do you really need a website?
Many small businesses still question the value of a website. "Is it worth the investment?" "How quickly will it produce results?" "We're doing fine without one!"
The unfortunate result of this apprehension is that many of these doubting Thomases opt for the cheapest vendor available - and, a self-fulfilling prophecy since these totally ineffective sites just reinforce the notion that the Web is not worth the investment.
Here are a few reasons why every business, however small, should embrace the Web as an important element of its marketing and customer relations.
Continuous, cost-effective promotion
A business website is a vehicle for continuous, 24/7/365 promotion. It never sleeps, does not go home at night; never takes coffee breaks or stays away on weekends and holidays.
Your customers expect it
Your customers expect you to be online and consider it an inconvenience when you're not. As such, not having a website can reflect poorly on your company's image and create unfavorable perceptions about your business.
Size matters
Few small businesses want to appear small! With a good website, even a tiny, one person enterprise can appear to be as large, credible and worthy as a company with millions in revenues.
Improve interaction with customers and suppliers
A website can help a company to, quickly and cost-effectively, multiply its customer and vendor interfacing capabilities by, for example, providing: product information; pricing; product literature; answers to commonly asked questions, etc. - on a 24/7/365 basis and at nominal cost.
Show instead of tell
Use three dimensional graphics, animation, audio, videos, etc. to create product demos and other presentations that describe your products and explain your services far more effectively than any print brochure.
Collect customer data
Important data can be gleaned from the traffic on your website. What time do they come? Where do they go within the site? What information do they access? Where do they come from? It is also fairly easy to gather relevant information, facts, or opinions by way of surveys and questionnaires.
Reduce the cost of doing business
By making more and more information available to customers and prospects via the website, a business can begin to reduce costs in areas such as printing, direct mail, print ads, customer service, manuals, and product catalogs.
Support offline sales and marketing
Send people to your site from print and broadcast communications for product literature; product specs; product/price comparisons; customer testimonials; demos; etc.
Expand visibility and reach
Facilitate growth beyond the usual limitations of geography and meager resources. Do business anywhere in the world with minimal staff or capital!