While I can’t emphasize enough how important it is for every small business to have a website, I know that the actual building of a good, quality website takes a considerable amount of time and a bit of skill, plus it’ll cost you some money. Or maybe you already have a website, but you haven’t updated it in a while. Whether you have a website or are looking to build one sometime in the near future, include these key, essential elements and start making your website work for you.

The Bare Minimum Every Effective Website Must Have

• Contact information including business name, phone number, email address, and location. This is one small key feature that will help your company establish validity and trust. Oftentimes, people are only going to your website to check to see that you are a legitimate company with a professional presence before committing to do business with you. It should be easy to find on the site.
• A unique positioning statement. Your site should include a brief description of what your business does. The statement should be no longer than one to two sentences and answer the questions “Who are you” and “What is different about your business?” Try to make it as unique and definitive as possible.
• A photo that represents your business. This photo can be of certain products that you’re known for or of you helping a customer. It should represent your value - what a person is going to get from your business.
• At least 300 words. Your site should have a text area on the page that contains at least 300 words centered around a keyword or phrase. Google tends to rank pages containing 300 words and more higher than pages with fewer words. The page itself needs to have at least 300 words, but they can be broken up into different sections throughout the page.
• A call to action. Your site should include something you want your visitors to do. You want an action that's trackable, such as a click-to-call link, a contact form, or a helpful download. The point is that you want them to take an action that you can track, then you analyze to determine the effectiveness of your marketing efforts.

Effective is Best.

Although you may not be able to build the website of your dreams right away, you can at least build something that will do what you need it to do to support your marketing efforts. If you can't afford to hire a professional to do everything for you, there are plenty of great DIY solutions that you can use, that are easier on the wallet and just take some time to complete. Or, you could even try Webcom Resource’s own Instasite solution that automatically builds and updates your site for you from your Facebook page (shameless plug because it is a life saver for many!)

Finally, there is no better quote to close this topic than the one below. ↓

Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection.

Mark Twain