The Ultimate Guide To A Perfect Website in 2023 – As the title suggests, in this post we are going to cover everything you need to ensure you have a perfect website in 2023 and the years to come.
We are going to be going over an 11-point checklist with many sub-categories within each one covering every you need to know to build the perfect website.
Without a strong website, it is impossible to envision planning a successful business.
The most crucial thing to remember is to give your website the attention it requires because an inefficient website only serves to waste your time and money.
Here’s a brief overview of the 11 points we’re going to be covering in this post.
- Identify The Goals of Your Website
- Have Clear Site Navigation and Architecture
- Build The Perfect Home Page
- Clear & Visible CTA (Call To Action)
- Ensure Your Website Is Mobile Friendly
- The Importance of An About Us Page
- Content is King
- Excellent Visual Design
- Equip A Robust CMS
- Track Your Results
- Highlight Your Reviews
Here is the ultimate guide to the perfect website in 2023.
Identify The Goals of Your Website
Try operating a vehicle on an uncharted route without knowing where you’re going. Throughout the travel, you’re probably going to feel disoriented, and you’ll waste a lot of time trying to figure it out.
This is what it’s like to try to manage a website without goals and objectives. That makes website strategy and goals an essential component of business successes, right?
What are website goals and objectives?
Website goals and objectives are a collection of objectives that have been determined for a website to accomplish in a specific amount of time.
In other words, achieving website goals substantially increases the likelihood of success online. They are crucial to the company’s success, after all.
Setting measurable website objectives and goals enables you to compare actual outcomes and identify the areas that require additional attention.
Let’s give you some ideas.
- Marketing – Drive traffic, and generate leads
- Sales – Help close sales by validating and supporting the sales team
- Customer Support – Improve customer satisfaction with speedy response times
- IT – Integrate your website with other systems your business might be using.
- Operations – Grow your company’s bottom line
Let’s go deeper into some of these ideas.
More qualified leads to be produced
This is likely the most common objective for your company’s websites whose primary objective is lead generation. This objective works best for businesses that wish to increase their sales leads through better internet marketing.
Increase awareness
This objective makes it possible to assess the efficiency with which your website informs visitors about your latest goods or services while you aren’t technically “selling” online.
This is effective for informational websites that don’t necessarily need to create leads or collect information, such micro-sites for the introduction of new products, official government and political websites, or non-profit websites devoted to spreading awareness of a certain issue.
Generate more sales
The greatest option for businesses that want to optimise their online sales is this, which is the most common objective for e-commerce websites that offer goods or services online (SaaS also fits into this category). We advise targeting percentage rate increases (in%) as opposed to absolute sales amounts, much like lead increase targets.
As a result, seasonal sales variations will be taken into account, and more accurate historical comparisons will be possible. For instance, raise monthly sales by 20%.
Hopefully, by now you can see that the importance of setting goals and objectives is very important, and this is why it’s at the top of the list for the ultimate guide to a perfect website in 2023. Without goals, there’s no way you could build the perfect website in 2023 and the years to come.
Have Clear Site Navigation and Architecture
Ensure the entire website is simple and straightforward to navigate. Poor navigation is annoying and may result in lost sales or leads.
Consider your website’s navigation like a map or set of instructions. It is simpler to go to your location when the directions are clearer.
30.8% of web designers ignore hidden navigation according to GoodFirms.
The same is true for the website navigation; if it is simple and makes sense, visitors will know where to go to find what they are looking for.
Here are 5 key principles of fantastic website navigation.
- Logical – It should be simple to use and make sense to navigate. The last thing you want is for visitors to pause and decide where they want to go because this feels like too much work and will probably cause them to leave your website.
- Intuitive – People prefer it when things go according to plan. The key to navigating is adhering to norms and fashions. Every day, web users visit a variety of websites, and if yours is the only one with a navigation style they find uncomfortable, you can bet they won’t be returning anytime soon.
- Structured – To make your website simple to use and easy to understand, structure is crucial. To list each of your pages separately in your navigation would be a very bad idea.
- Clear – People should be able to understand your navigation just as readily as they should be able to discover it.
- Simple – People will understand and find it easy to use your website if it has a straightforward navigation layout.
One of a website’s fundamentals is navigation. It may make or break a website, enticing users to stick around or discouraging them and sending them elsewhere. Change your navigation whenever you want—just make sure to test it first!
What is website architecture?
The hierarchical organisation of your website’s pages is referred to as its architecture. Internal connecting reflects this organisational structure.
The organisation of your website should make it simple for visitors to obtain content and for search engine crawlers to comprehend the connections between various sections.
Here are 5 tips for your website architecture.
- Maintain A Simple Top-Level Navigation Menu
- Make sure the URLs are accessible and relevant
- Sustain the website’s architecture’s consistency
- Use breadcrumbs
- Your Website Pages Should Only Require a Few Clicks to Access
Build The Perfect Home Page
People who visit your website are greeted with your homepage, which functions somewhat like a digital sign of welcome. A homepage that serves as an uninterrupted atmosphere for visitors is necessary if you want to keep them engaged to your developed website.
A gorgeous design alone is not enough. Here are the fundamental components for building a homepage that engages users more deeply.
As you can see, 86% of visitors want to see information about that company’s products/services, according to Tyton Media.
Keep your design simple and intuitive
It’s crucial to have a tidy and clutter-free look for your homepage. If a website offers too much information and imagery, visitors may feel overloaded.
If the material on your website is well-planned and neat, you will come out as more organised and professional.
Ensure your images are high resolution
After all, a picture speaks a thousand words. This is true with regard to your homepage. Your website’s visitors can learn more about you and your business from the photos on it.
Images that aren’t clear and look very blurry or in poor resolution may give off that you don’t care as a business, or your business isn’t that professional.
Just imagine if Apple used bad videos and low-resolution images for their new iPhone 14s. We can almost guarantee that Apple would see a huge drop off in sales online.
Ensure your website has trust & authority
To establish authority and high value in the eyes of your prospects, it is always essential to integrate other reliable sources on your website where it is practical.
A key signal for persuading your audience to perform the desired action is social proof.
It would be more beneficial for you to position yourself as an authority if you can put more of it on your homepage.
Get inspiration
If you’re just about to start designing a website or looking to present some ideas to your website designer, then get some inspiration from different websites or designs.
A great place to get inspiration from is Behance. You will find some amazing website designs here. Or you can get some inspiration from our work page!
Clear & Visible CTA (Call To Action)
Your call to action (CTA) is an opportunity to inspire your audience to take concrete actions to become a client or customer. It might make the difference between a conversion and a lead. The call to action, according to many, is the most crucial element of your website or advertising campaign.
As you can see in the image above, simple call-to-action names are used a lot according to Backlinko.
Avoiding the CTA is a serious error that won’t be good for your business. There are three reasons the CTA button has become such a standard on website content and in the ad copy.
Your sales funnel is motivated by CTAs
Sales funnels and CTAs work well together. They push the user to act right away by giving them instructions on what to do next.
If you want your users to visit your blog, provide you with their contact information, download an e-book, or subscribe to your email list, you must compel them to do so using a strategically positioned CTA in the sales funnel.
Use CTA best practices, such as emphasising the benefits in the button’s language, to your advantage. Use “Get More Tips” rather than “Subscribe!” as an example. ”
It might sound weird, but your customers need them
Customers demand and expect calls to action, so they are vital for businesses as well. The CTA at the bottom of the page is often what prompts visitors to take the next action.
They have read your advertisement, are intrigued by your brand, and are looking for the CTA button to find out what to do next.
The absence of the CTA can confuse readers and reduce your ability to convert them. CTA buttons make it simple for clients to take the desired action. That benefits both them and the business.
They boost the success of your digital campaign
A digital campaign is all about creating excitement about your good or service, attracting customers’ attention, and persuading them to make a purchase. The call to action completes the picture by highlighting the effectiveness of the ad language.
Our copy messaging will be ineffective without the CTA.
It won’t have the concluding hook that motivates buyers to move forward. When it comes to pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, CTAs are particularly crucial.
You may better explain the purpose of your PPC campaign to your audience by including a call to action.
Any sort of content needs a call to action to be complete. It is the icing on the cake that each user desires, whether consciously or unconsciously. Your lead has read, or at least skimmed, your content and may be debating whether to proceed.
The ideal outcome is to convert the person and hopefully turn them into a devoted customer by using the proper CTA at the optimum time. The CTA can be a tactful or direct technique to urge your customer to act right away for their best interests.
Ensure Your Website Is Mobile Friendly
There are 3 reasons why your website should, and needs to be mobile-friendly.
- Always accessible
- Establishes credibility and trust
- A cost-effective way to boost SEO
By this point, you need to understand that without a mobile-friendly website, your site is destined to fail. So let’s take a look at exactly how to build a mobile-friendly website.
Here’s how you make your website mobile-friendly:
- Select a theme or template that is mobile responsive
- Cut down on the content.
- Ensure your website is as light as possible (Your website needs to be able to load fast)
- Change the placement of elements on mobile
- Use a large and readable font
- Test all the time
As you can see with the image above, 67% are more likely to buy according to Search Engine Watch.
With 70% of web traffic coming from mobile phones, there’s a higher chance that people will be viewing your website from either mobile or a larger screen device like an iPad. You need to cater to all of these devices so not only do they have a better time on your website, but Google will also rank you higher in the search results.
The Importance of An About Us Page
We all want to create a killer page for one of our customers’ most popular web pages! One of your customer’s website’s most crucial pages is the About Us section. It is a chance for their guests to learn more about their business.
Your clients can use this opportunity to introduce themselves to their clientele and the type of company they conduct. So why not make it fantastic?
What’s included in a fantastic about us page?
- Facts, not hype
- Trustworthy features
- Target group
- Comfort your readers
- Engaging content
Over time your business will change, and you will also get more data. So keep fine-tuning.
Your website’s About Us page is never truly finished, just like the rest of the site. Periodically try new things to see what works and what doesn’t. And don’t forget to update your accomplishments frequently.
Add those if you land some lucrative new clients or contracts. You can spread the word about your business and attract more potential consumers by updating your About Us page.
Your website’s About Us page is never truly finished, just like the rest of the site. Periodically try new things to see what works and what doesn’t. And don’t forget to update your accomplishments frequently. Add those if you land some lucrative new clients or contracts.
You can spread the word about your business and attract more potential consumers by updating your About Us page.
Content is King
Your website doesn’t really stand a chance of being distinctive and reaching your audience without decent content.
When someone queries “Why is content king? which is why. It serves as your audience’s virtual front door.
Your audience and consumers’ hearts and minds can be reached via great content. As a result, it’s critical that your website includes the appropriate kind of material.
In the end, it will be your content that persuades customers to purchase your goods or utilise your service.
Although it can be hard to accept, design and graphics are not as important as other components. It becomes more successful and beneficial when combined with killer content.
To assist you in creating content, it is strongly advised that you hire someone with solid copywriting skills. Your thoughts can be turned into the kind of content you require by a skilled writer.
You can introduce yourself to your audience by using a website. You must make sure that what people see is valuable and of the highest calibre. Great content might be one of the highest elements when it comes to the ultimate guide to building a website in 2023, so focus on the content!
Excellent Visual Design
People make rash decisions. Forming an initial impression of someone takes just one-tenth of a second. The same applies to websites.
Users establish an opinion about your website in roughly 50 milliseconds (ms), or 0.05 seconds, which affects whether they’ll stay or depart.
This sum is based on particular studies. Participants in the first study were asked to score the aesthetic attractiveness of web homepages twice, each time for 500 milliseconds. They shortened the exposure length in a subsequent research to 50 ms.
Here are some great website design tips that everyone needs – even you DIY website builders!
- Have a plan – Before you start, plan out your colours, fonts, and layouts. You can do this in Photoshop and it gives you a great start, as opposed to if you were to do it as you go.
- Keep it simple! – Visitors dislike visual complexity, according to a significant Google study. The main point is that people are less likely to find your design to be beautiful the more complicated it is.
- Direct attention with visual cues – The ability to direct users is one of the fundamental purposes of web design. Giving varied weights to various elements will help you do this by directing attention in the desired directions.
- Avoid stock photos – People hate stock photos, so avoid them at all costs.
- Leverage social proof – New visitors are more likely to have a favourable opinion of your website, content, product, or service if you can demonstrate that others share that perspective.
Here’s a great video we found on key web design principles and why it’s in the ultimate guide to build a website in 2023!
Equip A Robust CMS
Considering that more than 68 million websites were created with a CMS, it is quite significant. What is it?
The content management system is referred to as CMS. It might also be the answer you’re seeking for if you only have a little technical know-how and money to quickly create a website.
Why use a CMS?
- No coding knowledge required
- Easy integration
- User roles and permissions
- SEO Features
- Security Features
These are just a few of the features we could think of when talking about content management systems.
Here are some of the biggest content management systems out there.
Again these are just a few of the CMS we could think of. There are many more out there. Out of the 5 we provided you with, we would recommend WordPress over any other CMS out there.
Track Your Results
This one is really simple. You’ve got a website either made for you, or built by you and now you need to know who’s using it, and where people are using it.
Why do you need to know all of this?
Well, you can test and track what works, and what doesn’t. If you know that out of all of the pages on your website, users are visiting one specific page, then you need to prioritise making that the best page possible on your site, and also understand exactly why they like that page a lot.
How do I track my results?
Google Analytics allows you to track new and returning users, engagement, revenue, retention, demographics, conversions, events and much more. It’s also free, so it’s great for any new business.
Want to track organic search results?
Organic search results in web search engines are those that are determined solely by algorithms and unaffected by advertiser fees.
Track organic search results through Google Search Console.
Highlight Your Reviews
It’s uncommon to make a purchase without first reading a number of online evaluations, from pressure washing services to tech purchases. 90% of customers in 2016 read at least one online review before choosing to visit a store.
More significantly, 94% of online customers said that a bad review had made them decide not to go into a store.
This implies that regardless of your business, having a strong online presence offers you a number of significant benefits, which is why it’s developing into a crucial component of branding.
You may improve your client experience and leave a good online impression by being aware of why you require online reviews.
Here are 3 reasons you need to highlight your reviews
Social proof encourages buying
If people in our immediate vicinity, even complete strangers, concur that a purchase is a wise choice, we are more likely to do it. The main source of social proof today is internet reviews, which also directly affect sales.
They give you a credible appearance
A constant stream of favourable evaluations can help your brand gain a lot of reputation and confidence.
They clearly Influence sales
Both case studies and theory have their limitations. There are always exceptions to the rule, and reality doesn’t always make sense. However, a growing corpus of benchmark data shows that reviews do in fact actually result in higher sales.
If you need a web design agency to build you the perfect website, then get in touch with Kaizen Five here.
