Monday, January 26, 2015

The Only 4 pages Your Website Needs (if you choose to have a website, that is)

(part 3 of 3)

In this 3-part article series my goal is/was to offer a different perspective on the seemingly endless, although good intention-ed, “you need to have a website” message. We covered an approach you can take to discover for yourself, if a website is right for you, or not (at that point in time), and alternative approaches you can take to achieve an online visibility if it was decided that “no, a website is not right for me at this time.”

What if after you had the Q & A with yourself, you realized you DO want a website? That ah-ah can be just as terrifying as it is exhilarating.

On one hand; you will have a website that people will visit, share, learn about you and your services and take an action-step (or two) that you offered to them (buy, sign-up, follow, join, etc.)

On the other hand; the overwhelm of where do you start, who to hire (or not), and what part(s) of the website to focus the most attention on (at this beginning phase) can lead to a similar procrastination as not knowing if you wanted one to begin with or not!

Without going into the depths of website design, development and promotion I would simply like to share with you The Only 4 pages Your Website Needs to give you a starting point for website success.

Here we go! 
  • Home page (shocking!)
  • Product or Service (oh, my – that was pretty obvious)
  • About (needed but care is required with this one)
  • Contact Us (yes, really)

In conjunction with the above; an added bonus, although to me not technically a “page” of a website, is also to include a blog (feed or otherwise linked) as well.

It really is that simple – invite them into the foyer of your business (home page) make them feel comfortable and offer them actions to take, share your story (about page) to create an emotional connection as well as stating your credibility, showcase your wares (product or service page) so they know exactly what problems you solve and what the benefits are to them, and finally make it super easy for them to find you (contact us page) so they can reach out to you; after all if they are on this page they most likely want to expand their experience with you.

You may very well have additional pages, but if you focus on these four you will feel less overwhelmed during the initial website building process and they ultimately will be the driving force of your website being found via a search query.

For each of the pages keep in mind how did the visitor arrived there (did you tell them to go, was it from social media or a newsletter or printed material, from another page of the same website) and now that they are there what do you want them to (specifically) know and what do you want them to do with this new knowledge (call-to-action).

With this simple approach you will have a powerful, sale generating website without overwhelming yourself in the process. I call that a win-win!

Looking forward to seeing you all again next month; not sure yet what the topic will be but…

Until then, happy marketing!
Chana Monahan
Greenhouse Graphics, llc. Where Ideas Grow

860-379-2974

4 comments:

  1. Sometimes the simple approach is the best approach, right Chana?

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  2. Absolutely, Daniel...or at minimum a great way to get something started; one can always embellish later down the road. Thank you so much for your great comments throughout this series.

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  3. can you add links to your other posts?

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  4. Ive experienced them to be very approachable and helpful, even when I choose to edit something around christmas/new years eve, they've always been quick to get back to me.web builder software

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