Start-up entrepreneurs, especially the home based small business owners often ask me this question “Does a small business website design and layout really matter?” Yes, it does. If you can afford to hire a professional website designer to develop and manage your business website set-up, it is good and worth the cost. The simple reason been that a professionally made business website design will give your small business website that unique look that separates it from the millions of websites on the net. You sure don’t want to be lost in the crowd 😉
Online Crowd
However, when starting a small business website, I strongly advise you to worry less about website design and work more on getting quality content for your business website. The average online visitor wishes to spend less than 60seconds on each site he or she visits. So, you have a hard job to keep him or her long enough to pass your marketing message.
Stand Out Online
If you have spent at least a month online as an online entrepreneur, (internet marketer) you would have learnt that getting visitors to a new website is a herculean task, except if you are ready to pay for traffic (using services like Google Adword, Bidvertiser, Text-Ad-Link etc). If you are not willing to pay for traffic, then you need to be an expert in satisfying your website visitors so that they will visit again and again and tell others about your small business website.
A beautiful business website with professional design showing all the desirable eye candy (dynamic html, beautiful graphics, flash presentation, video clips, audio podcast etc), will not make up for poor content. Have you not visited one or two business websites that looks so promising because of their beautiful design but left disappointed because they simply had nothing to offer you? I have visited many. It can be very upsetting for visitors to discover that the website that looks so promising is actually lacking in quality content.
So, if you ask me, a website rich in Quality Content is way better off and will get better result than a professionally designed website that lacks useful content.
More reasons why an entrepreneur should choose quality content over website design:
- Professionally designed website can be quite expensive.
- Quality Content brings and keeps visitors (Google searches for quality contents and send free traffic to such) while professionally designed template only appeal to visitors when stumbled upon (they must be discovered first) and they lack the power to keep visitors or motivate them to return.
- Quality Content can generate money and pay the bills while a professional template alone does not guarantee income.
- If I have not convinced you yet, then consider this. Google is one of the most popular website online as at today, but it is as simple in design as any website can be. Yet, you cannot compare any other site to Google when it comes to satisfying visitors needs.
So to be a successful entrepreneur, you must focus on satisfying your visitors needs by providing quality content. Soon enough, you will earn enough from your effort to employ the service of a professional website designer to add all the eye candy that your heart desires. That way, you end up having the two and that is the best for any small business owner. You can bet Nigerian Entrepreneur is moving towards that goal.
If you still insist on having a professionally designed website for your small business right from start, and you are not willing to pay a fortune to hire a professional to design your website template, then I highly recommend you visit Revolution Themes They have some free WordPress themes that you can easily customize to fit your need. By the way, I should warn you not to fall into the trap of spending endless hours tweaking a free theme to get that perfect design you want. It is not worth it!
I discovered the hard way that tweaking a free theme by yourself can be so time consuming and energy sapping. For over three months, I have desired to change from my former website design, a Remix Premium theme to another theme because I was unable to make something function well in that theme. (The multi-tab that contained my Archives, Categories and Recent Post was not displaying properly in IE, though it displays well in Firefox).
Getting a free theme that fits my needs was difficult. I spent hours endlessly searching and trying out some themes. Eventually, yesterday, I stumbled on Revolution Theme 2 and I got a theme that fits my needs. So, Nigerian Entrepreneur now wears a new look. 😉 I hope my regular readers love this theme.
If you are new here, thanks for visiting, I look forward to seeing you again. and again You can drop your comment below. Also, you can easily get updates to this post and other tips for Small Business Owners and Online Entrepreneurs by subscribing free to my RSS.
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Tags: Entrepreneur, quality content, small business, web design
I have to disagree with that. I’m a designer myself, and I notice that if people don’t like what they see, they wont stick around to read.
Its like food, if it doesn’t look right, who will trust the taste. With all this spam and virus business going around, looks are everything, content is second…
I have 2 small scale web sites but designs are top notch. I totally agree with you. You do not have to think for long. Would you buy something from a poorly designed web site?
@Organic Designer
Thanks for visiting and stating your view. I agree with you on the point that if it doesn’t look good, one will be skeptical about what the taste will look like. However, if it looks good and taste horrible, it is more annoying.
@eranda
Thanks for visiting. I am not disputing the importance of good website design. If that was my aim, I won’t change my theme for a new one.
My point is that the content is of higher priority than the look.
When I need an information, Google will serve it from any website it exists on, the look will not be considered.
However, if the information does not exist? Good website design will be of no profit 😉
Thanks pals for airing your views. Cheers.
Many clients I have dealt with have no content whatsoever… Where is a beginning website owner to find good content
I’m working at the moment on a total overhaul of my site. I’ve got excellent content, and it looked very nice, but since I’m changing the whole “feel” of it I know I have my work cut out for me!
I visited your site.You have given a good explanation about bussieness website design and also for a quality content.It seems a goodone about Entreprenuership.Thankyou.
You have given such a great valuable information about the business website and the need for quality content.Thanks for sharing this valuable information.
Been looking at doing SEO and bettering the web design on my website for a while, so this post has been really useful. Clear read as well, so thanks!