Do you happen to know the fastest way to make your website visitors click the X on the top right of the screen?

It’s having a boring website with nothing of substance or interest to look at. If you happen to have one of these spartan websites, rest assured visitors will hightail it out of the screen and flee in search of something a little more entertaining.

Unfortunately, far too many contemporary businesses have what’s referred to as “informational websites” that merely list a business’s name, address, and perhaps a few generic pictures procured during a quick Google image search.

In today’s day and age, these types of stark, stripped-down websites are an unforgivable travesty. With the multitude of apps, tools, designs, and pictures available on the internet, creating a website that is aesthetically pleasing, able to engage viewers, and capable of producing repeat visits is easier than ever.

A website is an absolute necessity for any business or organisation. Those professionals who don't have a website are immediately judged as incompetent, behind the times, and even unprofessional. The importance of a website is paramount (e.g. there’s no way in hell any successful business cannot have one.)

Your website is a reflection of you, your business, your products, your services, and even your capabilities, professionalism, and degree of aptitude.

Having a website also enables your business and its products and services to be found from anyone across the globe. Knowing that much, it’s a wonder how any business these days still don’t have a website.

The vast majority of businesses invest an extensive amount of time, energy, and resources into the making of their website. Among their primary focuses are making the website pleasing to look at, easy to navigate, and filling it with interesting, captivating, and distinctive content.

A website not only extends your brand by giving it heightened visibility, but it also gives it a sense of officiality and authenticity. These sites, when promoted on various search engines, advertising venues, and popular social media sites are afforded win after win after win as they garner larger audience numbers and begin to build a loyal followership.

If you are interested in taking your website from plain and ordinary to distinctively extraordinary, read on below for simple web design tips to keep your customers engaged and inclined to return time and again.

Famed international publication Forbes states that “as a business owner, you’re already aware that your customers are the lifeblood of your business.” I like Forbes. I listen to what Forbes has to say. After all, they are the premier publication in the world covering the latest business news, entrepreneurship, and technology while offering plenty of tips to enterprises on how to grow their businesses.

Thus, you should listen to what Forbes has to say. When they tell you that your customers are the lifeblood of your business, you better start figuring out every way possible in the world that you can attract and engage as many customers as possible.

Having a dynamic website should be at the top of your “how to gain customers” list. Just below that, you should be devising ways that you can engage with customers, foster interaction, and build relationships with them.

Are you ready to build the website that your business deserves? Let’s go!

1. Give it the beauty treatment

• If you are unable to do so yourself, hire a professional to design your website and its structural components. You want the navigation of your site to be easy and breezy, with high-quality, vibrant pictures relating to your business on every single page.

2. Humanize yourself

• Forbes has also been quoted as saying that among the most effective ways in building emotional connections with your customer base customers is to show them that they are dealing with a real, actual human and not some faceless-man type of entity. While showing your human side, you are able to engage with your customers in a variety of ways such as the following:

• Give yourself an introduction. Talk about your purpose, goals, and how you want to serve your customers

• Welcome the newest members of your site community

• Consider making it a practice to send individual customers personalised messages that acknowledge their presence and thank them for their patronage

• Directly message or email one of your social media followers on Twitter, Facebook, or Tumblr

3. Grow Your Community By Creating a Forum

• Forums are a type of online community that is extremely valuable for site owners. Through a robust forum membership, visitors not only come to your page on a regular basis bit are forging connections with other members. Through the building of your forum, your business gets increased visibility, guaranteed results, a large and loyal audience, and much more.

4. Hold a Contest or Raffle

• Customers love contests! The potential to win something for free is a fantastic way to encourage site visits. With high-quality written content and plenty of great images, your site visitors will not only enter your contest or raffle but stay to pursue your site in all of its glory.

• Try not to hold contests for prizes that are of little value to your customers. Make prizes worthy enough to excite and motivate your audience. In the process, your well-crafted website will keep them sticking around to see what your company is about, what it sells, and the products it offers.

• Great contest or raffle ideas include asking your customer to share photos of themselves using your product, or tagging your business on social media sites, or submitting ideas for site improvement.

5. Make Your Customers Team Players

• Everyone likes to feel that they are part of a team. Even the self-avowed lone wolf is lying when he says he doesn’t like to feel as if he belongs. Being a part of a team makes you feel valued, important, and necessary.

• Pay close attention to your customer base and their activities. Say, for example, one of your customers has released an awesome product that is sure to be a best-seller. Take the time to recognise your customer and give them the props and accolades they deserve for their ingenuity and hard work. Go ahead and promote them on your own social media accounts and highlight their efforts.

• Not only will your customer feel as if they are part of your team, but they will also more than likely engage in reciprocal actions such as promoting your company and its products.

6. Reward Your Customers Handsomely

• Rewarding your customers handsomely doesn’t mean giving them a cut of your profits or stock dividends. Rather, the concept refers to providing your customers with exclusive content, offers, and discounts for their loyal membership and patronage.

• Let customers know that subscribing to your newsletter or purchasing a membership to your site comes with tangible benefits that would not be available to them otherwise.

• Make good on those tangible benefits by offering noteworthy rewards like free membership for a year, discounted services or products from your company or your partner companies.

• Exclusive promos, content, and discounts can be released on your blog, website, or via your newsletter to let customers know through multiple avenues that your company appreciates its customers and loves to reward them on a regular basis.

7. Create a Product Tour or Host a Live Stream Event

• Live streaming is one of the hottest media campaign and marketing tools in existence today. Businesses from bakeries to famed handbag company Chancel are hosting live streaming events that not only enable viewers to “ride” along on a tour of the company's products but also gain an in-depth, behind-the-scenes experience of the work and various processes that go into making the products they are buying.

• Live streaming is heralded in the business community as among the hottest methods today to reach out to customers, captivate their attention by showcasing your products, and strategically turn that attention into sales.

Conclusion

Customers are the cornerstone of your business. Or as Forbes put it, the essential “lifeblood” of your business. As a business owner in today's modern times, having a well-designed website should be among your top priorities to engage with customers and build your base.

Your website can feature a wide array of elements to engage customers. As long as the content on your site is well-written, interesting, and captivates your audience, you can be assured of your company’s progress in the digital world of today.