3 UnSexy Things Your Website Must Have
When you think of a website, you’re likely thinking of the beautiful color scheme, eye-catching images, and having your target audience fall in love with your copy. Sorry to tell you but that’s not all you need on a website to make you legit.
Today, you’ll learn the 3 unsexy yet important items your website must-have. Let’s get started.
1. SSL certificate
I actually can’t believe I’m still harping on this one because I’ve been touting the importance of a website’s SSL certificate since I found out about it. The positive? I’m seeing fewer and fewer people forgetting about it.
What is an SSL certificate?
To you, it’s basically the little lock sign on the address bar before your domain name. It’s also shown on your domain right after the HTTP. Instead of just “HTTP://…” your site will be “HTTP://…”
What you don’t see is that it’s a feature that tells all browsers that your site is secure and encrypted. It stands for “Secure Sockets Layer” and is saying, “Hey, any info you put into this website is safely shared.”
Why should you care? Depending on the browser and the user settings, your site visitor might end up blocked. Sometimes, they can still bypass but who the hell wants to say “Yeah, bypass my security setting to go into this un-secure site?” It’s also a pro for your SEO. Google has mentioned that it uses it as part of its magical ranking system.
2. Privacy Policy
Whenever I mention the Privacy Policy to clients, I feel like a mom telling her kids to buckle their seat belts (which I also do). This page is basically text-only, although you can jazz it up if you’d like, that’s linked to from the footer. It holds the legalese that tells users what information you’re gathering, how you’re gathering it, and what you’ll do with it later.
Where can you get it? If you have the budget, get a lawyer to create one for you. I recommend Demetrius Robinson in Columbus, Ohio, my lawyer and Digital Hustle Tribe guest. Don’t have the budget? You could get a template. See another podcast guest, Melissa Wick, another lawyer in Columbus Ohio.
One note of warning, although you could copy and paste a privacy policy, I suggest adding it to your to-do list after a while in your business. The worse thing that could happen is that you put it off and it doesn’t support you when you need it. That said, even though I’ve always wanted to play a lawyer on tv, I’m not an attorney. My advice on anything legal should be taken with a grain of salt.
Other pages you might need on your website include Terms and Conditions, Accessibility Policy, Shipping Policies, and Website Terms and Conditions.
3. Google Analytics and Google Search Console
Even if you plan on never looking at either of these portals, you should still install them so that you can look back at the previously tracked information when you do. For example, it’s helpful to have it already installed when you start a backlink campaign. This way, you can gauge whether the traffic on your website actually increased - even if that is months to years out.
Is it too late to install these now? It’s never too late so whether you’ve built out the website last weekend or 2 years ago, just create the account and follow the installation instructions for your site.
Although these 3 are some of the not-so-sexy parts of having a website, they’re equally as important as the cute graphics and color schemes. Have questions about installing these on your site? Tell me in the comments: are all of these installed on your site?
