If you’re reading this article, chances are you’ve just started thinking about building their website. Perhaps it’s for your brand new eCommerce venture. Or maybe you’re a content creator looking to widen your reach and engagement with your existing audience. Or a freelancer who wants to establish a secondary source of income and earn money online. The truth is, no matter your goal, there’s one thing you will need to reach that goal. And that’s a website. Correction. A successful website.
Unfortunately, building a successful website isn’t always the most straightforward task. For starters, there are far too many websites on the internet already. 1.14 billion, to be precise. That’s a lot of competition to face. That’s a lot of standing out of the crowd to do!
The good news is that it’s our job to know what makes a website work. And then bring you in on all the secrets to help you build a successful website. And with that in mind, here are ten secrets that will help you create a super successful website, no matter when you start your journey.
Table of Contents
1. Find your purpose
We’ve already seen earlier in this article that a website can be created to fill any number of needs. But as the creator, you need to be sure just what it is you want your website to do for you. Do you want to list and promote your services? Are you looking to sell products on your new website actively? Will you be blogging and earning through affiliate links on this site?
The reason it’s so essential to establish and define your website’s purpose right at the outset is because it can be challenging, if not impossible, to change its goal later. So, take a few days, sit down, and list out very clearly the exact purpose you have in mind before you get down to any other secrets that will help you build a successful website.
2. Identify your audience
Once you’ve established your website’s goal, you must understand who your audience is. Many website creators will create a good-looking website and hope for the best. But this is not a good strategy if it can even be called a strategy.
Because a website’s audience can vary wildly based on its purpose. There’s no point in creating a flashy website if the audience is the elderly population just looking for information. And you certainly don’t want it to be a dull site if your audience is teenagers interested in K-Pop. A website that is too corporate sounding or looking may not work well with the social sector. And a very casual website may not work for the corporate circle.
So remember to take as much time as you need to identify your target audience. This is one of the biggest secrets to building a successful website that people don’t think about!
3. Find the right domain name
Think of a domain name as your business card or store signage online. It’s the name people will forever associate with your website and, in turn, your business. What’s more, it’s the one part of your website you do not want to change once you’ve established your brand.
With that said, what exactly makes a good domain name good? Here’s the five-ingredient secret sauce:
A: It’s short
B: It’s easy to spell, type, and pronounce
C: It’s easy to remember
D: It’s not complicated with numbers, hyphens, and such
E: It’s search engine friendly
If you can simply remember all these pointers while also keeping in mind your website’s goal and audience, you’ll likely end up with a domain name that is good for your website and your brand!
4. Get the perfect domain extension
A domain extension is the last three letters in your website’s URL. The most common one is .com. And you must research and choose the domain extension that best suits your website. The explanation that follows will bring you more clarity on why the domain extension is so important.
Let’s say you’ve finalized your domain name of choice. You’ll now very likely be faced with the issue of actually registering it. There are two significant reasons this happens:
One: The domain name you’re trying to register is already taken by someone else. This is a widespread occurrence simply because of the vast number of websites that have already been registered. Chances are, every new player like you faces this exact problem while registering their domain name of choice
Two: You’re still looking for a .com domain extension. As we said earlier, .com is the most familiar domain extension in the world. And because of this popularity, registering with a domain name is also the most difficult.
Instead, look for newer, more modern domain extensions that save you the trouble of having to rethink your domain name and help your website become more successful. Here’s how:
- Newer domain extensions can help you create a shorter website address. For instance, Handmadepaperstoreonline.com becomes handmadepaper.store.
- Modern domain extensions are rich in keywords. People already search for keywords like ‘kitchen supplies online’, ‘pet food store near me’, ‘art dealers online’, and so on. New domain extensions like .Store and .Online can bring these keywords right into your domain names. So, if you’re an online art dealer, your website could be as short and as keyword loaded as artsellers.online.
- New domain names make your website’s purpose clear to the audience. For example, a website called communitylearning.space lets people know that yours is an education-based website. And a name like ecofriendly.tech tells people your business has something to do with environmental technology. This builds credibility and helps people connect with your website better.
So remember to try out a domain extension that fits your website rather than trying to change your domain name to match the generic .com extension. This is the kind of secret that goes a long way in creating a successful website.
5. Choose how to build the website
Once you’ve established your website’s purpose, identified its audience, and chosen the perfect domain name and extension, it’s time to start building your website.
There are two ways you could go about this. The choice you make will rely heavily on the amount of experience you have, your budget, and the time you have available at hand. With that said, here are the two biggest choices you have when it comes to building your successful website:
One: Do it yourself
If you have experience designing a website, this is the route you could take. But remember, this process will require you to dedicate large chunks of time. Depending upon the tool you pick, you might not even need to know any coding. There are, after all, dozens of free website builders available today. Remember that these builders can often limit what you can do in the design process.
Two: Get professional help
If you’d rather concentrate on the other aspects of the business, you could also hire a professional web design team to build your website. These agencies can create wholly customized websites for you, add plugins that help the website function better, and even improve SEO capabilities. While they often cost a decent amount of money, they can save you time and offer additional services, such as content writing. These can help you continue to build a better website in the future.
Answering the following questions might help you make a better-informed choice about which way to proceed:
- Do I want my website to be basic, or do I want all the bells and whistles?
- What is my realistic budget?
- How much time do I have to build this website?
- Do I have the know-how to keep adding better features to the website in the future?
- Will I be able to manage the website by myself once the business has scaled up?
6. Create a meaningful website design
Whether you choose to do it yourself or go the professional route, you must remember to make the actual design of the website meaningful in every way possible. The aim here should be to bring together form and function. Because a website that looks gorgeous but doesn’t work well for the user is as bad as a website that gets things done but looks like it was made two decades ago.
So remember to:
Make the website easy to navigate
Don’t confuse or make your user overthink. Reduce their efforts in getting from one page to another on your website.
Make the website accessible to all
Not all your website visitors will be the same. Think about how your website design can help those with disabilities still interact with your business and brand.
Make the website responsive
As of 2021, more than half of all website traffic globally came from mobile phones. So be sure to create a website design that works well on mobiles and other screens.
7: Analyze and optimize
All the great design and imagery in the world won’t help a website if it just doesn’t show up in search engine rankings. So remember to optimize everything on your website for search engine rankings. There are dozens of free and paid tools available today that can help you optimize keywords that match your website and your industry. Here are just a few of them:
But before you even get into the keyword game, you must remember to keep creating top-notch content on your website. The writing on your website must be easy to understand for almost anyone who visits your business. It should also inform the reader and help them make better decisions. Good content on your website should also be well-researched, as this goes a long way in search rankings. And don’t just create walls of text. Let images, videos, data charts, and words all come together to create quality content for your website.
Finally, remember to take advantage of the various analytics tools available. They will help you track what’s working, what isn’t, and what needs to. Even with many competitors, Google Analytics remains the top tool for the job.
To conclude
From domain names and extensions to design execution strategies and everything in between. These are the seven secrets that can help you build a successful website. It may not be the easiest thing, particularly if you’re starting. But arming yourself with these industry secrets will go a long way in moving many steps closer to success.
