Tech companies, like other businesses, understand the role a great website plays in their marketing strategy. Studies show that more than 50% of B2B customers make a large part of their purchasing decisions online and also use the internet for product research as well.
Whatever the nature and extent of tech products or services that your business provides to customers, your marketing strategy is focused on how to increase leads, boost conversions and sales and also to project your company in the best possible light.
This means that your website is the main weapon in your armory. It needs to perform its role as a central hub, a channel for reliable and authoritative information, and also offer the customer a seamless user experience through the website without feeling pressurized or overwhelmed.
Technology web design is a special area of website design that combines in-depth knowledge of products and services on offer, target audiences and great design elements.
What Are Tech Companies?
It’s important to know exactly what “tech companies” are, what they do and how they differ from other businesses.
Traditionally, tech is anything that helps people to produce more and produce efficiently at a lower cost. However, today, “technology” is associated almost exclusively with software and the digital revolution.
If your business is one that makes, licenses or sells tech based products, or it’s one that is heavily dependent on technology, with an emphasis on technical content, or is a company that has a primary base in another kind of business, but has a huge tech component in it, or is a tech consulting firm, it can be termed a “tech company.”
In general, tech companies function in an eco-system that is constructed around technology. They are valued higher than “tech enabled” companies. In other words, the company wouldn’t exist without technology.
Web Design Essentials For Tech Companies
A question that many business owners encounter at some point in the course of their careers is “Does my business really need a website?”
Obviously, no business worth the name today would be caught without a website. It’s as mandatory as having a logo or a sign outside your store.
After all, many tech companies belong to B2B businesses, which is why you should consult a B2B web design agency to help you kickstart your website design. For one, any tech company would be hard put to convince other businesses that it’s worth partnering with them when they don’t even have a website.
But if you’ve invested in creating a website, but let it alone ever since, not caring to update the tech, content, or design elements, it’s as good as not having one at all.
The benefits of a great website for tech companies are:
- Helps you get found: According to statistics, more than 90% of adults in the US use a search engine to gather information and 46% have a local intent. People search for local businesses and services online with a higher intent to purchase and more than 60% of them read reviews and customer feedback before they engage with a company. Ensure that your website stays on top of search engine rankings and fix 404 errors immediately.
- Know your target audience: A well-designed website can help you connect with your target audience more efficiently and quickly. It gives you data about their location, demographics, behavior, etc. that you can use to create a more personalized experience.
- Find your customers where they are: Social media is ubiquitous today, and it’s a great place to find customers, share information, updates and feedback. Building links helps to connect with customers through great content such as blogs, whitepapers, informative videos and webinars. This helps to give your website a stamp of authority and credibility. Today, a huge majority of people browse on their mobile phones. Unless your website is responsive to various devices, you could lag behind in the rankings.
- Showcase: Ultimately, your website is your 24x7x365 marketing department. Keep it as fresh and updated as you would your brick and mortar store. Statistics show that 47% of visitors to a tech website first glance at the products/services, and 33% at the homepage, they want to see contact information, and information about the company. It must have information about pricing, shipping, tech support, product details, reviews and payment methods.
- Don’t shy away from: Many tech vendors hesitate to display prices or too much of technical information. However, these aspects are important to genuine purchasers. You can add links to tech information and give price ranges if you want to avoid concrete figures.
How To Hire The Best Website Designer
Your tech website needs these absolute must-haves:
- Great content: Your web content must be informative and engaging that it will appeal to your tech audience. If your clients are B2B, you can use jargon or technical terms because they’re already experts on it. The more technical the information is, the better, showcasing your expertise or technological know-how.
- SEO optimization: Search engine optimization is a must for both content writers and website designers. SEO is a critical aspect of web design, ranking your website in Google and other search engines.
- Responsive design: Your website should be intuitive and responsive in any screen size, especially on mobile screens. Hire a tech web designer who can fully explain what your website needs to be more responsive.
- Support: Offer support services to your readers in contact forms, self-help articles (such as FAQs and Q&As), and post your contact details.
- Good quality images and visual content: Use original and high-quality images to further enhance your content.
- Good loading speed: Your web pages should load fast (preferably not more than three seconds).
- Clear CTA (call to action): Call-to-action buttons are essential in directing your audience to what you want them to do next after reading your content.
- Educative or informative resources: As much as possible, your tech website should have backup resources and factual links from statistical data, case studies, white papers, current news and events, and industry experts’ blogs.
- Great UX: User experience coincides with a good user interface that doesn’t require too much learning.
- Professional look and feel: A professional-looking website is not cluttered and confusing. It shouldn’t cause eye strain when viewed and used for prolonged periods.
- Seamless journey with easy navigation: A great website is easy to navigate with easy-to-find menu options and intuitive navigation tools.
Scalable design: Whether you’re planning to expand your business soon or not, it’s good to adopt a scalable or easy to manage web design (which involves internet bandwidth and web host).
Tips to hire the best designer for your tech website:
- Know What You Want: The web design industry has a range of professionals – you need to choose whether you want a freelancer, a design firm or a full-service agency. All these have their own pros and cons, and it’s wise to analyze your needs, preferences and budget before you make your final decision.
- Check credentials and experience: This is an industry saturated with people with varying capabilities, skills, pricing points, experience, specializations, etc. It’s important to check credentials and references, and also whether they have experience in creating/redesigning tech websites. Look at portfolios and talk to other clients of theirs.
- Have a Budget: While pricing is important, don’t grab the cheapest quote. Instead, talk to your marketing department, peers and teams to understand the true value of a great website and evaluate how much you’re willing to invest in it. Stay a little flexible so that you can pull in some extras if they’re available.
- Add-on Services: Web designers/design-firms may offer certain add-ons such as SEO, content creation, analytics, etc. Check if the firm/designer you’re interested in would be able to provide these.
- Design Process: Ensure that your designer can explain the design process clearly. As a tech business owner, you would have some degree of familiarity with these issues and you’d feel more comfortable knowing the design details. If you want your designer to use a site builder, you can familiarize yourself with the various options by checking out some of the best website builder reviews online. It will help you get a better understanding on what site builder your designer will use and if or not you would be comfortable with it.
- Support: Finally, ensure that your designer/design firm will give you all the support you need whenever it’s required.
Keeping these aspects in mind, you can shortlist a few designers/firms and then evaluate each one according to your own unique priorities.