Introduction
Creating a website is a crucial step for any new startup. However, the process of designing, building, and launching a fully-functional site can be daunting for founders with no technical expertise. Between learning web development basics, choosing the right platform, integrating tools, optimizing pages, and actually marketing the site, launching a website as a non-technical founder often feels like an insurmountable challenge full of complexity and new languages to learn.
That's why startups need a purpose-built solution like Unicorn Platform to remove the headaches and launch new websites incredibly fast. With its easy drag-and-drop builder, pre-designed templates, and seamless third-party integrations tailored for startups, Unicorn allows you to get your online presence up and running in record time.
In this beginner's guide, we'll cover how to:
- Choose the ideal website building platform for startups
- Build and structure your site with Unicorn's editor
- Connect your favorite startup tools and services
- Optimize your site for higher performance
- Promote your new website after launch
Whether you need to create your very first website or redesign an existing one, following this playbook will help you launch faster than ever before. Let's dive in!
Choosing the Right Website Platform
The first step to creating your startup's new website is selecting the right platform. You want an intuitive solution tailored specifically for lean teams, not enterprise corporations. Here are the key factors to evaluate:
Focus on Simplicity
Look for a platform with an easy drag-and-drop visual editor. You want to build pages by arranging pre-made sections, not coding from scratch. Unicorn has a beginner-friendly interface that lets you create professional sites through point-and-click.
Integrations & Connections
Seamless integrations with other tools like Stripe, MailChimp, Calendly etc. enhance functionality. For example, embedding a Typeform survey is a breeze with Unicorn's integration marketplace. Competitors like Wix often lack deep connections.
Designs for Startups
Startup-specific templates and components help you create the perfect homepage to convey your business to investors. For example, Unicorn offers templates showcasing founder bios, funding stats, product screenshots and more.
Mobile Responsiveness
All templates and sites created should adapt smoothly across desktop, tablets and mobile. Slow load times on mobile leads to high bounce rates. Unicorn uses the latest tech for speedy mobile experiences.
Choosing a purpose-built platform like Unicorn will shave weeks off your website launch timeline compared to starting from WordPress or another generic option.
Steps for Building Your Site
Once you've selected Unicorn as your startup website builder, follow these steps to launch your site:
Choose and Customize a Template
Browse Unicorn's template library and pick an industry-specific template that fits your needs. For example, an ecommerce startup may want to highlight their product catalog upfront.
Tweak the template by changing colors, text, images and more to match your brand identity. Add new pages or sections as required to achieve your ideal structure.
Connect Your Tech Stack
Link your custom domain name for a professional look. Install Google Analytics to understand visitor behavior. Embed Typeform surveys to capture leads. Accept payments with Stripe without managing plugins.
Unicorn's seamless integrations marketplace connects your favorite startup tools in just a few clicks.
Review and Launch Your Website
Thoroughly test your site across devices before officially launching. Fix any formatting issues, broken links or unclear messaging. Ask for feedback from target users to spot areas for improvement.
When everything looks good, publish your live site and submit XML sitemaps to search engines. Monitor analytics to gain insight on traffic and engagement.
Optimizing Your Website After Launch
Launching your startup website is just the beginning. You need to continuously optimize it for higher performance and results over time.
Conversion Rate Optimization
Simplify signup forms and make calls-to-action clearly visible to boost conversions. A/B test page headlines, images and more. Identify and fix dropout points in your sales funnel based on analytics.
Improving Page Speed
Speed up page load times by optimizing images and adding caching. Fix database queries slowing things down. Upgrade to faster hosting for snappy response times, better for SEO.
Publishing Fresh Content
Regularly create SEO-optimized blog posts focused on what your audience cares about. Include relevant calls-to-action in articles to capture more leads.
Unicorn provides guidance on optimizing your website for higher growth after launch. The simple editor also makes it easy to continually test and improve pages.
Promoting and Marketing Your New Website
You've created an amazing new website for your startup using Unicorn's platform. But how do you get the word out and attract visitors? Here are effective strategies to promote your new site:
- Leverage social media: Share your new website on all your startup's social accounts. Ask followers to check it out and provide feedback. Post regularly to drive traffic.
- Email marketing: Send an announcement to your email list highlighting the new website and key features. Include a strong call-to-action to visit the site.
- SEO optimization: Research target keywords using Google's Keyword Planner and optimize pages for ranking. Produce fresh, high-quality content consistently.
- Run promotions: Offer exclusive discounts or perks for visiting your new site. Contest giveaways also help with initial traction.
- Guest blog outreach: Reach out to industry blogs and pitch contributed posts linking back to your site. Helpful for domain authority.
- Ads: Consider running Facebook, Instagram and Google ads targeted to your ideal customers. Provides another discovery channel.
With Unicorn's user-friendly platform, you can launch a beautiful new website for your startup quickly. Combine that with savvy marketing and you'll attract visitors in no time. Reach out to Unicorn's support team for more promotion tips after launch!
Conclusion
Launching a new website is a big milestone for any startup. But creating an effective online presence from scratch can be daunting without technical skills. Unicorn's purpose-built platform helps startups build, launch and grow new websites incredibly fast.
With its intuitive drag-and-drop editor, professionally designed templates, seamless integrations and startup-focused features, you can get your new site up and running in record time. By following this guide's steps for choosing the ideal platform, efficiently building your site, optimizing continuously, and promoting your launch, you can establish your startup's online presence faster than ever before.
Whether launching your very first website or redesigning an existing one, Unicorn provides the speed, simplicity and support needed to turn your online vision into reality. Check out Unicorn's website builder to bring your startup's new website to life.
