The Value Of A Good Website To The Small Business Owner

These are the benefits you should be looking to gain from your small business website: a fusion of incoming and outgoing information, intelligence that you should embrace to service existing customers and attract new ones. And unlike printed matter, you need never be nervous about imparting sensitive information (price lists, specifications, etc.) because you have the possibility to update variable data instantly.

As for direct selling, you’ll get the odd sale or two from your site, but not a lot. Not yet anyway. Stick with it, though, and you’ll do much more direct selling in time as the retail ethos of the web begins to bite – and there is evidence that it is starting to do just that – for even the smallest of trading concerns.

An Ernst & Young Study showed that in the year 2000 online retail sales were just above the $39 billion mark and have continued to rise year on year. Online retail sales in 2004 rose 23.8% to $89 billion, representing 4.6% of total global retail sales. Online retail sales were forecast to reach $109.6 billion by the end of 2005. (Source Shop.org/Forrester )

How It All Pans Out In The Creation Of The Site

• Your mission statement and complementary graphics on the home page – where you would also position an ‘order’ button if required;
• Appropriate content for the pages devoted to produce, sales and service;
• Something of value for your website visitors – useful tips on your particular area of expertise: suggestions which should be updated on a regular basis;
• Links from one page to another within your site – but not beyond – or you’ll lose your precious visitors to someone else;
• An electronic ‘forum’ where visitors can clock in and record comments;
• An email address where they can contact you;
• A facility to which you should give serious consideration straightaway: an invitation to subscribe to your free newsletter.

 

Okay, there’s some work involved in setting up your virtual stall and in particular servicing the final item listed – but it will be worth it – because electronic newsletters (’ezines’) are the best way to capture email addresses, build up a prospects list, and create new customers.

As to costs for website creation and hosting: very little, if you use a service such as Third Sphere which is devoted to fostering small business online.

http://thirdspherehosting.com/plus/?xstcreat&id=xstcreat&pkg=

What You Get With The Third Sphere Local Enterprise Hosting Service

If you spend $25 (approx. £15) a month with them, they’ll give you advanced tools to create a website which looks as though it cost £25,000 to construct.

Keeping Pace With The Internet Opportunity

Despite the bad publicity associated with the collapse of numerous major dot.coms in recent times, the internet is still in its infancy, but even so offers an incredible opportunity to small business – if small business would take the trouble to discover how best to use the internet to its current advantage. In so doing, small businesses will be operating on a universal platform and on equal status to the major players. That said, unless yours is a downloadable product or service, you won’t be doing much in the way of direct selling (not yet anyway) but you will move with the times and carve out a niche for yourself in other essential directions.

Local Offline Businesses Grow Rapidly Online

If you own an offline business with local clientele, a website is a must nowadays. Use it to grow your business locally, build trust and deepen relationships with existing local customers, raise your local profile above that of competitors, keep your customers in touch through your ezine, attract new customers, and in many cases extend your market globally. Your world, your reach, your impact is now much, much bigger than a Yellow Pages ad. Think of a website as a super-Yellow Pages ad with 100 times the results at one-tenth of the price.

Stop Waiting For Customers To Arrive Or The Phone To Ring

It’s scary to stand behind the counter of your shop with not a customer in view, or sit behind your desk with no incoming calls. It creates feelings of frustration, agitation, anxiety: unhealthy feelings that can lead to depression if not rapidly staunched.

So What Do You Do?

You can’t force customers to visit you or cause the phone to ring – but you can take some practical action nevertheless.

Exchange Offline Inertia For Online Activity

Switch on your computer, go online, and engage in proactive marketing. It won’t fill your cash register or your order book, but it will stop you feeling maudlin and outflanked by adverse conditions offline.

You Need Just Two Things To Make Online Marketing Work For You

• Knowledge;
• Application.

 

This book will provide you with the knowledge, strategies, tools and techniques; the application is all down to you.