... oftentimes for the very practical reason that they have limited resources to invest. One area where they shouldn't hold back, however, is in their ultimate landing page: their website.

A recent survey showed how quickly visitors judge a site's creditability based on its design, writes Brooke Howell, SmartBrief's small-business editor, in a blog post. According to comments made by Tiffany Jonas, president of Aio Design, during a presentation at the National Association of Women Business Owners' 2010 Women’s Business Conference, 75% of web users admit to making such judgments, with some researchers finding that 50 milliseconds is the average amount of time render a decision about the visual design.

50 milliseconds !!!!!!

Tips she offers for sites to look legitimate and customer-friendly include shying away from pay-for-click ads as well as unprofessional or clichéd images. It is also important to have a site that is intuitive to navigate as well as easy-to-find privacy policies and general corporate information.