In today’s business world, an online presence is vital. The first thing most customers do when they are seeking out new products or services is to go online and check out the company’s website, or do a search for that item.
If your services or company is not listed, you’ll miss out on a lot of opportunities to gain organic new business.
What You Need on Your Site
At a minimum, your site needs to provide basic information, specific information, testimonials and contact information about your business or service.
The basic information should include a little bit about who you are, the general area you work out of, and what services in the industry that you provide. Typically, this would go on the home page and the about page.
The specific information will explain to your site visitors how you go about providing the services or the products that you are selling.
If you are an architect for example, you could talk about how you meet with the client, draw up a proposal or some general plans, and what the rest of the process is like when they work with you.
The testimonials area of your website provides personal reviews of you, your employees and your work.
Anytime you work with a new client, you should be asking them to give you feedback and/or a review of your work so that you can publish them on your site.
As online services grow, customers continue to look to testimonials to help them as they make their buying decisions.
Finally, the contact page is a way for interested site visitors to get in touch with you to hire you or to request additional information.
It’s not recommended to write your direct email address on your site, as spammers may send you unwanted comments or junk mail.
However, there are lots of form software options available that will allow you to give your site visitors the necessary fields to supply their contact information so you can get back in touch with them after their initial contact.
In this “Thought Leader Series: Architects: Your Online Presence Is Vital,” you can read more about the importance of a website for architects, in particular.
Creating the Portfolio Site
A portfolio site is for you to display the work that you’ve done for previous clients.
This tells your site visitors what your work looks like, the scope of your talent, your specialties, and how much work you’ve done.
For an architect, a portfolio site is a must.
Before a customer even wants to have a conversation with you about your design work, they will want to see if your work is close to what they are looking for in a home or commercial structure.
The portfolio site is a great way for you to showcase your work without it seeming like you are bragging.
Most architect portfolio sites are image-rich, with only a modicum of text to caption the images and to provide contact information.
About the Author: Kate Supino writes extensively about marketing and best business practices.
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