How to Use AI for Small Business Website: 6 Essential Ways

The Impact of AI on Small Business Website Trends

Today, we’ll be breaking down 6 trends in web design where small businesses are using AI. Whether you’re a newbie to the world of web creation, or you’re a seasoned veteran who wants to give your site a facelift, we’ll be covering how the use of AI can help you make the best website possible.

Are Small Businesses Using AI?

Before getting into how AI is impacting trends in small businesses, it’s important to address how much this technology is being used.  According to a census done by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 23% of all U.S.-based small businesses in 2023 were using AI technology, and indicated a higher likelihood to see profit because of it. However, the other 77% of businesses stated: “that they do not know enough about AI or claim its benefits are unclear.” These stats tell us 2 things.

1. Businesses using AI are benefitting from it
2. Education surrounding AI is the main barrier to entry

At Hocoos, we want to bring the benefits of AI technology to all small business owners. Below, we’ll be showing how businesses using AI are creating trends for 2024 and beyond. If you’re unclear on the benefits of AI, keep reading to see how this technology can work for your website.

6 Website Trends Where Small Businesses are Using AI

Below we’ll be diving into 6 ways small businesses are using AI to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their websites. By following these trends, you can leverage the power of AI to create the best possible version of your website.

1. The Use of an AI Website Builder

Never before have you been able to make a fully functional website tailored to your business in a matter of minutes. Even with beginner-friendly drag-and-drop editors, small business owners still spend hours trying to figure out a functional design.

An AI website generator like Hocoos lowers the barrier of entry for making professional quality websites. This technology allows small business owners to spend less time figuring out the ins and outs of web design, getting their business up and running quicker.

With the Hocoos AI Wizard, all you have to do is answer 8 simple questions, and a website will be ready to go in minutes. This gives you the perfect starting point to add your flair to our designs. From here you can customize it further by adding in more information about yourself and your own images.

As the technology continues to develop, AI website builders will likely become the norm for small business owners who can’t spare the time or money to build a website from scratch. This is especially useful for business owners with no prior web design experience.

In the coming years, AI web development tools will make unprofessional, poorly designed small business websites a thing of the past. 

 2. Fully Custom Images and Designs

While stock images are still a valuable resource for website owners, businesses are beginning to prioritize custom designs over images available to everyone. Custom designs make a website stand out amongst the competition by creating a unique identity. 

While high-quality custom designs used to cost hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars, this is no longer the case. Now, you’re able to generate professional quality illustrations in a matter of seconds using detailed AI prompts.

You can use the AI here at Hocoos to edit and extend existing images, as well as create completely custom logos. This way you begin crafting a more unique brand identity in a matter of seconds without having to hire a graphic designer.

By using this technology, small business owners don’t need to outsource the creation of custom content just to keep up with other businesses. Instead, they can have the best of both worlds – custom designs that are high-quality, fast, and affordable. 

3. E-Commerce and Online Stores

E-commerce sales have been steadily growing year over year and show no signs of slowing. According to Forbes, retail e-commerce sales are expected to reach approximately $8.1 trillion in 2026, growing significantly from $6.3 trillion in 2023. This shows that incorporating e-commerce into your business is a smart course of action. Luckily, the same technology used in AI website builders can get an online store up and running in no time. Especially if you run a brick-and-mortar store, shifting into e-commerce is one of the best ways to scale your business and reach a wider audience. Also, as online shopping continues to gain popularity, you’ll be able to buy more than just retail products online. Many service-based-businesses will also use an online interface where you can book appointments and buy services directly. 

Once again, AI tech is lowering the barrier of entry to create online stores, which will only serve to bring more small business owners into the e-comm game. Hocoos comes fully equipped with an online store builder that can get your products or services live on the web in a matter of minutes. Regardless of the business model, if an entrepreneur has a website, expect them to have a digital storefront too. 

4. AI Chatbots

One of the most important factors for success in a small business is engagement with customers. Unfortunately, as a business scales, it’s impossible to be constantly available to answer questions. This is where AI chatbot tech comes in.

If you’re unfamiliar, this is technology that allows customers to ask AI questions about your business, getting completely personalized results. For example, a hardware business could have an AI chatbot that’s able to give customers recommendations for materials, or quotes for services, all in a matter of seconds.

This technology is largely able to replace a FAQ page on your site, going above and beyond to provide answers to specific questions. AI chatbots can give great customer service without business owners needing to devote the human resources needed to respond to each person individually. They are also designed to help drive sales, which will make them a solid investment for most small business owners running e-commerce stores.

The point is, don’t be surprised when that little icon in the corner of your site becomes the MVP of your company. 

5. Generative Content

As the adage goes, content is king. To get ahead in the world of search engines and social media, your brand needs to have a strategy that pushes out value to your audience in the form of consistently high-quality content. However, with all the work associated with running a business, especially when just starting, you probably don’t have much time to dedicate to this. 

 With a bit of prompting, you can get AI – like the tools available here at Hocoos – to generate a complete blog post in minutes. Our technology also prioritizes design to make you an attractive page that’s upload-ready.  

With this being said, if you’re interested in using AI for your content, there’s something worth considering before you hit publish. While AI can save you a ton of time on brainstorming and drafting articles, it’s not quite at the point where it can deliver a top-tier article on its own. 

Because of this, you’ll probably still want to spend a bit of time adding your own writing to AI-generated blog posts. 

While AI-generated content is valuable, whether you’re adding a bit of humor or insights from years of experience, there are still some things that AI can’t nail down. I believe the highest-performing content in the coming years will use a combination of AI-generated content and authentic human input.

Writers can lay the groundwork for great content in a matter of minutes with AI, which will give them more time to focus on adding their unique spin on things. This is the only way to make AI-generated content truly stand out. After all, no matter how good AI gets, the best content will always have a human touch. 

6. Data-Driven Content Strategy

If you have any experience with running a website, you know the importance of analyzing data and adjusting your strategy accordingly. This analysis can quickly become a full-time job that distracts from other tasks. Luckily, AI technology can track your website’s performance and give you tailored feedback on your content strategy. 

Part of the Hocoos AI Blog Builder is providing smart insights. It’s able to take a look at how well your content is performing, and which pieces of content are doing the best. From here, it will provide recommendations for new content that your audience is more likely to love. 

By getting AI to analyze the data, you’ll not only be more confident in your content strategy, but you can also spend more time making meaningful, quality content. Especially when paired with AI content generation, your web presence will be on a whole nother level.

Conclusion

AI is creating trends that will permanently change the way small businesses run their websites. From the use of AI website builders to content creation, and analytics, AI technology can help small business owners create and run professional websites for a fraction of the time and money it used to take. 

If you’re a new business owner, or you’re just looking to update your existing site, come give the Hocoos AI Website Builder a spin! It only takes a few minutes to get a website up and running and it’s completely free to try. By using our AI website builder, you can get a feel for how other small businesses are already using AI for their web design. We have a feeling you’ll like what you see.

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