We are often asked to explain how to make a good website. Do you have a list of the elements you need for a good website? Unfortunately, there is no easy and comprehensive answer. Like many SEO, the answer is: It depends on the situation. What website do you have and what do you want to achieve? Who do you want to talk to? However, there are some best practices to help you get started. This post lists seven factors that can help any website to have better websites and better search results.
Comprehensive SEO
The number one thing to keep in mind is something that we at Top4 Marketing advocate a lot: comprehensive SEO. Essentially, comprehensive SEO helps improve your website in all areas to make it rank higher in search engines. By all areas we really mean every aspect of your site on all levels, from the content you provide to the user experience you provide. If you combine all of this into a solid SEO strategy, make improvements and measure the results, you’re on the right track!So what makes a good website?
Many of the things we consider important for a good website are difficult to quantify. For example, in the field of SEO, there are many topics about quality. Even Google has said for years that you need to focus on the quality of your website and its content.
After every algorithmic update that Google implements, the answer for those who lost rankings is the same: it might not be your fault, because other sites might seem to be a better fit for this specific query. However, you need to work on the overall quality of your content.
Many people are looking for information about how to do this on the Search Quality Raters Guidelines, looking for any help they can get. While you shouldn’t rely on Google for everything, in this case they are right. You should improve your content — always!
Make sure to look at user intent and the behaviour of your potential customers. Keep your keyword research up-to-date periodically. And check your niche, what’s happening in your part of the market? Continually evaluating your SEO strategy will allow you to stay abreast of changes in the market and identify new possibilities.
1. Your website matches user intent and has a clear goal
Do you know your audience? Do you know your business and what you bring to this world? Why should someone come to your site and do business with you? It’s not because you think you have an awesome product — that just won’t work anymore. “Build it and they will come?” Your website should have a clear mission and goal.
If you want to succeed, you need to know your audience. You have to reveal everything about them. You can probably understand what they say they want, but is that the same as what they really need? Does your product or service simply offer a possible solution to a problem or does it actually improve the lives of your customers?
Your story has to be right. It should be based on people’s wishes and needs. This means that you need to set a search intent for your site. Find out how people end up on your pages and tailor them to answer their questions. Organise your user journey from A to Z and place your content strategically. Also, pay attention to how you say the answer. Often you will find that the conversation style is what you are looking for.
2. You have a technically proficient website
A good website is easy to crawl and shows search engines what can and cannot be indexed. A good site doesn’t have many flaws. Good websites load super fast from anywhere in the world. Make sure you do everything you can to get those pages to load as fast as possible.
Technical SEO is very important but a good understanding of the basics can keep you ahead of the curve. Think carefully about what CMS you are looking for and how you will run it. Not to be too biased but WordPress generally gave us everything we needed. It is powerful, flexible and almost everyone uses it. WordPress websites are pretty SEO-friendly but with a little help from our SEO services, you can get your WordPress website optimised for search engines in no time. Also, make sure to choose a hosting company that is reputable, flexible and helpful.
3. Your website is secure, safe and trustworthy
Search engines and users are looking for signals that indicate trust. Why should your site and content be trusted? Something like regular downtime can indicate poor maintenance. If you don’t see the green lock icon, you may not be taking security seriously. There are many clues they are looking for.
Search engines like Google strive to deliver the best results to their users. Increasingly, if search engines doubt your claim, or if you use a dubious “expert” to validate your content, they will not display your content. Instead, they choose results that prove to be good and reliable results. That’s why you need to work on your credibility at every level, both technical and content.
In addition, your website should be a safe haven for your visitors. You need to have your security in order. A hacked website will get you nowhere! And a hacked site is easier to prevent than it is to fix. Use up-to-date software, have your SSL in order, create strong passwords and use tools such as Cloudflare to protect your site from DDoS attacks.
4. Your website is well-designed with stellar UX
Does your website need to be beautiful? Let’s be honest — beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The design of your website needs to help you reach the goals you set. Your message should come across loudly and clearly. The design should be branded and well thought out. But more importantly, your website should be clear and easy to use for everyone. Accessibility is not something you should ignore.
You also need to consider user experience, which is not only how something looks but also how it feels. It’s about giving users a pleasant experience, something they’ll remember. UX is also not letting users wait long for your pages to load. This is annoying to users because they can’t read the text on the website because of the color scheme, or they can’t press the buttons on the mobile site. Think to yourself: How can I turn potential frustration into happiness on my website?
And satisfied users may have higher purchase intent, so get those CTAs in order!
5. Your site has awesome, user-friendly content
Be user-centric, not company-centric. Good content helps users reach their goals. You need to keep your business goals in mind and deliver that content at the right time. To do this, you need to know your user inside out, as we mentioned above. Understand them, understand their behaviour and focus your content on that. The content you offer should be clear and easy to understand by using language your users know well. Try to bring something unique to the table. Do the research and present original reporting.6. Your website is mobile-friendly
Mobile data traffic has been steadily increasing in recent years. If your website isn’t mobile-friendly yet, you really should try it and work on your mobile SEO. But if your site has been mobile-friendly for a while, it is time to start looking at building your next site mobile-first.
This isn’t a new concept but most websites are still developed desktop-first. After designing a desktop view, designers often narrow it down to mobile size and lose its reliability and freshness in the process. By adopting the mobile-first mindset, you can focus on the tasks that your users should be able to perform on your mobile site. It helps clean up clutter and more often than not, allows you to come up with a fully focused minimal design. Less is more, remember?
7. Your website can “speak” directly to the search engines
Search engines have tried reading webpage content to figure out what a page is about for years. They need that content to be able to match the search query with the indexed pages that give the best answers to this query. It turns out that actually understanding the content or media on a page is harder than it looks, especially for machines. Search engines need a little guidance to discover the true meaning of elements on a page. Enter: structured data in Schema format.
Schema is kind of like a translator for search engines. It describes the elements of a page. Thanks to schema, search engines can now say with certainty that a review is a review and a recipe is a recipe. In turn, because Google is so certain about the content, marking up these elements can lead to rich results in the search results pages. This includes carousels, nutritional information for recipes, star ratings, FAQ dropdowns, swipeable How-To boxes on mobile and much, much more. Structured data is one of the areas where search engines are consuming a lot of resources these days, so be sure to stay up to date.
By implementing structured data on your site, search engines will not only know what all of the elements mean but also how each one relates to the bigger picture.
Final takeaways
There are a lot of things to go in to build a good website. It’s not just about buying domains, getting random hosts, installing WordPress (or any other website builders for that matter, like Shopify, Squarespace, Wix, Sitebeat, etc.) and choosing cool themes. When you leave it at that, you’re setting yourself up for failure. You have to plan to get things right. You need a strategy which is probably the most important element of a good website.
Although far from being a complete list, those are some of the most important elements you should focus on while developing or improving your site.
How we can help
Whether you’re just starting your business or you’re already established, your website should be one of the top priorities for your digital marketing strategy. If you’re a small business on a tight budget, making a good website is a good start of your digital marketing strategy. It’s a great way to build credibility and get noticed online without breaking the bank.
Our website development company team can help bring your vision to life, whether it’s a simple WordPress website to showcase your business or a complex eCommerce website. Pairing your website with other digital marketing strategies like SEO, content marketing, copywriting and others will allow you to reach your most qualified users.
Ready to optimise your website with the best web design agency? Get in touch today to chat about how our website design company can grow your business. Or if you’re eager to get started, use our web calculator to get a free, instant estimate for how much your website will cost you!