Introduction to 5 Website Setup Mistakes
We often, in the haste to achieve success, commit mistakes that could and should be avoided. These mistakes often lead to the failure of the work that is important. Having your own website for any reason, it maybe to put your portfolio online, your own blog or having an e-commerce site to sell your products, can be very fruitful if done correctly and can even crumble if you make wrong decisions. Just like any traditional business venture, your decisions will either take you forward or pull you down.
Personal websites can still afford to be flawed because most of them are hosted for free and hardly cost the creator any money. So, if you have a blog and you do not own your domain name and you post random things occasionally, it is fine but in business, minor mistakes can cost you a lot. Making the wrong decisions and investing in them can be disastrous. Digital marketing might be one of the cheapest ways of marketing your brand but you still have to invest a handsome amount every year. And not to forget, these mistakes can cost you more than money, it can cost you your consumers.
The website setup mistakes can be of various types. You might feel hiring a professional to do your work will somehow reduce the percentage of blunders but it’s not so. Even with experience on your side, you can commit the most common website setup mistakes.
Here is a list of website setup mistakes that people mostly commit and the ones you must avoid:
Website Setup Mistakes
Following are some website setup mistakes:
1. No Plans or Strategies – Website Setup Mistakes
It’s often said that running towards your problem head on is never the correct solution. When you face the problem of lagging behind your competitors you often think of doing something different that give you the edge. This often leads you to take quick measures and investing less though behind the decisions you make. You decide to follow the current trend blindly and don’t find the need to make plans or work on strategies.
To take your business online is one of those current trends. But just like any major business decisions, the decision old Digital Marketing needs some time and thought to be put in it. Assumptions and variables do not help in businesses. You cannot assume that putting yourself online will make you famous overnight because most of the people use Internet. Keeping your consumers as variables, meaning, having no idea about the audience you are trying to reach is not a smart move.
If you want traffic on your website you need business plans and marketing strategies. Now these doesn’t involve long documents describing intricately and precisely what you do, making plans and strategies just involve answering the usual questions, the whats, whys, hows and whos.
So, start with- WHAT?
What is your website about? What kind of products will you be selling? What are the services, apart from your product, do you intend on providing? This will give you the basic idea about what your website might look like and tell your customers what you stand for.
Next, WHO?
Who are the people you are targeting? Who are your competitors? This really reduces your effort in the processes later on when you start your website setup.
Lastly, How?
How is your website different from the ones already available? How do you propose to solve the customer’s problems? How do you intend to earn profit out of this?
This question will really help you plan a better website to run your business. Also, strategizing while keeping in mind concepts like SEO and PPC will certainly make the task of website setup less daunting.
2. To think that it’s a cake walk – Website Setup Mistakes
Never underestimate your enemy, they say. Not to suggest that setting up your own website will prove to be your enemy but nevertheless, do not underestimate the work you will have to put in order to make it work. There is no easy way into Digital Marketing. Though as a customer you might get the feel that it is like a restaurant where you order things and they reach you after some time, but for a website setup and maintaining it is a lot more than a simple chain of demand and supply.
More than your products, your attention is what your website and your consumers demand. To establish the proper technique and to never remain stagnant are the tasks to achieve. So, unlike any traditional business, you will need to put in a lot of efforts to fully acknowledge the task in hand. There is no hard and fast way to the top. Remember always, slow and steady wins the race! The platform may have changed but your hard work should not.
There is a lot of work required to be done even after you setup a website. Mostly, and a better practice is to always have a public forum in your website. Why? Because how else will you know whether or not your customer are satisfied? They can post their comments about their experience and you can learn from it. For instance, if they have anything negative to say, work on it immediately so that it never happens again. Like they found the product to be out of stock or the complaints about not receiving what they see. Your customers should be able to trust you and that will only happen when you listen to them and make them their first priority.
Also, if your customers finds it difficult to sort through your website, customer support must be available 24*7 in order to guide them. And the work doesn’t stop here. You need to keep updating your website. Your website cannot look the same and have the same feel as it did the last month. Which means, you should be growing and evolving with every passing day.
So, if you thought having an online business will be a cake walk, now you know, it won’t be!
3. Limited knowledge of hosting platforms – Website Setup Mistakes
Websites don’t just go up and running on their own, they need to be hosted and hosting a website is costly when you want to be pursued as a serious enterprise. So, you have to make sure that your money does not go in vain. Why do you need to pay? The answer is simple, which one sounds more serious in your opinion- www.abcXYZ.wordpress.com or www.abcXYZ.com? Obviously, if you have your own domain name, you are bound to be taken seriously. If you choose to host your sites for free on Weebly or WordPress.com, then you come under the category of those who blog just as a hobby i.e do not do it for a source of income. To own your own domain name that showcases your brand name, though you have to pay for it, but it is worth every penny.
The other problems with free website hosting are that a lot of necessary functionalities are not available to you, like connecting to the social media and you are not responsible for the site or its content. In short, you are not your own boss and that is not something you would want to deal with. This is vital because if you don’t decide what is posted on your website, you won’t be viewed as a trusted source. Connecting to social media is also, important. Social media is a big platform for Digital Marketing and you can reach out to a bigger crowd and most importantly to the youth not just of your nation but all across the globe. So, if you cannot decide what your website will or will not contain, how do you expect it to represent you, your enterprise or your ideologies?
When you have decided on what your website will represent you must choose a platform accordingly. Do a thorough research of which hosting site suits you the best and fits your budget. Also, you can host your own website but it requires not just financial investment but the sound knowledge of hosting. Take your time in making the decision, this is one of the most crucial step while setting up a website.
4. Lack of efforts in showcasing the products – Website Setup Mistakes
It is your product that the visitors of our website are interested in. Put yourself into your consumer’s shoes and try to figure out how you would like to be presented with the services of the website once you are on it.
Unlike traditional marketing propaganda, there is no salesman trying rigorously to sell your products. The only thing that is going to sell your product is how much about the product you can tell in the limited space of a web page. Good-quality and impressive looking photos and a short but effective description will really come in handy. All the essential information regarding the product must be made available otherwise, your customers will only end up saying, “It would have been better to go in a shop”. If you are building a website to sell your products, that’s the last thing you want your visitors to think.
Keep in mind, the customers can neither touch nor see for real what your product has to offer so, you have just one chance to make an impression and win their trust. How you sell your product is entirely your responsibility and no one else can be blamed if you failed to do so.
Your products, the stock availability, the specifications, the description and the cost are all very crucial in your enterprise’s success. You cannot take anything for granted.
5. Designing issues – Website Setup Mistakes
Last but not the least, how your website looks is your USP( Unique Selling Point). The visitors can only connect with you through your website. Therefore, your website must represent your true self and your brand name, appropriately.
Your website should not only be visually appealing but informative as well. Yes, it should be screaming about your services and your products but it shouldn’t be scary. The usual misconceptions associated with visually appealing is that it means using lots of colours and images. That’s so wrong. Keep your website as minimal in design as possible. Choose a theme and work around it. Two or three contrasting shades of colour is enough. Images that tell a story are sufficient. Don’t crowd your website with things that are not necessary. Simplicity is the key!
But design and themes and images are not the only things required in your website. They are only there to provide a gist of what the website has in store for its visitors. The actual knowledge will always come from the written text in the website. The message you put forth must be crisp and clear. Nobody is going to spend hours reading your website nor is anybody going to be satisfied with limited knowledge.
There has to be a proper balance between the designing and the messages on the website. None should overpower the other. They must go hand in hand. If you find yourself in no state to design such a balanced website then hire a designer. This is the part you cannot compromise with. Explain in detail what you want your website to look like to the designer and keep a check on its progress.
Your domain name, your services and your website design are the only things that would increase the traffic to your website. Do not back down on investing in these areas.
If you have decided to go with your decision of setting up a website, be smart. You now have the complete cheat sheet to setting up a website. You know what to do and what NOT to do. Your website is the make or break of your business if it is the only source of income and even if it isn’t. You are right, most of the population does use the Internet and that means they are getting smarter. So have to be too. Not just smart, be wise!
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