Bring a new wave of potential customers to your business with a well-designed website!
Whether you’re looking to create a space for e-commerce or to increase your online presence, crafting a website is an important step in the digital age. To stay competitive with larger businesses, you need a website that appeals to search engines and your customer base. Across a wide range of industries, good business website design can ensure that your material and digital products get the reach they deserve!
For B2BeeMatch members that are on the fence about building a website for their small business, we’ll first unpack why we think you should launch a website—from built-in email marketing tools to the power of customer testimonials. Then, we’ll introduce to you some of the B2BeeMatch members who specialize in web design.
Why bring your business online?
Reach more potential clients!
Word of mouth (WOM) is the most powerful, persuasive tool for businesses, and with the rapid growth of e-commerce in the last two decades, everyone should consider how electronic WOM spreads. With an online presence, you’re able to generate conversation and present your potential clients with the benefits of your business.
Many consumers make their buying decisions before clicking past the first page of results on a search engine. Therefore, your small business’s ability to occupy digital space can significantly affect who engages with your services or products.
With a website, you also show your potential matches on our platform the full scope of your business—a deep dive into your services!
Credibility
Whether you’re hoping to showcase your portfolio, host online stores (websites with ecommerce functionality), or craft business blogs, a website is your showroom. Your website can demonstrate your business’s values, specialties and uniqueness. While we know you deliver excellent, reliable goods, new customers may not know that yet!
When a customer searches for your services, their first impression matters. Therefore, it’s important that your website be organized, up-to-date and accessible.
Client testimonials provide social proof
What is social proof?
Essentially, social proof is a fancy term for the influence that social interactions have on our consumer behaviors. Essentially, it’s the digital word of mouth that we discussed earlier.
Social proof is the same currency that influencers and celebrities provide businesses on social media. They leverage their reputation and reliability to endorse a product in the hopes that those who trust them will copy their actions. Other examples of social proof are survey results, reviews, testimonials, demonstrations and even likes on Twitter.
This is why customer feedback is so important! Social proof demonstrates to prospective customers that other people were satisfied with your services or products. If other people were happy, then it tells the new client that they can have the same happy experience.
Can’t I just rely on review websites?
Relying on websites like Yelp and Google Reviews to produce accurate client feedback is tricky. While you may get good reviews, they’ll never show the full range of services, products and opportunities that your business provides. They’ll never give you the chance to showcase all of the work that you do or draw attention to the aspects of your business that are most important to you.
With a website, you’ll be able to showcase your accomplishments and how you’ve improved your clients’ businesses and lives. If a client has a particularly good experience, you can showcase their testimonial! If you have examples of how your products and services can benefit others, then you can provide evidence of those benefits through videos, survey results and beyond. That provides social proof of your company’s excellence and reliability!
It’s your business’s marketing platform
Compared to traditional marketing, such as billboards, radio spots or fliers, a business website is far less expensive per view. While traditional marketing tactics can catch the eyes and ears of commuters, a website doesn’t rely on someone’s work-to-home route (which is ideal in a work-from-home era)!
Websites have greater potential to reach the customers who are actually in need of your services. Are you more likely to query Google when you’re looking to get your walls painted or floors re-done, or do you think, “I should take Highway 103-E tomorrow so that I can write down the name and phone number from that billboard”? Most likely, you’ll choose the former!
With a website, showcasing your work to the online masses has never been easier.
Depending on what route you take on your website-building journey, the average cost of a website varies. However, whether you craft your own website with the cheapest plan possible or make an investment with an experienced website designer, you’re still getting one of the least expensive forms of marketing out there.
Do I need technical knowledge to do business web design?
Maybe! There are a few paths before you.
You could always build your own website, which could save you money in the short term. It’ll take a lot of research, learning and time to build up your website design skills, but there are lots of tutorials out there that showcase top-notch design templates. Remember to think about your security needs, what hosting services are available and how you want to present your brand.
There are plenty of platforms that can help you host and build your website. Google Sites, Google Domains and Google Analytics offer a triple threat with their intuitive drag-and-drop builder, tablet and mobile version previews, easy business emails and many more built-in features. Alternatively, there’s always SquareSpace and Shopify, which often have discounts floating around the internet and can connect you to other social platforms! These eCommerce features all have different rates and costs, but many sites will offer you a 14-day free trial so that you can test their services.
If your website budget is flexible and you want a professional touch, then we would strongly recommend that you consider hiring a business website design company.
Web designers have the technical skills, security know-how, creative tools and professional knowledge to craft a website for your needs. They can ensure that it’s consistent with your brand and easy to use and that it meets your functionality needs. If you have a creative vision that you want to implement, then they can bring it to life! Also, if any technical issues come up, they will have more experience troubleshooting these web tools, leaving you with more time to run the heart of your business.
What to prepare for the design team building your small business website
What does your business model look like? How do you want this website to function? The answers to these questions will look different for every B2BeeMatch business. Whether you want to build a business blog, host digital products or showcase your beekeeping services, there’s a website designer out there for you. In this mini step-by-step guide, we explain what you should think about for your website design!
Think about your domain name
Your web address, AKA your domain name, is important for your site’s visibility and usability.
To improve your SEO rankings, make sure that your domain is easy to spell, relatively short and under the correct domain extension (for example, .net, .org, .uk and so on). Domain optimization suggests that websites with the .com extension are usually the best fit, but don’t be afraid to use a different one if you think it’d be more appropriate. If your website ranks well, and the algorithms at Google Analytics shine down upon you, then you’re set! The team working on your website can help you develop this, but it may be fun to brainstorm some ideas beforehand.
Muse about what color palette you’d like
B2BeeMatch’s website design members can guide you on everything from website branding to color schemes. If you have key elements of your brand on a brick-and-mortar business, then you may want to integrate them into your website. For example, if you happen to be in a building with Googie architecture, then bringing the Space Age aesthetic to your website could be really cool! If you’re known for the bright colors of your brand, how do you want to use them on your website? The color palette that you and your design team choose will come down to aesthetics, content focus, professional standards and client perception.
If you want, you could research business website examples and the sleek templates that companies you admire use. If you have something in mind, share it with your team!
Think about your need for website security
It’s important to keep your online sales secure and your data safe, especially if you’re running an online store. For your sake and your customers’ sake, give a bit of thought to how much security you want your website to have. Also, consider whether you’ll need unlimited storage for your data or just a little. This decision will affect the costs of your website because independent servers, which are typically more secure and have faster loading times, are more expensive. Once again, your website design team should be able to guide this decision, but you should consider what extra features are priorities for your website.
Things that your team considers when designing your website
Different website builders will use different approaches, and the features that you need will also determine their choices. Your website design team will want to create the ideal website for you and your business, so your input is very important. So, think about what you need: Do you want someone who can update the software and content of your website as you expand? Have you found inspiration in the sleek templates you’ve found online? Do you work in a sensitive field that requires extra security for your domain? Do you want to focus on art and content creation for your portfolio? Do you want a website with design elements as cool and unique as your business?
Above all else, your design team will make sure that your website has a clear description of your business, with copy that’s easy to understand and memorable. In addition to the previously mentioned considerations, here are some extra things they may think about:
- What hero image (the banner image across the width on the top of a website) will appeal to your client base? What imagery will hook them?
- What do you want the user experience to be? Make it smooth but depending on your field, you can be a little more creative.
- Are you looking for ecommerce functionality? What payment method will you use? Will you offer a free trial for your product or service?
- How will your branding consider visibility and accessibility? Avoiding pain points will ensure that your customers stay on your site longer!
- Who needs your products or services? Their user experience is just as important as good content.
- How many pages will you need? What do you want your website to say, do or explain about your business?
- How do you want your website to look on mobile devices? The mobile version of a website is now more important than the desktop version, as more and more customers use their mobile devices to surf the web.
- When are you aiming to launch your website? What content management resources will you need?
- How can you ensure that prospective customers reach you? Where do you want your contact details to be? Think about what your customer service will look like—will there be contact forms, live service or something else?
You can use these points to help you think about your needs and wants beforehand so that you can clearly explain them to the professionals you choose from among your matches on B2BeeMatch.
How do I choose the right web design team for my small business?
How do you get started? How do you find the right small business to craft your website? If you’ve ever looked into the website design process and felt overwhelmed, you’re not alone.
B2BeeMatch can connect you with a highly rated digital marketing agency, web designer or web design agency. These professionals provide the expertise to create your business’s dream website! You can connect with them today, and they’ll ease you into the process.
To provide a light sampling of the work web designers can do for you, let’s talk about a few of B2BeeMatch’s many web design members.
Are you feeling spicy? This Canada-based, quirky and talented team is a full-service creative agency; they create unique, beautiful designs with bold colors. They've got over 18 years of experience in design service, and their own impressive branding speaks for itself! (Seriously, their website is really neat!) As registered graphic designers, Cayenne Creative can help build your website as well as support craft branding that’s based on industry, product and market research. Whether you’re looking to express your brand through a jazzy color palette or cool, clean visual designs and visual elements, they’ve got you covered.
Below are a couple of examples of their work:
If you have the chance, check out Cayenne Creative’s portfolio by clicking here!
Wots The Big Idea offers a wide range of digital marketing services. Their client base includes both SMEs and multinational businesses, with a focus on bringing together creativity and function using the best design tool on the market. Using data to drive their services, Wots The Big Idea is ready to create your business’s website! Their team has 60+ years of knowledge, their clients leave glowing reviews and they reliably deliver quality web solutions for a variety of industries.
Below are a couple of examples of their work:
You can check out WTBI Marketing Agency’s portfolio by clicking here!
A digital design company for the digital era, AB Designs develops brands, creates custom websites, and generates sales through designs that improve search engine optimization. Based in Cape Town, South Africa, AB Designs works alongside many talented digital creatives from across the globe. Their remote strategies and lead generation techniques make this digital marketing agency a force to be reckoned with! AB Designs offers a variety of custom design services, but always focuses on clear messaging and improving your search engine rankings with great visual content.
Below are a couple of examples of their work:
You can find AB Design’s portfolio by clicking here, and you can learn more about AB Designs through our Meet Our Members blog post!
Younoh Media is a digital marketing agency that focuses on using simple, bright and clear designs to retain your audience’s attention! In addition to website design and development, they offer everything from influencer marketing to social media management. With their help, you can be confident about bringing your business online.
Below is an example of their work:
You can check out Younoh’s portfolio by going to their website and checking out their Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook!
Redegal is an engineering and digital marketing agency that specializes in online business generation. They have 120+ members on their team of Google Analytics gurus that have helped a wide selection of brands to create their vision. Whether you’re looking for help with your business website design or a digital campaign, this award-winning agency is sure to increase your digital sales. They are experts at translating customer behaviors into material profits through their focus on purposeful content creation. They offer individualized plans based on your needs, so don’t hesitate to reach out to them for a consultation!
Below is an example of their work:
You can check out Redegal’s case studies by clicking here!
Shaibit Hosting is different from the previous examples; rather than being a business website builder, they offer award-winning WordPress website management. They guarantee security protection, active monitoring and dedicated servers to keep you covered from every angle.
Especially if you work in a sensitive industry, Shaibit Hosting’s focus on quality security and fast loading times for your website is a huge relief for business owners. They know the cost of bad security for your payment methods and want to keep you protected while maintaining ease of use. Further, they offer live chat support and a variety of different paid plans to meet your needs.
The many businesses that trust Shaibit Hosting to provide security for their websites can be found at the bottom of their landing page—check them out and stay secure!
Publishing your website
When it’s time to let the bird hop out of the nest, stretch its wings and soar, your website design team will be ready! Let them know what your launch expectations are, and they can tell you whether your timeline is reasonable. Together, you’ll get your business website running in no time with great content for your users and the best features and options to make sales!
Once your website has taken off, remember to show it off—point customers to it, shout it out on your social media accounts and tell your fellow B2BeeMatch members where they can find you!
