Online shopping is rising and businesses are getting more revenue from internet sales than anywhere else and one factor influencing this boom is customer satisfaction on their websites. Unlike major businesses like international corporations, small businesses with little exposure will have to optimize the website to attract visitors by ranking high on search engines. Also to generate income, they must go the extra step to win the visitor’s trust and convert them to a customer.
We conducted a survey on a handful of perpetual internet users and discovered 5 basic elements they notice when making the decision of patronizing a previously-unknown small business on the internet.
Simple Interface and Web design
Having a simple interface enhances user satisfaction by giving the user only what they need on any given screen, without a lot of clutter and bright colours. Users are more attracted to sites with effective use of white space, legible typography, and sites with videos and animations. If you’re just starting a website or you want to optimize your website in order to improve your customer conversion rate, visit http://designrfix.com to see the do’s and don’ts for effective web design. A good website design greatly improves the website’s speed, which is a key SEO tool and very important when converting visitors to clients.
Trust elements
Trust elements are the second most important thing because as a small business, people need to see proof of your success in dealing with other people before they think of becoming your client. Putting up the logos of your current clients and reviews of satisfied customers for your visitors to see when scrolling your homepage will go a long way in building their trust.
Call to Action (CTAs)
Call to action or CTA compels your visitors and customers to take specific actions like leaving a contact for consultation purposes or reading more about a certain service or item. Your call to action should be relevant and offer to bring users closer to the solution to their problems. People want to be persuaded to buy a product or a service and your CTA should do just that.
A Search Bar
Every good website has a search bar on the homepage or at the top of every landing page for easy navigation. Make sure your search bar is easily visible, so when customers type into the search box, they’ll be presented with the relevant information they seek. The search bar is especially useful when browsing websites with hundreds of pages, making it easy to find a particular item or content. Remember, the goal is to optimize your website in the way to make the visitor comfortable enough to become a customer.
Contact and FAQ Page
Without links to the real world, anyone will consider a business website shady or untrustworthy and this is where most upcoming businesses fail in converting customers. There are situations where the customer needs to be assured that there’s a face they can hold accountable if anything goes wrong, and providing contact numbers, emails and physical addresses will reassure them.
Customers will also have questions in regards to your product or service and don’t want to speak over the phone or write an email. These questions can be answered with a simple FAQ page containing all the possible questions that may arise in the course of making a purchase including the shipping and returns policy questions.
To summarize these five points the keyword is putting the customer first and going the extra length to establish your business online.
