If you’re not Nike or ASOS or John Lewis or B&M Bargains, your website is probably getting a whole heap of website visits from people who have no idea who the fluff you are.
It’s an additional challenge faced by every small business – as well as selling your product or service, ya kinda need to sell your brand, too. Well, at least you need to reassure each customer that you are totes legit and not a dodgy scam artist.
What’s more, we’ve now fully waddled into an era where it’s easier than it’s ever been to launch a website and start selling.
Sure, for about a decade now anyone could boff out a Shopify storefront in an afternoon but now with the swift adoption of AI engines like ChatGPT, scammy sausages and “hustlers” can also tick all the SEO boxes and make themselves just sound real so much easier.
So now as well as competing against all those high street giants and global platforms and marketplaces and other independent brands – you’re now also up against more bad eggs and scammers than ever. Fun.
And that’s what brings me to today’s blog post – how to make sure that your website does not look like a scam website. Well, 5 small changes – there’s defo more that can be done but I’ve tried to keep to easy swaps and website additions.
We want to set you apart from your nasty competitors, and make it as easy as possible for new customers to trust you and buy from you. Let’s go.
1. Change your website’s background colour to anything other than bright white
I’m starting with a weird tip, but it’s a very good one. Scam websites tend to customise their platforms as little as possible because they don’t want to invest days of design resources into a website that’ll likely shut down within a month.
For these reasons, a lot of scam websites tend to stick very closely to their original templates or themes – and those default templates tend to have pure white backgrounds.
Changing your website background to literally anything else is the easiest way to look like you’ve invested in your website’s design, even if it’s as simple as replacing #FFFFFF with #F6F2EE.
You don’t need to go wild with colour – think of it like switching out a landlord’s special of Pure Brilliant White for one of the other 96 shades of white on the Dulux website.
2. Pop a mini bio in your website footer
You could pop a sentence in your footer that says something like “I am not a scammer, promise”, but that wouldn’t make much sense.
If you want something that makes a tonne of sense, try adding in a one-sentence mini bio; something like:
- Limited edition ceramics made by hand in heart of Somerset; or
- A 24-hour locksmith helping Geordies get home since 2018; or
- Utterly splendid websites for independent brands & podcasts
A mini bio starts to reassure your customer who you are not (a scammer), because you are telling them exactly who you are (a ceramicist/locksmith/web design co). This also has the added benefit of improving your website’s SEO as you’ll get some lovely specific language about your small business all over your website. Win. Win.
3. Pop a mini ‘about us’ section on every product or service page on your website
A lot of these anti-scam-website tips are focused on how we can shoehorn as much about how legit you are into your customers’ brains as possible.
Popping a short, sharp ‘about me/us/the brand’ section into each of your product or service pages means that your customers aren’t forced to go hunting for that about page if they want to know who the fluff you are.
I like to go for something around 2 sentences long – about double that mini bio in your footer, and if you have the time, tie it into the product or service from that page.
If you run an ecommerce business, this abouty content is ideal for popping in toggles on your product pages.
Utterly shameless self-promotion
Utterly splendid websites for small businesses & independent brands
Looking for a website that generates visits, impresses client, and fills your inbox with enquiries? We’d love to create one for you.
4. Use heaps of photos of the real-life humans behind your business
Ya know what a scammer really wouldn’t want? Photos of their face all over the internet.
Mingling in some photos of you and your team throughout your website is a really easy edit that adds trustworthiness. After all, people trust people. Let me add one of my headshots now so that you trust me more…
Nice.
I am a big advocate for businesses of all types and sizes investing in a generous suite of professional-quality brand photography with this exact goal in mind. Well, also because imagery makes everything look nicer AND we all need pics to go with our blogs/Instagram posts/pitches/products/Pinterest.
Even if you don’t have that bank of imagery, a very good selfie on your about page is much much better than nothing.
5. Put more emphasis on your reviews and/or testimonials
“Get loads of positive reviews” would be an excellent way to look less like a scam website, but it’s also a big BIG job, and this article is all about small changes.
Reviews add trust, especially when you can put a name and a face behind them. So rather than stressing about getting more reviews for your small business (which I do totally want you to get), let’s just focus on working with the reviews you currently have – and just making them unmissable.
Try popping big, short reviews on prominent pages like your home and about pages, or quoting a product purchaser directly into that product’s description.
PS. Wanna know what makes a good review? Check out 3 compelling qualities of super effective testimonials and how to get them
And that’ll do for now.
Making sure that your website doesn’t look like a scam website doesn’t need to be a massive job. With a few small swaps and edits, you could be well on your way to coming across as more real.
If you’d like more website advice – boy are you in store for a proper treat because I have an abundance. No, 10 abundances.
Head back to the Studio Cotton blog to see what helpful tidbits and deepdives my team and I have been working on, or check me on Instagram as @studio.cotton where I turn these long-ass articles into much more bitesize endeavours. I’ve also never written endeavours before but my brain has run out of steam and my belly has run out of Babybels, so it’s about time I signed off.
See ya!
