now, keep in mind that not every CTA should work towards making a sale, because you want your potential customers to also sign up for your newsletter, share your content, or download your free products. With that in mind, be sure to craft CTAs with a clear value proposition that will tell the customer exactly what they’re getting.
Search and live chat functions
Finally, be sure to make yourself available to your customers at all times by integrating a live chat function into your site, and make their experience as seamless as possible by adding a search function. While these two features might not seem like they are connected at first, they actually complement each other in a big way.
The search function will help visitors find what they’re looking for before deciding to get in touch, while the live chat feature will help them answer any last questions they might have before making a purchase. Together, the search function and the live chat will help you drive sales and boost UX on your website.
Wrapping up
In the competitive business world, having a website simply doesn’t cut it anymore – you need to have a website that is completely optimized for the modern customer, as well as the search engines. Be sure to integrate these features and solutions in order to grow your business in 2020 and beyond.
About the author: Mia Taylor
