The Basics Behind a Functional Corporate Website for B2B organizations

Creating a successful corporate website is crucial in our modern business environment. A website is often the first impression a potential customer has of your company, so it’s important to make sure it is professional, user-friendly, and contains all the necessary information to help convert visitors into customers.

When it comes to B2B companies, they tend to face several challenges with their corporate websites, including:

1. Complexity: B2B products and services are often complex and difficult to communicate, making it challenging to design a website that accurately represents the company and its offerings.
2. User Experience (UX): B2B customers have different needs and goals compared to B2C customers, and creating a website that caters to these needs can be difficult.
3. Personalization: B2B companies often have a small number of high-value customers, and personalizing the website experience for each customer can be a challenge.
4. Mobile Optimization: With the increasing use of mobile devices for business purposes, it’s important for B2B websites to be optimized for mobile, but achieving this can be difficult.
5. Data Management: B2B websites often have a large amount of technical data and product information that needs to be effectively managed and presented.
6. Lead Generation: Generating high-quality leads is a key goal for B2B websites, but achieving this can be challenging due to the complex buying process in B2B markets.

Some of these challenges are strictly related to content creation, which is a separate conversation you can find out more about in our previous blog. On the more technical side, however, every corporate website should include the following elements:

A clear and concise homepage

Your homepage should clearly communicate what your business does and its products or services. It should also be easy to navigate, with a clear call to action for visitors to take the next step.

1. Company logo and tagline: The logo and tagline should be prominently displayed at the top of the page to establish brand identity.
2. Navigation menu: A clear and intuitive navigation menu should be included to help visitors find the information they need.
3. Hero section: A hero section should be included to provide a clear and concise overview of the company’s offerings, benefits, and value proposition.
4. Product/Service information: High-level information about the company’s products and services should be included, with links to more detailed information.
5. Customer success stories: Real-life examples of how the company has helped customers succeed should be prominently displayed.
6. Company information: Information about the company’s history, culture, and leadership should be included to build trust with visitors.
7. Contact information: Contact information, including a phone number and email address, should be easily accessible from the homepage.
8. Calls to action: Clear and prominent calls to action should be included, such as filling out a form or scheduling a demo.

Contact forms, contact information, and CTAs

Your corporate website should function as a lead-capturing device, meaning it needs to entice visitors to contact you. Several visible CTAs should prompt users to contact your company if they are interested in any product or service, and contact forms should be easy to fill out and submit. If your company is open to being contacted directly by anyone who wants to call or email, you should have a phone number and email address visibly displayed in your website’s footer, as well as in your “Contact” page.

About Us page

Your company’s “About” page should provide a brief overview of the business, its history, and values. Including information about the company’s leadership and key employees will also help as a trust factor for website visitors as they can see the real people behind the brand.

Your About Us page needs to be the most humanized part of your website. Potential customers shopping around for possible business partners often navigate to the About Us page to see if a company’s values align with their own and try to find out if they can connect with the business on a deeper level. Try to feature what makes your company more than just a corporate entity and demonstrate the purpose driving the people, driving the company.

Product or Service pages

Your product and service pages provide detailed information what your business is selling. This part of your website should have the most detailed and high-value content you can create, since this is often where potential customers will make a decision about working with your company or not.

Aside from clear descriptions and information, high-quality photos and videos should be used to illustrate and demonstrate what your products or services do. If pricing is a must in your industry, make sure to avoid tricky price listings that may confuse your customers.

If your company uses a website for eCommerce, these pages should make it simple for a user to add items to a shopping cart and check-out. If your buying process starts with a contact form, make sure your product and service pages make it easy for customers to contact you.

Blog and Resources

Your blog/resources segment is where you showcase your company’s creative content. A blog is a great way to keep visitors engaged with the business and provide valuable information related to the products or services offered. Regularly updating the blog with new content can also help with search engine optimization (SEO). This segment can also include additional resources like case studies, videos, webinars, and downloadable digital assets like ebooks, brochures, whitepapers, etc.

Responsive design and fast loading speed

Above all things, your corporate website needs to deliver a positive user experience. This means ensuring it has a responsive design and fast loading speed. It should work properly on all devices, including desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. It also needs to be optimized for fast loading speeds, as visitors are likely to leave if a website takes too long to load.

SEO

The SEO conversation needs to start before any content is produced for a new website. SEO enables search engines to organically find your website. There are both on-page and off-page SEO tactics that need to be considered, but an SEO strategy that drives the overall design approach is a must to ensure your website brings in relevant traffic.

SEO is a very wide topic that we’ve covered in past articles You can find out more about SEO here and here.

Privacy Policy

A website privacy policy is a legal document that outlines how a website collects, uses, stores, and shares the personal information of its visitors and users. A privacy policy typically includes the following information:

1. What personal information is collected: The privacy policy should clearly state what type of personal information is being collected, such as names, email addresses, and IP addresses.
2. How personal information is collected: The privacy policy should describe how personal information is collected, such as through forms, cookies, or third-party tools.
3. How personal information is used: The privacy policy should explain the purpose for which personal information is collected and used, such as for marketing, customer service, or analytics.
4. Sharing of personal information: The privacy policy should explain under what circumstances personal information may be shared with third parties, such as with partners, service providers, or law enforcement.
5. Data retention and protection: The privacy policy should explain how personal information is stored, how long it is retained, and what measures are taken to protect it from unauthorized access or theft.
6. User rights: The privacy policy should explain the rights of users regarding their personal information, such as the right to access, correct, or delete it.
7. Changes to the privacy policy: The privacy policy should explain how changes to the policy will be communicated to users and how they can opt out of certain uses of their personal information.

It is important for website owners to have a clear and transparent privacy policy to build trust with their users and comply with privacy laws and regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the EU.

Social Media Links

Don’t forget to include links to your company’s available social media profiles. This will allow visitors to follow your company on their preferred platform and stay up-to-date on news and promotions. For B2B companies, the basic social media platforms you should be using are LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube. Facebook is still relevant but is less used nowadays by B2B companies.

In conclusion, a successful business website should be professional, user-friendly, and provide all the necessary information to help convert visitors into customers. By including these key elements, you can ensure that your website is effective in helping your business grow and reach its goals.