So you say to yourself why would you need the services of a trained web designer, if you can get it done on your own.

Sooner or later, it gets to the point where you need your business website to reflect your commitment to your business.

Do not think that the well informed potential client would have a positive impression when they view your website as “homemade”.

Here are some of the assumptions that they will form:

• You are new in business: Being new in business should not be perceived as negative but truth be told, people would be reluctant to want to buy from a person that is just starting out. You should not blatantly promote that a potential client would be your first client. You should promote your expertise and previous experience.
• Your business isn’t making any money: If people see a “Free website by Blah Blah” on the footer of your website, they would think “Can’t afford a paid-for website”.
• You don’t have clients and/or customers: People want to deal with businesses that have a proven track record.
• You are not committed to the business: This means that you can pack up shop tomorrow and not finish their project or provide after sale care.

Did you know that these conclusions would be drawn in less than a minute? All of these assumptions would take them to your competitors, period.

These are some of the reasons to hire a professional web designer:

• Many are business owners themselves
• They understand what gives a positive or negative impression
• They provide more than just web design
• Many are trained not only in web design but web development, search engine optimization, internet marketing and more; and have in depth knowledge and experience in these areas
• Many don’t charge an arm and a leg, they have affordable services packages to meet the needs and budget of a potential client

A very important thing that I continue to see in successful business owners and I’m privileged to continue to connect with many; is that they delegate to experts in fields that they don’t have the a background or in depth experience in.

Remember, First Impress Counts! and Anything Worth Doing is Worth Doing Well!

1. Always have the email come from the same person at your end. It helps to create a sense of rapport and stability.
2. Never use a subject or title line that is misleading; always make it descriptive of what is in the body of the email.
3. On the other hand, keep it snappy. Instead of “Your November Newsletter”, use the title of one of the more important articles in your newsletter.
4. Make it clear that it is okay to forward the email to others, if the subscriber likes. This form of viral marketing can grow your subscriber list over time.
5. Always include links to your product pages in the body of the email.
6. Also include an easy opt-out link at the bottom of the communication.
7. Be sure to solicit responses and comments. People love to share their thoughts.
8. Formatting is especially important in plain text messages. Keep the attention going by using bulleted lists instead of lengthy paragraphs.
9. Stay away from using all capital letters or italicizing words, as they can be harder to view on a computer screen.
10. Watch the use of color in your emails, especially with text; lighter colors tend to be hard to read, especially on a white background.
11. Use fonts that are similar to those used in most email clients; it will make it easier to arrange the text to best advantage, especially for plain text emails.
12. Include some incentive to visit your website, such as promoting a new product or noting a new blog entry.
13. Don’t forget to include a special offer or a discount from time to time.
14. Always thank the subscribers for their time and support.
15. Before you send the emails to clients, send them to an email address of your own, with one in HTML and another in plain text. That way, you know exactly what the subscriber will see.
16. Don’t be afraid to try something different now and then. Vary texts, layouts, and other elements to see what subscribers respond to best.
17. Keep the text of the email focused; rambling will lose your audience, just as wandering text on your website will drive visitors away.
18. Use a reliable program to blast mail to your subscriber list; most allow you to review a report of successful deliveries once the job is complete.
19. Review the reports regularly, and compare them to spikes in your web site traffic, and the responses you get about specifics of the emails.
20. Used software to tabulate and categorize the responses. It will make it much easier to process them and turn them into usable data.
21. Assess the percentage of response you get. The industry standard is between five and fifteen percent. If you are getting less than that, it is time to rethink your approach.
22. If a response serves as the inspiration for an article in the next newsletter, ask the subscriber if it is okay to mention them by first name and initial. This is enough to maintain anonymity, while still recognizing their contribution.
23. Ask subscribers to submit some of their own copy once or twice a year. You may be surprised with the quality of what you receive. Reward the best one with a free ebook or other product.
24. Send out special holiday emails along with your regular weekly communications.
25. Listen to the feedback from your subscribers. It will help you refine the mailings as you go along.

Here are five simple ways that your website could be losing you business:

1. Slow Page Loads: People get really frustrated when pages take long to load. If you have this problem then check the size of your images and ensure that their sizes are optimized to load quicker while still maintaining the integrity of these images. Find ways to optimize your pages as well, also contact your web hosting company about this issue if everything you’ve tried hasn’t resolved the issue.
2. Dead/Broken Links: No one likes to click on a link and it goes to a “not found” page. Use a good broken links checker regularly to ensure that all your links are valid. A great tool to use for checking links is the W3C links checker.
3. Inactive Contact Forms: Imagine someone who is really interested in your products and/or services and then they’d taken the time to complete your contact form, click on the send button and NOTHING HAPPENS! Many people would immediately move on to the next person.
4. Poor Navigation: It’s important to give visitors to your website many ways to navigate through your web pages. It comes highly recommended from the usability point, to have more than one way to click through pages.
5. Visible Contact: Not every potential client wants to use your contact form. So create other options for they to contact you via. Some people like to send emails and some like to speak to a person. Adding an email address link and telephone number can make a difference.

Taking into consideration the mentioned above points can makes a huge difference in whether you gain more business or not.

AI Virtual Solutions is a company providing Virtual Assistant (VA) services to work-at-home professionals throughout North America and the world.

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