Image from © Gajus @ stock.adobe.com--Best Corporate Websites

How to Build the Best Corporate Websites for Startups

Establishing a web presence is a must for all businesses in the 21st century. Many millennials rely on websites such as yelp to find places to eat, shop, and find services. A web presence is imperative to new customers finding and rating your business. Whether it be to look up reviews, a dinner menu, or directions, customers will use the internet to find your business. If it is not listed, chances are a majority of potential customers will move on. Startup companies are strapped for cash and tend to have difficulty competing with the best corporate websites. Now days, creating a website is not all that difficult. Launching a company website does not have to be a daunting task. This is the first of a series of articles that explores ways startup companies can compete with the best corporate websites.  There are a few options when deciding how to launch a website; these options consist of doing it yourself with website building tools like wix.com, hiring a freelancer, or hiring a web design company. 

Doing It Yourself – Competing With the Best Corporate Websites

Creating a website yourself works out well if you just need a basic site to get across the point your business is legitimate. These are fairly basic websites with little onpage search engine optimization (SEO). SEO is how search engines such as Google rank your website for keywords typed in their search engine. SEO is a great way to get organic traffic to your website. At Wix design and maintenance for such a site will cost anywhere from $4-$30 a month depending on website specifics. This will most likely be the cheapest option.

Hiring A Freelancer – Competing with the Best Corporate Websites

Hiring a freelancer can be extremely advantageous so long as the business owner finds a honest respectable party. Freelancers are independent contractors in which one can hire for specific tasks. Websites such as Upwork offer freelancers from across the world. I like Upwork because if a freelancer is hired on an hourly basis, one can monitor their work by random snapshots taken of their computer every couple minutes and it also displays how many times the mouse and keyboard were touched throughout a given timeframe. It is as easy as posting a job, receiving applications, and selecting qualified individuals to interview. Payments are kept in an escrow account until both parties agree upon the deliverable. Depending on the website specifics, a website designed through this avenue could potentially only cost a few hundred bucks. Qualified freelancers do a great job for only a fraction of the cost of web design companies.

Hiring A Web Design Company – Competing with the Best Corporate Websites

Web design companies are good for those that have the capital, those wanting to steer away from the hiring process, and want assurance of an adequate deliverable. There are plenty of companies to choose from. If I personally were to go through this avenue I would highly consider offshore based web design companies in countries such as India due to US based firms charging a premium price while many of them still outsource much of their work to India and the Philippines. The main advantage one would gain by choosing a US based company is the ability pursue a US based lawsuit if necessary.

Notes

1. In order to set up a website the owner will need a domain name and hosting account. I use Godaddy for both domain names and hosting setup due to their award winning customer service. If you are not tech savvy, do not underestimate paying a more expensive price for good customer service. GoDaddy’s cheapest hosting plan costs a little more than $10 per month and a domain name can be registered for an annual fee of approximately $10.
2. It is recommended that the email addresses associated with your business have @domainname.com instead of @gmail.com or @yahoo.com. This gives a much more professional appearance. Such emails can be set up for free at Zoho.com with limited storage or several other companies offer this service for a small fee (Gmail, Godaddy, etc.). Many website design companies and hosting companies will offer this service for a monthly fee.
3. If you are a ecommerce business my recommendation is Shopify. It is awesome and easy to use with much of the necessities pre-populated. We will save details for another article

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