Hi, my name is Lilly Ghahremani and I’m a web strategist for Tiny Frog Technologies. And today I’m going to talk about the unique needs of websites for IT businesses.
And the reason I want to talk about this today is that these are really fun and challenging sites. And the reason for that is that what IT businesses do is so complex and these days, the trends on websites are towards simplifying. So how do you strike that balance as an IT business looking to have a great website?
So the first recommendation that I have is – talk to your users in their language. Some IT businesses service other technology companies. In which case, you might have a little bit of wiggle room to use industry language and lingo. But generally, IT businesses set up the IT networks and systems for traditional, basic businesses in all different sectors. If this is the case, it’s really important that you just take a step back from overly technical lingo. And the reason I feel comfortable recommending this to you is as a general rule, lowest denominator can’t go wrong. Lowest common denominator really means using language that anybody would understand. And the ability to use simple language in talking about even complex technologies really shows the user that you know what you’re doing and that you don’t need to talk over their heads. Your goal with an IT business website is to get people interested enough to pick up the phone. And this is really important to remember with the strategy for your IT business website. Very rarely are you selling as service directly through the website. You need someone to call and have a consultation to really decide what they need before you quote them. So you don’t have to do a hard sell on the site. You just need them to feel comfortable that you know what they don’t. And that’s really where the strength of IT teams is – is in knowing what traditional businesses don’t about setting up IT systems.
A few other recommendations that I have for you are: To add your most popular solutions or services in a visible place on the website. Don’t make your users dig around. If you have a service that is a go-to popular thing you get called for, day in and day out, put it right on the homepage somewhere where people can find it, click it, and move in to learn more about it.
Secondly, again, I can’t say this enough, keep language simple and direct. Focus on solutions. What problems can you solve for them?
Third, build credibility. Build their comfort. This is a big deal for a lot of businesses to bring in a tech team to set up the backbone for the way they run their operations. So what can you do to show them that you are a trusted community partner? You can do this with testimonials, you can do this by showing affiliations or partnerships. If you’re a dealer of well-known brands, if you’re a Microsoft partner, as an example, these are things the average user will see and recognize and they build your credibility in their eyes.
And finally, when I talk about taking a step back from technical language, the first question I always get from people is “But what about SEO?” SEO absolutely comes into play on a website but the question is, do these keywords need to be the first things you put in front of people, or do they need to be built into the bigger strategy into the site through back pages, through landing pages, and through a deeper game plan for long-term results? To that end, and I highly recommend working with an SEO specialist to really build that value into your site. Strategy is such an important part of creating a website that delivers what you need for your business. And something we love to do here at Tiny Frog.
So again, I’m Lily Ghahremani, Web Strategist at Tiny Frog Technologies, and if you have an IT business we would love to talk to you about delivering your next website. Contact us today, we’re hoppy to help!
