Your website has several very important roles, including attracting qualified leads and customer acquisition. The features that your organization includes on its website will largely depend upon how you are utilizing it. But, with customer acquisition in mind, one of the most important aspects of your website is whether you are providing appropriate information for potential customers seeking to make a buying decision.

Consider the following as you design or design your B2B focused website:

• Site Organization and Navigation– When potential customers land on your site, do they see specific landing pages? Or, are they directed to your company’s home page? Your site’s navigation needs to begin with your customer’s primary entry point. Consider including a site navigation tool that can be accessed from any page; a top of the page navigation tool, a toolbar or side toolbar. In addition to offering clear navigation options, be sure that your website includes an internal search function, making it easy for potential and current customers to find the information they are seeking.

• Collateral– Consider adding brochures, product specification sheets, white papers about relevant topics/news/industry information, case studies that support your company’s initiatives, company presentations, price lists, and catalogs. These items should be in addition to your content rich, static company web pages and your company blog. Information is power; particularly when it comes to sales. The more information your customers have access to, the more purchases they are likely to complete.

• Consider Site Access– Should the information on your site be available to everyone? Or, should specific information be reserved for current customers via a personalized portal? A best B2B practice is to require log-in information for downloadable materials as it provides a more accurate method for tracking customer activities. Plus, it doesn’t offer all of your valuable collateral to anyone landing on your website.

• Provide Answers– Even if you provide all of your company’s collateral materials on your site, customers will still have questions. Provide a comprehensive FAQ page that includes questions and answers commonly seen within your organization. Include a “Click for More” information button on your product’s collateral pages. Include “email us” links on all of your information pages. And, consider integrating an online chat feature into your site to provide immediate answers to questions that your customers come across. By appealing to all of these needs, you are less likely to lose potential customers and potential sales due to lack of information.

By focusing to these small website details, you will be positioning your organization’s site for increased customer acquisition. And after all, the acquisition of new customers is the ultimate goal of every business leader!