53 Features Your Local Business Website Must Have

Every business needs a website, even your small business. Why? Because growing your businesses online presence starts with being on the internet. We all know the internet is a powerful platform that can be leveraged to your advantage to reach a broader audience than your bread and butter storefront. A small business website acts as an online storefront, a marketing platform, and more all in one accessible place - available 24/7 -even when you’re sleeping. In 2023 71% of businesses already have a website - so if you haven’t accepted this reality yet, it’s time to catch up - and fast.

Researching a website development company or a freelancer is a good start, but in reality, setting up a website is a collaborative effort between you and your developer. You know your business and audience better than anyone, so they will need your insights and knowledge to craft a website that sells.?

So what makes an effective local business website ? We’ve prepared a checklist of 53 must-have features for your website to set you up for success.

Homepage Features for Your Local Business Website

1. ccTLD domain. A country-code top-level domain (ccTLD), or a country-specific domain is a must for a local business site you’re building. This helps specify where your business operates. For example in Australia, the standard domain is .com.au.?
2. Phone number. Placing a visible phone number on the homepage allows your visitors to contact you right away if they want to engage your business or service. Enabling a live chat functionality also makes you more accessible, because visitors can contact you easily whilst they might be at work or commuting for example.?
3. Logo. Never forget your logo! It’s the easiest way for you to leave your visitors with a call card to recall your brand. A logo at the top of the homepage can make your website memorable.
4. Main menu/navigation bar. Think of your website’s menu / navigation bar as the map that showcases the main event within your website. It must lead visitors to important parts of your business, like the products or services page or a contact us page. Pro tip: create your main menu with the customer's browsing experience in mind. What are your customers looking for? Where do you want them to go?
5. Site headings and tagline. Sum up what your business is about in a few catchy and creative phrase or taglines that visitors will remember! Don’t forget to think about your SEO and include relevant keywords.?
6. Short blurb of text. Don’t confuse this with the tagline. You commonly see this referred to as the ‘what we do’ or “our story” situated near the top of the home page. This section is an opportunity to summarise what your business does and what it strives to achieve.
7. Banner image/video. Visuals are what will ignite your site visitor’s interest in your brand. An impactful banner image or video that showcases your business matters.
8. Call to action button. ‘Buy Now’! ‘Contact Us!’ and other similar CTAs should also be placed strategically on your site so a visitor can be compelled to act. Tips on better CTAs and where you can place them? Read this article on best CTA strategies here !?
9. Best-sellers. Showcase your business’ best-selling products or services on your homepage. This creates a good first impression for your visitors and encourages them to browse for more information or find and buy your hero products quickly.
10. Quote form. Place quote forms on your homepage so that customers can easily make enquiries on the spot. It is actually a must on every page of your site so your customers can easily reach out to you for answers.?
11. Quality content. Write helpful, usable content for your website visitors. It’s not only to be relevant and make it easy for visitors to find what the want, but it also helps your site rank on search engines, especially if the content you publish is of excellent quality and up-to-date. Content calendars like this one from Elephant in the Boardroom can help guide content creation topics in 2023.?
12. Readable font. Be user-friendly by implementing readable fonts. For establishing branding, keep fonts consistent throughout the site and stick to two to three font families maximum.?
13. Testimonials and social proof. Testimonials and reviews from your previous clients are a must for the homepage. This adds credibility and trustworthiness to your brand, since the reviews are from authentic people who have interacted with your brand before.?
14. Newsletter signup forms. Newsletters are one way to keep your brand connected with your customers and to feed them valuable insights, updates and even teasers for your upcoming product launches or new content.??
15. Contact information. Place your brand’s contact details from every platform on your website so users can contact you and follow your brand on other channels they frequent, from phone numbers, social media to emails.?
16. Link to your brand’s socials. Businesses must maintain a consistent social media presence . Today's consumer loves to do research.?
17. Footer menu. This is basically the Main Menu located at the very bottom of the homepage. You can add contact information, other “quick links” and links to less relevant pages like terms and conditions or return policies that you might not add to your main menu.

Tips for your Service Pages:

1. Readable URL. Make sure you use URLS that a user or search engine can easily understand. For instance, a webpage domain.com.au/services or domain.com.au/shop will lead page visitors to think they’re visiting a page where they can view products or services offers.
2. Link to other pages. Internal linking is a must for every business site, as it strengthens website credibility and SEO potential. It also aids users to find other relevant information on your site that they might not have found otherwise.?
3. Child service pages. No, this one is not for the kids! These pages house more specific services or information that your business offers. For example, in a digital marketing business, you may create child service pages to explain more about a specific services like marketing strategy , social media strategy , etc. I'm sure you get the gist.?
4. Gallery of local work/portfolio. Present your previous work, case studies or projects here, don’t forget to ask for a testimonials and review from clients. It adds a touch of authority and credibility to your brand - word of mouth and peer reviews matter.

The “Location” Pages

1. URL with service area name. If your business has service areas or branches in multiple places, it’s important to indicate this in your business URLs. A website domain like domain.com.au/service-area/melbourne, will lead visitors to your Melbourne service area website page with location relevant information.
2. Maps with directions. Show your local shop’s location through maps and easy-to-understand directions. Sometimes, your business address won’t give it all away, so providing visitors with directions and maps can be helpful.?

Contact Us Page Tips

1. Business address. Aside from a map, mention your shop’s address. It also demonstrates to your customers that you are a local business.?
2. Contact forms. Instead of contacting you directly via a phone call or email address, a visitor can message you directly through the website’s contact form. This also keeps a user on your website for a little longer. Ask for their contact name, email address / phone number and a message. You could also ask for information like services they are interested in or a preferred call back time. Keep in mind that people like to protect their personal information, so keep it short.?
3. Business hours. Keep your business operation hours updated on your contact page. Make sure to update if you’ll operate on holidays or if your business won’t open its doors on a certain day. There's nothing worse than a customer dropping by your office or shop expecting you to be open - when you’re actually closed.?
4. Captchas or anti-spam feature. Captchas help filter out real page visitors from bots. It is now a standard practice for sites to install these, so their inboxes won’t get filled up with spam messages.?

General Tips for Other Pages

1. ‘About us’ page. Tell your business story here. Include important details such as business history, goals, achievements, and vision, and present them creatively. You could also include a “meet the team” to show the scale of your business and to build trust.
2. Privacy policy page. Not everyone checks this page, but it is essential.
3. FAQ page. Answer your customers’ most common questions here. It also saves time for you and the customer as well and avoids unnecessary phone calls and emails.

Tips for your Blog or News Page

1. Sidebar. This area sums up the most popular content topics from your website for easy navigation and access.
2. Search function. Provide a search bar in the blog page so your readers can find relevant content topics or articles your site might have quickly.
3. Social media share buttons. Your articles should be interesting and worth sharing. Social media sharing buttons should be located at the top and bottom of the blog article so a visitor can spread the word about your content via their social media profiles.?
4. Comments feature. Comments on blogs are one way to encourage engagement and interaction. Keep the conversation going by enabling these on your blog articles. Note you will need to moderate these to avoid spam or offensive content.

For Search Engine Optimisation

1. Updating meta tags and descriptions. Updated title tags and meta descriptions are important factors for SEO rankings, so, your website should always have it title tags and meta descriptions reviewed for relevance and updated if needed. Need tips on creating title tags and descriptions that will strengthen your website SEO? Explore our top tips here !?
2. Updating URL structure. A readable URL matters for SEO too, so make sure you can update it easily.

What's left?

1. Mobile responsiveness. Most of your website visitors access your site through mobile phones. Optimise your site for mobile access . This is also a plus for SEO rankings.?
2. Hamburger menu on mobile. Since it won’t be possible to load up your desktop website as large as it is on a mobile device, enable the hamburger menu function. It makes the main menu appear as a sidebar, so you can view other parts of the site through your mobile phone.?
3. Browser compatible. Check if your site is compatible across several browsers like Chrome, Opera, Firefox, Edge, Internet Explorer and Safari. Remember, your site viewers access your site through different browsers.?
4. Google Analytics integration. The Google Analytics tool helps track your website’s performance, and its reports can help you create strategies to keep or change essential things within your site.?
5. Google Search Console integration. If you want to know how your website performs in Google searches, integrate the Google Search Console tool to your site.?
6. Optimise website speed and performance. Optimisation is an important criteria in SEO rankings, and also aids in increased user experience.?
7. Use browser cache to increase speed. Your website must be cache-enabled so it can store data which can be used when the visitors search for your site again.?
8. LocalBusiness Schema. A tool to help search engines understand your website content, LocalBusiness Schema is also one tool you shall use for your website.?
9. Fast hosting. Choose a website hosting services that is fast, reliable, and secured.?
10. Security. A secure website benefits both you and the persons accessing your site.?
11. Site backup. Backing up your site and its data regularly is also a must to maintain its data in case of any website breach. Of course, we don’t hope for this to happen but better be prepared as always.?
12. Easily manageable. This is where an efficient content management system (CMS) comes into picture. Your website shall use one for manageable content.?

Tips and things to avoid

1. Don’t use flash elements as it is not mobile-compatible.?
2. Don’t use automatic music in the background that will annoy users out of your site.?
3. Embed YouTube videos instead of uploading it directly to your site.?
4. Avoid using moving sliders.

And lastly…

1. Dead-end pages which lead visitors to darkness of nowhere - always have a 404 and implement redirects if you retire a page or change the URL.

Ready to build your local business website? Need an agency to do the ground work? Let Elephant in the Boardroom bring you a step closer to your dream website!?

www.elephantintheboardroom.com.au ?