The new year is a great time to think about your website and branding. Whether you already have a website or are thinking about building one for your business, you want to make sure that your website is covering all of the bases.
So, what pages does a small business website need? And which pages are nice-to-have?
Essential Pages for a Small Business Website
Home Page
Think of this page as your initial greeting to your website visitors. This is the page that sets the tone for the rest of the website, and gives your visitors an initial feel for who you are and what you do/offer. This page doesn’t need to be complicated. Briefly introduce yourself and your business, and have a clear call-to-action (CTA).
The number one goal for your ‘Home’ page is to make it clear to the website visitor what you do/offer (within seconds). If visitors can’t piece together what you do quickly, you risk losing them.
About Page
Your website should help establish trust with your website visitor. One way of doing this is through your ‘About’ page. Let visitors know who you are, what your mission is, and why you care about that mission.
It’s also nice to add a brief sentence or two about you personally. If you enjoy kayaking in your spare time, or if you have a heart for animals, mention it. Give people a quick glimpse of you as a person and what you care about. There have been a number of times I have connected with clients over a shared love of hiking or writing. These personal connections help make you more relatable, strengthen your business relationship, and establish that human connection.
Services Page
If you are a service-based business, you’ll want a services page where website visitors can learn more about the work you do. That being said, don’t just tell visitors what you do – help them see how it will personally benefit them and solve their pain points. To do this well, you need to know your target audience and what they care about. What concerns, questions, and stressors do they have? Whatever it might be, speak to those things.
Contact Page
Make it easy for website visitors to get in touch with you. The best way to do this is to have a dedicated contact page with a professional contact form. Consider also adding links to any of your professional social media platforms. If your business has a physical location, a contact page is a great place to also include your:
- Business Address
- Operating Hours
- Phone Number
Legal Pages
Legal pages are typically accessed in the website footer, but they are an important part of any small business website. You’ll want to check what requirements exist given the nature of your website.
Nice-to-Have Pages
Some of these may be more or less applicable given your business, but here are some additional pages that might be helpful:
- FAQ – this is a great page to have, especially if you get a lot of questions from your visitors or clients/customers. Not only does it bring more clarity to your website visitor, but it saves you from having to field questions.
- Blog – this is another great page to have, especially if the type of work you do or product you offer is a topic you can easily write content for. Say you’re a copywriter and help small business owners with their newsletter copy. It might be a great idea to post blog posts on your website that give helpful newsletter content ideas, writing tips, etc. Not only does this show potential clients that you have value to offer, but it also gives you a better chance to be found. While SEO (search engine optimization) is a whole topic in and of itself, if you write blog posts on topics people are regularly searching for and use relevant keywords that your target audience cares about, it can help in your visibility on internet searches.
- Portfolio – this page is great to have if you have work to show potential clients/customers. Say you are a photographer who specializes in professional headshots. Having a portfolio where you showcase samples of your work can help to establish credibility and trust. Again, this doesn’t have to be complicated. The goal is to show potential clients/customers that you have a proven track record and can do professional work for them as well.
Final Thoughts
All in all, there are a few pages that every small business website should have. Two items of note – first, there are other pages that may be important for your small business given the work you do. Second, while there are exceptions to some of the above pages (for instance, a landing page where ‘Home’, ‘About’, ‘Services’, etc. are all condensed into a single page), the pages outlined above give any small business website a solid foundation and pave the way to building clarity, credibility, and trust with website visitors.
If you’re thinking about launching a small business website (or redesigning your current one) and want someone to help you bring it all together, feel free to reach out. I’d love to help!