So you want to launch a website? Here’s a fact fun for you – as of January 2020, there were 1.74 billion websites on the internet.

From the moment your site goes live, every existing website will be competing for your territory. Since there is such a wide variety to select from, your users won’t have any qualms about jumping ship to another readily available website that can meet their needs.

As such, you must craft a website that can stand up to the competition while being highly valuable to your target audience.

Here are a few crucial things you need to cover when launching a website to stand out from the competition and thrive.

1. Don’t Cut Corners With Your Hosting

Do you think the website hosting you use matters? You should because it does. To understand this, you need to draw a line between your hosting and the site’s performance.

The capabilities of your hosting service impacts some search engine optimization (SEO) aspects that affect how your website performs.

For example, if you use slow hosting, it affects your site’s speed. Your users will likely leave your slow loading site as research shows that users will abandon your site if it takes more than two seconds to load. That then adversely impacts how well your website performs.

You, therefore, need to understand the various types of hosting available to pick the right match for your site. Hosting service providers charge based on storage and bandwidth. Determine a realistic traffic projection for your site to avoid settling for a slow host.

Other issues to consider when picking a host is the level of support you’ll need as you launch and the type of servers in use by the provider.

2. Pick a Good Domain Name

A domain name is like a unique address specifically for your site. The right domain name is a useful means to improve your digital advertising efforts, especially as far as SEO is concerned.

Picking a good domain name can lift your ranking, which makes your site more visible to users. Additionally, a good domain name makes you more competitive in search results.

If it’s descriptive and relevant, users will instinctively know what your website is about just from looking at your domain name. That helps you generate more traffic, especially with those users that aren’t familiar with your site.

As you select a domain name, look for something easy to remember. If such a domain name can be relatable to your business, that’s excellent for your long-term outlook. You should also look up the potential domain name you plan to pick and ensure it has little to no Google search results as that makes it easier for users to find your site.

Don’t forget to select a domain name that features your keyword. While this may not carry as much weight as in previous years, it delivers desirable results in the long term, and you need any edge you can get.

3. A Precise Buyer Persona Is a Must

At its core, your website is created to develop and nurture a relationship with users. If you don’t understand who you’re looking to interact with, you won’t serve their needs. Ultimately, that will make your website irrelevant to them and deliver abysmal results to you.

A buyer persona is a detailed profile of your ideal target users. It includes their demographic information and other relevant data points that help you uncover more insights about your ideal users.

What do they like and what do they fear? What unmet needs do they have? What are their aspirations? These are some of the pertinent questions a buyer persona answers.

Once you have a detailed and accurate buyer persona, you’ll have the ammunition to develop highly personalized content and offers. Such personalization is essential in your SEO and email marketing, among others, where you need to segment your audience if you’re to be effective.

As you offer more personalized content and offers, you strike at the heart of the salient needs your users have. That makes it easier for you to not only draw traffic to your website but also convert leads to paying customers.

4. Don’t Mistime Your Launch

Not enough people time their website launch right and that is a huge mistake. It’s common to hear of businesses that feature on Shark Tank finding their website crashing due to poor timing and preparation.

You may be tempted to make a big splash right before a major holiday or event, but don’t give in to it. If you do launch the site and immediately encounter heavy traffic, you’ll struggle to handle that. Remember, how users perceive your website determines if they keep visiting it or not.

The more prudent way to launch a new website is by staggering the traffic. Look for a launch day that won’t feature as much traffic within your niche.

As your site goes live, you’ll notice changes and adaptations you need to make for more optimal operation. Through this, you can gradually build up your audience knowing your site’s limitations to avoid delivering poor user experience.

5. Use HTTPS

HTTPS is a protocol that encrypts the information flowing between a server and a client. It enables you to protect your user information from the very start, and you shouldn’t launch without it.

Nowadays, if a website doesn’t use HTTPS, a user will get a warning from a browser before proceeding. Most users won’t opt to follow through the moment they realize the website isn’t protected. If you fail to use HTTPS, you’ll bleed potential traffic and develop a negative reputation that’s hard to shake off.

HTTPS is also essential as it influences Google search ranking. Websites that use the protocol tend to have lower bounce rates. As such, using HTTPS contributes to your SEO, and any slight improvement drives more traffic your way.

Will You Be Launching a Website That Outperforms Competitors?

The internet is chock full of websites, and every day you’ll be neck-to-neck with them for traffic and customer dollars. Thus, you must invest in launching a website that delights and surprises your users for it to become an essential part of their life, and convert them to paying customers.

Drive Social Media is a digital marketing firm dedicated to delivering a minimum three times return on investment for all clients. Talk to us today for digital marketing services across the marketing landscape that will provide tangible results.