How to Make a Small Business Website (in 2022) – Free Beginner’s Guide

For any small business, the amount of people you reach determines the overall success of the company. The best way to reach the maximum number of potential clients is with a website for your small business. In today’s market, it is critical for small businesses to have a website. Regardless of if your company’s business is done online, a website will allow you to advertise and allow customers to search for you much easier. Basically, your website is your online business card with all of the information your customers need to know about your company and its services.

You can make a business website by yourself without the need to hire a web-developer. Creating a website for your business has never been easier. Let’s take a look at how you can create your very own business website.

Before Making A Website

There is no need to hire an expensive web-developer or have any experience in coding. Creating your own website is as easy as following our step-by-step guide.

What You Will Learn

• How to choose a domain name to match your business
• How to purchase website hosting
• How to install WordPress
• How to design and structure your website
• What content you should include in your website
• How to use add-ons and extensions to add features to your website

WordPress is a program that helps millions of small businesses build their websites. In fact, WordPress is responsible for powering 32% of all websites online.

In the past, coding would have been a skill needed to be able to design and create a custom website. WordPress has disregarded the need for coding by offering a variety of pre-made templates as well as extensions and add-ons.

The following step-by-step instructions will show you just how easy it can be to setup up your small business website with WordPress.

Step 1: What You Will Need

Before creating your small business website, you will need both a domain name and website hosting. The domain name is the name of your website such as yourcompanyname.com. Website hosting refers to where all of your online files will be located.

Now that you have your domain name and website hosting, let’s keep moving forward.

Step 2: Setting Up Your Website

You will need to purchase your domain name and hosting. Setting up a website may seem a bit expensive for new companies. Typically, a domain name costs $14.99 per year and hosting is as much as $7.99 per month.

Since there are two different forms of WordPress, you will need to decide which form is right for you. WordPress.com is a hosted solution while WordPress.org is self-hosted.

It is recommended that you use WordPress.org because it will give you access to all of the features immediately.

Bluehost is the official hosting partner of WordPress and is what we recommend using to set up your website. Bluehost is offering our users a great deal. The offer includes a free domain name, free SSl, and a 60% discount on hosting. This means you can have your website up and running for as little as $3.95 per month.

It is time to purchase your domain name and hosting.

Step 3: Choosing A Domain Name

A domain name adds credibility to your business and a memorable domain name can make the difference. Take some time to come up with a suitable domain name that is relevant to your business. Now that you have your domain name, here are some hints and tips to get you going:

• Visit the Bluehost website and click “Get Started Now”
• You will then be asked to choose your price plan

• After selecting your plan, click “Select”. On the next page, enter your domain name

We have also included some helpful tips to help you choose the perfect domain name:

• A .com website is easier for customers to remember
• Your domain name should be linked to your business, either by using your compnay name or trade
• If the first domain name you choose is not available you can try adding a location or geographical area to the end. This increases the chance of obtaining local business.
• Make sure it is simple, easily remembered, and easy to pronounce

Step 4: Install WordPress

Once your domain name has been chosen, you will enter account information such as the business name, address, and contact information.

There will be extra options presented to you that you may purchase if you wish to do so. However, we do not need these right away and they will be available later if you wish to add them.

You will then be asked for your payment information and after your payment is received you will get a confirmation email explaining to you how to login to your web hosting control panel.

WordPress will be installed for you through Bluehost. The hosting dashboard is where you will be able to directly login to your WordPress website.

The WordPress administration area is where you will manage your website and change settings as well as add new content. The admin area is presented after you login.

Step 5: Creating Your Content Layout

You will need to come up with a simple design that is easy to navigate. Successful small business websites follow a standard layout. You can choose your layout by clicking “Pages” and then clicking “Add New Page”.

Remember to keep it simple at first. Our goal is to build a foundation for our site to grow upon. Start with a headline and a few words about the company. Add a few images but you do not want your website to look crowded or cluttered. You can always add more as your website grows.

Listed below is a basic list of the most common pages used in a small business layout:

• Homepage- This is where you will introduce the company and draw in customers. You will want to give a brief description of your services and give potential clients a call to action such as “call us” or “send us an email”.
• About Us- This is where your clients really get to know you and the company. You can include things such as how you got started, company values,  and your mission to serve your clients.
• Products or Services- Here you will list the services or products you provide with a light description of each one. Each listing should have its own heading with a price or a call to action to ask about receiving a quote.
• Contact Us- This is how your clients will know where to reach you. The page should be dedicated to listing the address, phone number, and email address of your business.

Other pages can be added as needed but remember to keep them relevant to your company. Review pages and pages for each individual service are common.

Step 6: Choose a Design

Your website needs to have some flare. While WordPress has its own general template you may use, there are also thousands of other pre-made templates that you can choose from to give your website just the right look.

We recommend keeping it simple. A distracting background can be confusing and hard to navigate.

Most business websites use a design that has a navigation menu at the top followed by a brief welcome underneath. Here you can use a call to action such as “keep reading to learn more” or “click the About Us page to meet our team!”

After you have installed the perfect design for your website, you will be able to customize it with different settings that change the appearance. Click on “Appearance” and then “Customize” in the WordPress admin area to play with these features.

Customizing your website will allow you to change background colors, add menus, remove sections and much more. You will need to click “Publish” when you are finished customizing your layout. Otherwise, the page will not be saved.

WordPress includes over 50,000 free plugins that allow you to ad new features such as contact forms and Google analytics. With over 50,000 plugins available, we are sure you will find just what you need for your website.

The job of creating the website for your small business can be a difficult task. Just remember to focus on your content without getting too extravagant. Simplicity is key to creating a successful business website. We hope that we have been able to provide you with helpful information that has you feeling excited about building your own website. We would like to wish your new website and small business success for years to come!