This article is addressed to B2B small business owners.
We will try to make a document with all the important website specifications for B2B small businesses, covering several specifications categories: technology, plugins, functionalities, graphic design, fonts, beauty, content, user engagement and user satisfaction, landing page, Google tests, Google guidelines, and Google marketing products. Let´s begin.
The website is the central element of a B2B small business digital marketing project, therefore it must be well planned, designed, developed, and maintained.
Technology
WordPress responsive is the technology to use to develop websites for B2B small businesses.
There are several content management system (CMC) technologies available in the market to develop websites for B2B small businesses. However, WordPress offers 2 characteristics that make it the best option:
- WordPress is the world market leader in website content management system (CMS) technology, with 60 % market share for all websites developed with CMS. Other competitors are Joomla, Drupal, Magento, Shopify, Blogger, Squarespace.
- WordPress takes care of 80% of search engine optimization (SEO) technicalities, according to Matt Cutts, former Google anti-spam team chief.
Plugins
WordPress plugins are codes or pieces of software that add new functionality to the website. “The WordPress Plugin Directory is the largest directory of free and open source WordPress plugins”
Important and useful WordPress plugins for B2B small business are those for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Google Analytics, Google Site Map, Google Tag Manager, and Social Network engagement.
Functionalities
A B2B small business website is a digital marketing “artifact”, therefore it has to comply with the two main intrinsic properties of any artifact: be functional and be beautiful.
How to design a functional website? There are many ways to do this, but we prefer to use the classical design methodology which consist in listing all the website potential users and each of the tasks these users will perform in the website when visiting it. This exercise will give us the different functions that the website should have. Users and tasks. Each of the different user’s tasks should be easy and intuitive to do, and should cause a satisfactory feeling in the user after its completion. Each task should be easy to accomplish, quick to execute, and create a feeling of satisfaction after completion. This is mainly the ISO 9241-11 that is used to design user centric digital interphases.
After all the users and tasks have been described, then we have to design a website prototype to be tested with a well-designed usability test, to warranty website usability and user satisfaction. Testing and adjusting is required in this design phase to warranty quality.
The most important users task should be placed in ubiquitous (omnipresent) places to make it easier to find.
Graphic Design
Graphic design has to warranty that the most important functionalities are placed in ubiquitous places, and they are easily seen by users, with bright colors to call the users attention.
Website background color should be solid white, like an art museum walls.
Images should be large sizes and relevant to the website content. Images should inform and educate the website users. A non-relevant image might be used only for a design purpose.
Fonts
Fonts used in a website content should be san serif fonts, and among san serif fonts, verdana and arial are the most recommended by several usability studies carried on by the Usability Lab at the University of Wichita, for digital devices. Font size should be large sizes to make it easier for users to read content.
Beauty
Beauty is an abstract concept, therefore it is hard to define, conceptualize and measure it. Some scientific studies about beauty have shown that designs are beautiful when they use Fibonacci golden ration within the design.
In the case of websites, some characteristics make a website beautiful, like white color background, bright solid colors call to action buttons, large font sizes, san serif font types, relevant and large images, minimalistic approach (less is more), large titles, easy to use tasks.
Content
Variable relevant content is one of the most important elements of a B2B small business website. Articles about the products, services, and customer needs are the content to be produced and published in the website blog. These articles will educate prospects and customers and these articles will also position the website in the first page of Google, social networks, email marketing, directories blogs, and other places in Internet.
Fixed and permanent content should also be written in a colloquial manner, short phrases, and easy to read. This is the content related to the B2B business, like the products and services, about the company, contact information, social networks, testimonials and reviews, company owner’s bio´s with picture included, and how the products and services satisfy customer needs.
User Engagement and user satisfaction
Users visit website with a task in mind and that task should be performed by users in an easy, fast, and satisfactory manner. This is what we call user satisfaction. User should be pleased after task has been accomplished.
B2B small business also needs the website visitors to make some type of engagement. This can be done in several manners, such as: fill a contact form, make a phone call, send an email, subscribe to a newsletter, write a comment on articles, share an article, send an article by email to another user, like an article, write a review about the business, request a proposal, request a consulting, request a quote, download a document, follow the B2B small business in the social networks, and many more types of engagements. All these forms of engagement should be available to website users in ubiquitous places as much as possible. All these type of user engagements should be indicated in the website functionality specifications mentioned above. All these forms of engagement should be listed in the user’s/tasks matrix that needs to be done in the functionality design phase.
Google recommends that every business website should be designed with the user in mind and how to satisfy user needs when they visit the website. Website users should be able to satisfy their needs by executing one or several tasks in the website in an easy, fast, and satisfactory manner. Websites prototypes and testing and adjustments are desired phases in the design and development project.
Landing page
Every B2B small business website should include a landing page for the content and advertising campaigns. This landing page should have one form of user engagement to allow users to contact the business managers or business owners.
Google website performance tests
Every B2B small business website should comply and pass the following Google website performance tests:
PageSpeed test:
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/
Mobile-friendly test:
https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly
Mobile speed test:
https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/intl/es-419
Rich-results test:
https://search.google.com/test/rich-results
Lighthouse audit test:
https://developers.google.com/web/tools/lighthouse/
Google Webmaster, SEO, and Links guidelines
Every B2B small business website should comply with the following Google guidelines:
Google Webmaster Guidelines:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769?hl=en
Google SEO Guidelines:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/7451184?hl=en
Google Links Guidelines:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66356?hl=en
Google marketing products
Every B2B small business should have setup and implemented the following Google marketing products connected to the website:
Google Search Console:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home?hl=en
Google Analytics:
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/
Google My Business:
https://www.google.com/business/
Google MAPS:
Google Plus:
Google Tag Manager:
https://www.google.com/analytics/tag-manager/
We hope you find these website specifications useful for your B2B small business.
You can read our previous article in the following link:
About the Author:
This article was written by Julio Sanoja Rial, owner, founder and digital marketing consultant at MSalesLeads, a digital marketing agency for B2B small businesses. We help B2B small businesses to go and grow their businesses online. We help B2B small businesses to get qualified sales leads and new customers online.
