What Must you Have to Develop a Website? Clear List to Help you out

You already know that a website is a need for your business and want some clarity on what it would take to develop your website. This article would serve as a to-do list for getting your website running smoothly and effectively. As expected, you’d hire a digital marketing agency to get your web development done, but it would be an advantage to have a good understanding of what you’re getting into. Let’s see what is required of you to get started.

1. Domain Name

A domain name is what people type in a web browser’s search field to find a website. It is a permanent address for a website so you’ll want to take some time choosing the name. If you already have a business name you can check the availability of your name on whois.com. If it’s not available then you have to choose another one. You probably have typed in a domain name before in a browser, something like www.softeky.com and you’ve noticed that some websites have a different extension. Let’s look at the common ones so you can use the best fit for your business:

• .com– the most common extension, mostly used for commercial websites.
• .edu– best fit for educational websites.
• .org– suitable for non-profit organizations and other organizations.
• .gov– only used for governmental web pages.

You should use the domain extension that depicts your business category as you would be requested to provide legitimate proof of organization or institution. After checking for the availability of your domain name you can go ahead to buy and register with any of the well-known registrars like NameCheap, Bluehost, A2, and Godaddy etc.  

2. Web Hosting Plan

Your website is a collection of web pages and related content that is identified by a common domain name and published on a web server. A web host provides a space on the internet for your website to dwell. This hosting gives anyone access to your website. It is also the responsibility of your hosting service to manage your website under any of these three web hosting plans:

1. Shared Hosting: This is the least expensive and recommended for a small project website. The hosting resources are shared and you have no control over the server.
2. Dedicated Server Hosting: It is more expensive than shared hosting. In this hosting, you have control over the server, and the hosting resources are used by you alone. This significantly increases your web speed and performance.
3. Virtual Private Server Hosting: This hosting plan gives you complete control over the server. It is the best choice if you’re developing custom appliances or running a SaaS business.

  Now that you’ve gotten an idea of the hosting plans you can select your hosting service amongst the best in the industry.  

3. Web Development Plan

In your marketing plan, you may have included having a website. Don’t stop there! Design a web development plan, set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Authentic, Realistic, and Time-bound) goals, and set relevant KPIs and metrics that would help checkmate your performance. Your plan should answer questions like:

• What do you hope to achieve with your website? Do you want to increase sales, drive traffic, generate leads, or showcase your product/service using your website?
• How do you intend to achieve that goal?
• How do you want the website to look?
• How would you love your web content to be organized?
• What actions do you want your web visitors to take on the website?
• What are the KPIs you’ll use to measure web performance?
• Who would you need to work on the project?
• When do you want your site launched?
• How much are you willing to invest in your website?

When you’ve got these answers outlined, you’ll make your web development process fun and productive.

4. Buyer Persona

A buyer persona is a semi-fictional representation of an ideal customer based on real data and some select speculations about your customer demographics, behavior patterns, motivation, and goals. Your customers are valuable to your business and understanding them would help you meet their needs. Ensure you;

• Understand their buying process
• Know where they live
• Understand what they’re interested in
• Get to know their pain points
• Understand why they’ll purchase what you offer
• Determine what motivates their buying
• Discover what their expectations are when using your product or service
• Know their income status and more.

This information can help you create relevant content that can drive action on your website and increase the conversion rate for your business. Make sure you meet the needs of your buyer persona with what you offer.

5. Web Content

Use the information you’ve gotten from the audience research run earlier to create relevant content they would resonate with. Reference your brand’s tone and voice when creating your content. Your brand’s voice is your brand’s personality while your brand’s tone is how you express that personality. Use these guidelines to create killer content;

• Make your home page the first conversion point.
• Do not overwhelm your visitors with irrelevant information.
• Be clear, precise, and engaging as possible.
• Use simple and conversational English in your content
• Use a straightforward layout.
• Include a CTA (call to action) on every page of your website.
• Understand the buyer’s journey.
• Provide relevant information about your product or service.
• Use enough white space.

 

6. Images

Humans learn and think in pictures, that’s why it’s integral to use quality images on your website. A website is perceived to be professional when it uses high-quality images to depict its product or service. Other advantages to using high-quality images on your website are:

• They make your web content interesting to read.
• They enhance search engine optimization.
• They boost sales of products or services.
• They boost brand promotion.
• They help lead generation and conversion.
• They increase the quality of user engagement.

Using images with people in them feels more human and engaging. You can get stock photos from Pixabay, Pexels, and Shutterstock. Edit the photos so they’ll look a bit different. Pro Tip:

1. Do not use images that are stretched or pixilated on your website.
2. Use images with people in them, it builds trust.

 

7. SEO Plan

According to Wikipedia, Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the quality and quantity of your web traffic from search engines. Improving your SEO would help you attract new customers, reduce your advertising cost, and more. You can use these tips for a start when creating an SEO plan.

• Perform rigorous keyword research.
• Decide the keywords you intend to rank for.
• Run a search on the keywords.
• Analyze the sites that appear on Google’s first page.
• Create better content surrounding the keywords.
• Build internal and external links around your blog post content.
• Optimize your content for featured snippets.

 

8.  Web Layout and Design

If you’re intending to create a good impression online, you should consider having a well-designed website. A professional web layout would help you attract new customers, and also increase your chances of luring them into buying. More importantly, you’ll provide a good user experience when customers visit your site, which is a plus for your marketing. Here are the three most important criteria of a website you should look out for:

1. Content width design
2. Menu bar design
3. Home page header design

Do not settle for a poorly designed website; insist on getting the best no matter the cost. It pays in the long run.

9. Social Proofs

Social proof is the idea that consumers will change behavior based on what other customers are doing. Business coach Bailey Richert described 12 types of social proof and suggested 4 best practices that can be used to implement them in your marketing. According to Hubspot, there are 8 ways social proof can manifest itself:

• Expert’s stamp of approval
• Celebrity endorsement
• User testimonials
• Business credentials
• Earned media
• Social media shares
• Wisdom of the crowds
• Wisdom of your friends

Having your customers share reviews of your product or service, creates a sense of importance in them and also assures new customers that they are making the right decision if they choose you. Dominique Jackson helped shed some light on social proof in his curated content on Sprout Social and some helpful research was shared by Bright Local in their local consumer review survey. Consider including social shares and follow buttons on your website so customers would have the space to review your brand on social media.

10. Web Maintenance Plan

Web maintenance is the act of running routine checks on your website regularly so you can fix web issues immediately and improve your website when necessary. The mistake most website owners do is to fold their hands after getting their website launched and most times they’ll incur costs they could have prevented. Some of the routine checks you can run on your website:

• Identifying unknown broken links.
• Fixing bugs and malware.
• Testing your web page load time.
• Updating your website content.
• Improving and analyzing the performance of your website content.

To get the best from your web maintenance run the checks consistently. Maybe monthly or quarterly whichever works for you. Does this seem like a lot of work for your website?  If you’re going to get a website do it right, so you don’t end up spending money on fixing issues you could have avoided. Now that you know what is required to develop your website, you can get started. Need some help? You can reach me or drop your request in your comment.