Written by Liam Murphy | 23 March 2010

Once you're armed with a virtual office, you will have a prime business address, a local phone number with a sultry toned receptionist to answer your calls and meeting rooms that look sharp with every piece of technology you need. To your prospects, clients and partners, you will look like a business that's going places, and a company that's in control. However, before you pat yourself on the back too quickly, there may be something that you've overlooked. Your website!

For a large number of businesses, their clients will come across their website at some point in time. For a large proportion of them, it may even be their first contact with that company. Think about that. The first impression of your business by your clients could be formed through your website. That makes your website very important.

Depending on what business you're in, your website could also become a channel that you can get enquiries from or even make sales. By having a well optimized, usable and professional looking website, it can work like another member of your sales team, or even the top performing member of your sales team.

If you're starting a new business, you might not even have a website yet; or you may have a website that's just not quite right. Not to worry, here are some tips for creating a website that reflects the same professionalism of your business that your virtual office does.

Find the Right Domain Name

Your domain name is your address on the web and like your virtual office address, you need one that represents you in the best way. Don't use a free one that you get from your Internet provider that looks like 'http://www.myinternetprovider.com/~mycompanyname891'. Your domain name is part of your business marketing and might appear in print as well as online.

If it's available, find a domain that corresponds to your company name. You might even want to find your domain name before you finalize your company name, just to be sure. If it isn't available, you could try contacting the owner of the domain and see if you can purchase it from them at an agreed price. Otherwise, you could be more creative with your naming. My advice would be to either stick with the .com suffix, or if you have a regional business, use your regions domain suffix.

Get Professional Help

If you want your website to look professional, you're going to have to find a professional to do the design and development.

You know your business and what you want better than anyone else, so before you start phoning all the web companies in your area you need to think about the following things:

1. What are your objectives with the site?
   Are you trying to sell something, market to an audience or provide information?
   
   
2. Who are you targeting with your website?
   Different targeted demographics will require a different approach.
   
   
3. What content will have on the site?
   They say content is king when it comes to websites. You need to provide enough for your visitors to convert so that you meet the objectives you've defined.

I'm not saying that you're going to have all of the answers to these questions immediately, but by thinking about this initially, it will help you to articulate them to the web developer that you choose. If he's not asking you the same questions, then you might want to pick someone else.

Get a Content Management System

Make sure that you get a Content Management System attached to the site. A Content Management System (CMS) is essential for the management of a website and the one that you choose can be the difference between a constant headache and a joy to work with. Therefore, you must choose the right one that fits your needs.

Open Source (ie. free) CMS, such as Wordpress or Joomla are very powerful now and almost every design company or web developer has had experience with them. A CMS allow you to update your own site without having to pay someone else whenever you want to change the content or add a box to your layout, for example.

Optimize for Google

When it comes to websites, it's not a case of "if you build it, they will come". If you don't market it, they won't come! One of the most important website traffic generating methods is through search engine optimization. If you optimize your site right, you will be ranked highly for keywords that your clients are using to try and find companies like yours or products & services like the ones that you sell. You can either appoint an SEO company to assist you with this or learn how to do it yourself. A warning though; it's a long, ongoing process.

Hopefully, this article has given you some insight into what's required into getting an online presence that reflects your professional image. It is worth investing some time into developing your website into something that will support your marketing efforts. Remember, not only is your website is an extension of your virtual office, it's an extension of your business.