Your website is your company’s online calling card and it gives your potential customers their first impression of your business. So what kind of impression is your website giving your visitors? Are you creating a sense of trust and credibility? You should be. Credibility is an extremely important element of any website if you want visitors to stick around and potentially build a relationship with them.

Let’s get right into it. Here are seven ways to increase your website’s credibility.

1. Make it Look Good

Your website needs to look professional, clean, and up-to-date. An amateur looking website will give website visitors the impression you are running an amateur operation. Need I say more?

2. Tell Your Story

Telling the story of how your business came to be helps create a personal connection with your site visitors. People love to hear about the struggles and successes of others. It helps make your company appear approachable and builds a sense of trust and credibility.

3. Highlight Your Professional Credentials

If you have taken the time and expense to improve your personal or business credentials, make sure your site visitors know it. This helps prove that you are a trustworthy company a visitor can trust.

4. Add Photos of Your Staff

A great way to help build your company’s credibility is to give visitors a look at the people on the other side of your site. Having custom photos of your CEO, your sales manager, your receptionist, and etc. makes your company approachable and enhances the trust level visitors have.

5. Use Videos

Today’s Internet users are more sophisticated than in years past. They expect a business to have more that just text and simple images on its site. Video is becoming so common that website visitors come to expect it from credible companies.

6. Include Customer Testimonials

People want to know what other people think about your company. Testimonials are an easy way to do that. You can ask for testimonials from some of your best long-term customers as well as a few new ones to offer a wide assortment of opinions. Being able to identify the person giving the testimonial helps to build trust as well, so make sure you include the customer’s first name, last initial and location.

7. Keep it Up-To-Date

A visitor comes to your website and finds the last update you made was a year ago. What does that say about your business? Visitors want to see an active site with up-to-date information and content. That means a blog that is updated at least a couple times a month (at the minimum). It also means an online store with up-to-date pricing and product selection. An out-of-date website sends the message that your business may be struggling or just doesn’t care.

Do you have any other suggestions on how to improve a company’s online credibility? Share them below!