If you know anything about online marketing and location marketing, chances are you’re aware of the importance of designing a website while keeping search engines like Google and Bing in mind. However, you may not have thought about the importance of considering social media website design while designing a website. Since social media websites’ popularity is continuously growing, you should create your new website by keeping social media optimization tactics and best website design practices in mind.

Here are a few tips that should help you design a website with social media in mind and achieve the best website design. These tips will help you come up with a web design that is socially focused.

 

Achieving the Best Social Media Website Design

 

1. Include Social Sharing Buttons

The first thing that you should do is include social sharing buttons. You can position these buttons in the header or footer of your website for the best website design. If you have the time, you should consider experimenting to identify the optimal position. It would help if you had social sharing buttons on the website’s home page and the individual pages. Every piece of content that you publish on your website should include social sharing buttons to make the content as easy as possible to share for your readers. Make sure the social sharing buttons aren’t buried at the bottom of your articles and blog posts. Many website owners have experienced an influx of backlinks from social media websites after repositioning their website’s social sharing buttons.

 

2. Include Social Follow Buttons

Not only should you include social sharing buttons, but you should also have social follow buttons. In many cases, a potential customer will come across the products and services and be interested but not necessarily ready to buy. It would be best to incorporate social follow buttons on the home page and individual pages of your website. Interested users can follow your business on social media. This will serve as a low-pressure way for visitors to keep in touch with your business until they’re ready to buy your products and services. The statuses and content you post on your social media profile will be a constant but not in-your-face reminder of your business and the products and services you offer. Including social follow buttons can be a great way to boost your sales in the long run.

 

3. Incorporate More Visual Content

In the past, text-only articles and blog posts were the norm. Today, visual content is more important than ever for achieving the best website design. Therefore, you should take the time to incorporate high-quality visual content into the design of your website. While everyone knows they shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, many consumers consider a website’s design one of the top criteria for determining a brand’s credibility. Quality visual content will help improve your business’s credibility and gain your website more exposure on social media websites.

When you include visual content in your articles and blog posts, one of these images and videos will appear alongside a brief excerpt of the content when your users share your articles and blog posts on their social media accounts. These images and videos can help catch other social media users’ eyes and encourage them to read your content.

 

4. Publish Content Regularly

It will help if you publish content regularly regardless, as Google’s ranking algorithm values fresh content highly. Fresh content is also essential when it comes to social media optimization. If your site lacks content, the best website design in the world won’t be able to increase social reactions. You need to regularly create a schedule for publishing content if you want to generate substantial traffic from Facebook, Twitter, and social media. A blog is a great way to publish content regularly. After all, the very nature of a blog encourages publishing content regularly.

 

Final Thoughts on Social Media Website Design

It is important to remember that you do not own the “digital real estate” in your social media account. You can be banned from the platform and lose your following overnight. It is important to publish content and advertising on social media networks, but always remember to channel that traffic back to your main online real estate – your website. Social media website design aims to create a frictionless flow of traffic back and forth from your main business website.

Social Marketing Express from LOCALSYNC (included in the free Local Business Online Toolkit) helps you track how your business performs on social media. Take a look at the video walkthrough of Social Marketing Express.

Want to learn more about designing a website that leverages the power of social media for your business? Visit LOCALSYNC Training to learn more about marketing your company using social media with LOCALSYNC’s Total Social Media training.