1. Less is More
Technology is a virtual motorway. Through time, technology changes and it updates to the desire of society. New business owners requiring new websites will in the majority of cases have a lack of knowledge of the web, require moving buttons, music or ‘something that will stand out'. Remember ‘less is more'. If you have a visitor on your website they are there for a purpose. The purpose is to see more information on your services and not listen to music. Without any marketing direction, approximately 70% of the time your website will be found on a search engine via keywords that suit your business category. At this point the visitor has a list of an average of thousands of websites to view. Your website needs to load within the average of 1-2 seconds for visitors to view information on your company. Because of the amount of competition there will be on the web, you need to ensure your website displays all the information it needs to on the first page to stop the visitor leaving and visiting a competitor's website instead.
2. Avoid Templates
Templates do not fit your business' look and feel. A template is just a cheap, quick and easy way of putting a website on the web. The internet is now used as a source of finding information and an alternative to directory books. The average web user will automatically be able to assume if your website looks ‘cheap'. It's not a reflection on your business, and first impressions do count for everything when it comes to the web. If you want the best from your business, we recommend to go Bespoke.
3. Spell Check
Sure, you have a decent website on a bespoke platform. But have you got spelling and grammar errors? There's nothing worse than reading through a website and seeing a spelling/grammar error. Automatically you psychologically believe the website and business is unprofessional or owned by school pupils. It is an absolute necessity you check your articles, content, and almost everything. It may even cost extra but it is absolutely worth it. Imagine a large corporation ready to use your services, and then they see a spelling error. Uh Oh! I'd recommend doing a Google search on ‘website spelling errors' and you will see a news article saying "Spelling mistakes ‘costs millions' in lost online sales"... I will say no more.
4. Security
Even the largest of companies and corporations have had their customer data hacked into. This is because they are not concentrating on securing customers data regularly. Just because it seems secure at first, it doesn't stay secure forever. All operating system software updates itself to stop and avoid security flaws regularly. Just as security gets enhanced, so does the other side of the scale (hacking). The same goes with your website, if your website is e-commerce based, it is an online system. If the website stores data or database driven, it is also an online system. Online security packages such as McAfee SECURE provide reports on security flaws of your online system. Therefore by using such software this helps to keep your code up-to-date with any issues that may open doors to potential hackers or threats.
5. Foundation
I can't stress this tip enough: without a good foundation your website will be no good! When talking about the foundation, this is not just the wireframe of the website, but also the system placed behind it (framework). With a framework all your code can be separated into different categories such as models, controllers and views. Without going into too much jargon, these ensure your website/system will not be affected by adding sections. Many owners of websites have issues getting their websites updated. As soon as an update has been made it affects another part of the system, this is due to the amendment of the current codes; therefore it is extremely important the developers of your website have experience in this field. When developing a website you need to think about future prospects for updating and adding features, otherwise you will be spending more than you could imagine. Remember, without a good foundation your website will not mean much in the future. The design is just a temporary visual aspect which will soon be outdated by our fast-paced moving world.
Gaurav Malhotra
htt://www.level5websites.com
