1. Simple, Effective Layout: AiroHealth.com

Naman Kumar, Founder & CEO, Airo Health

This website is effective because of the layout. The first look tells you exactly what the product is and what problem it is designed to solve for your life. The second section (scrolling down) tells you how it works. The third section dives deeper into what the product can do for you while the next actually teaches you how to think about stress and anxiety. The last section contains some user testimonials. You’ll also note that each page ends with a call to action designed to convert a user.

2. Unique Selling Point: RateYourSeats.com

Arianna Halpert, Marketing & Operations, RateYourSeats.com

RateYourSeats.com is the best designed website [for ticket buying], in that it offers the best ticket prices along with the actual seating view! We crowdsource photos, ratings, and reviews for hundreds of sports and concert venues, ensuring that our customer is buying the best ticket.

3. For UI/UX Design: GrooveJar.com

Katelyn DeBlois, Digital Marketing Manager, FE International

GrooveJar, a startup that works with other startups to improve website traffic conversion, follows all of the best practices for UI/UX website design, including a clean navigable layout, CTA’s, and the ability to access information below the fold without even scrolling, but it also uses the product right on the website! It has a chat box, easy access reviews in the bottom left corner, countdowns and much more. These are all functionalities that GrooveJar offers, so other startups can see it in action without even having to contact anyone.

4. Mobile First Website: SmarthomeNX.com

Dhaval Doshi, Founder & Director, Smarthome NX

Our website is mobile first, so the main navigation bar is the hamburger menu on top left corner that opens up the menu drawer which is very easy to access on mobile phones. We also use AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) that allows our article to load instantly from the search engine results page on Google. Additionally, we use Facebook commenting on all articles as most users on the web have a Facebook account. This makes it easy for users to comment on articles without having to create a separate login to join article discussions.

5. Mobile Loading Speed: Vertoe.com

Neha Kesarwani, Co-Founder, Vertoe

In our business, site speed matters otherwise there is a high bounce rate. We optimized the site to load quick and according to Google Page Speed insights, our site now ranks as ‘Fast’, the highest rank. Vertoe website is mobile optimized so no app is needed and having no app also means that customers don’t necessarily have to download a new app while booking thereby reducing friction. Our one click checkout helps customers navigate through our website in a seamless way. Booking a storage location takes only a minute! Its responsive web design that works across all platforms (iOS and Android) and across all screen sizes – phones, tablets and desktop.

6. Easy To Find Contact Information: RepCheckup.com

Garrett Smith, CEO, Pitch + Pivot

Repcheckup combines a slick looking and easy to read design with relevant information and contact information available on every page. As a startup you need to make sure your users are staying on your website as long as possible, but have the option to call/email/message you if they see fit. RepCheckup combines all that in one!

7. Fresh, Modern Design: Kayako.com

Adam Rogers, Content Marketing Expert, Rogers Marketing, LLC

The Kayako website is a great example of a startup website because it’s conversational, quippy, and accessible. Immediately from browsing the website you can see that Kayako customer service software is for businesses that care about their customers. The website is fresh and modern, it’s simple to navigate and the illustrations are beautiful. Most importantly, it’s easy to understand the benefits of using Kayako and the effect it will have on your business when using Kayako to power your customer support.

8. Simple Beginner-Friendly Theme: Outseta

Geoff Roberts, Co-Founder, Outseta

In the spirit of the “Lean Startup” this site was built on top of Squarespace and leverages its “Bedford” theme. This is important because it’s a fully functional and responsive site that was built by a relatively non-technical marketer without the need for any development help. This allows my technical co-founders to focus on building out product, not our website. The site has a clear, obvious call to action to “Get Started” and its simplicity has been effective in generating leads while our homepage clearly articulates for site visitors what we do. We’ve also built a vibrant and active blog and included a “Sales Pitch” page in our primary navigation – this is a strategy I’ve yet to see on any other website. Basically we do not have a sales team at all, but instead make our “pitch” readily available to site visitors who may be interested in hearing it.

9. Prominent CTA: Moda Shinsa Montreal

Andres Tovar, Chief Marketing Officer, Moda Shinsa Montreal

In the world of apparel, looks matter. I believe Moda Shinsa Montreal has an excellent website for a startup because of its high quality pictures with strategically placed products and easy navigation. It uses a simple and mobile friendly design, with a prominent call-to-action to purchase products.

10. Live Customer Service: SimpleShowing.com

Fred McGill, Co-Founder, SimpleShowing

SimpleShowing’s website is a great example for startups due to its ability to capture leads in a non-intrusive, helpful way. By utilizing a tool called Intercom, the website is able to offer live chat with customers including the ability to capture their email and phone number. Secondly, this website has a Hubspot plug-in that offers the ability to capture leads through pop-ups that provide ebook downloads and other valuable content to consumers. Lastly, we have enabled FullStory on our website to allow us to view the journeys of people when visiting our site. By viewing this data, we can constantly optimize our webpage when we find hindrances in the web flow and content. All of these tools enable this site to be the perfect lead generation tool while also providing customers with the support they need.

11. Clear Value Proposition: OpenListings.com

Kevin Miller, Director of Growth, Open Listings

Open Listings went through complete site revamp and rebrand this past month. This website is a great example because it has clear messaging that explains our value proposition and how we are differentiated from our competitors. It is a simple and powerful rubric to follow for other startups.

12. For Easy UX: CorsettiCruisers.com

Brian Corsetti, Owner, Corsetti Cruisers

Corsetti Cruisers restores classic FJ60 and FJ62 Toyota Land Cruisers back to their original beauty. This website is great for a start-up company because it’s simple and to the point. You want to create a personal experience for your customers where they aren’t bombarded with ads and lengthy articles for SEO purposes.

13. For eCommerce: DanasBathandBody.com

Dana Phyllis Carter-Rankin, Owner, Dana’s Bath and Body

Our startup business has experienced tremendous growth and the website platform we used is a major part of this. We are using WordPress with the WooCommerce plugin. This site is easy to use to add our product inventory and update product info. The plugins and widgets allow us to customize the site to fit our company’s needs such as sending an automated email when a cart is abandoned and showcasing suggestions of other products a shopper may be interested in. For my company’s consultant program, I used Ultimate Affiliate Pro to manage our team of 250 consultants. It integrates seamlessly with PayPal and other payment options to help me pay their commissions efficiently. This is a great starter site for business owners and entrepreneurs.

14. For Easy Navigation: FoxyTrades.com

Paul Koger, Founder, Foxy Trades LLC

One thing that we’ve been working on is to try and make the website solve the customers’ problems as soon as possible and make the resources easy to find. We asked for feedback from our customers on what to improve on our website and the main idea that was repeated multiple times was to make the main resources easier to find. Now we try to design our interface in a way that helps the customer with the answer to their problem as fast and seamlessly as possible. I believe most websites are filled with quality information, but in most cases, the websites are hard to navigate. The one thing that small business owners should focus on is their website’s user experience. Good user experience will lead to greater interaction and to more sales.

15. For On Page SEO: Custify.com

Philipp Wolf, Founder & CEO, Custify

We put a lot of thinking into our website before we started working on it, especially regarding the “on page SEO”. We thought this through and decided to put everything on a fast CDN, which makes the website load super fast in any part of the world. Additionally, we also optimized the code a lot in order to make it load super fast on any browser or operating system. We don’t use a content management software as it would only slow us down – most of the time it’s not needed for smaller websites anyway. Result: we have a google page speed index of 97/100, compared to competition who only has around 50/100. This makes our page rank high even though we are relatively new and have not many backlinks at the moment.

16. For Ease of Use: Printful.com

Briana Feigon, Director at Communications, Tictail

As a small business owner, its a safe bet that you’re single-handedly expected to make everything happen. That’s why ease of use is such a clear benefit to the Printful design. You walk away with the design you want, in the quantity you want, without it taking a week to make on your own. The second reason I’m a Printful fan is its global reach. At Tictail, we empower small business owners to build global brands by selling their products through our international marketplace used in over 140 countries around the world.

We know firsthand the impact thinking global has on our business, and it’s critical to offer our brands another resource that is similarly global in its approach. Finally, Printful’s blog! What a smart way to offer entrepreneurs relevant tips to apply to their businesses, counsel on email campaigns, share details on legal requirements when opening a business, and give insights on global e-commerce market leaders.

17. As a Presentation Tool: FourTwentyInvestments.com

Hani Helou, Founder, nuBranch Media

In addition to providing key information to potential investors in the industry, the website also stands on its own as a corporate presentation tool. The website has a PowerPoint-inspired design that highlights the client’s capabilities in a unique and exciting format. The animated 3D flip design coupled with a bright yet minimalist use of text and graphics keeps the visitors engaged and flipping through the slides to find out more information about the company.

18. For Verifiable Reviews: PPCProtect.com

Alexander Winston, Head of Design, PPC Protect Limited

The PPC Protect website combines several important features that turn users into paying customers. To help with trust, our website includes the Reviews.io widget that displays all of our most recent reviews. This is perfect for transparency and convincing customers we do a good job of what we promise to do. On the homepage, directly under the main headline, the website lists our most important service features and why customers should purchase our service. Scrolling further down, the homepage also includes its own branded mascots: the Viking protectors, similar to Slack’s theme of custom illustrations, you won’t find any stock photos here! Finally, we have an awesome about us page that lists all our employees, including their own caricature. Not only does this give an insight into our team, but it also shows we’re proud of our service and happy to put our faces on it.

19. Privacy and Payment Options: EFynch.com

Teris Pantazes, Co-Founder, EFynch.com

For new startups (EFynch included), I think there are a few things that users are looking for in 2018 that can be capitalized on. Privacy is a big issue for EFynch. Other big trends are having a verifiable review system (think blockchain style), some component of AI or the use of a sophisticated algorithm to help you determine job details, payment processing options (credit card is not sufficient — EFynch offers everything from ACH, PayPal, even Bitcoin!), and some component of internet of things (IoT) to support our easy-to-use dashboard.