1) Word of Mouth
The single most powerful form of new business creation is word of mouth. Your past customers, friends, acquaintances and staff aren't likely to carry your brochure or even your business card everywhere they go. The can however carry your domain name, in their heads! Every time they have a conversation that leads to your kind of business they just quote your simple domain name. You've chosen a simple domain name of course, easily remembered, easily spelt and requiring no explanation. For that reason avoid hyphenated names.
2) Cost Effective
Have you ever produced a colour printed brochure or other printed promotional material? expensive isn't it? When you have a web site created you may consider that expensive too. Hang on, make the comparison. A web site is a full colour brochure for your business. Unlike a printed brochure it never gets lost or put in the bin and you never have to go to your printer and pay for more. If things change or you are able to offer new products or services alterations to your web site can be made instantly and relatively cheaply too. You wed site is available in pristine condition, 24 hours a day to anyone in the world. You can even replace your printed brochure with a CD of your web site.
3) Lower Advertising Costs
Any honest advertising expert will tell you that small and often is better than big and seldom. Would you spend your advertising budget on one big ad published once? Of course not because that approach just doesn't work. So how do you communicate all of your key benefits "small and often". When you have a web site it's a lot easier. Reduce column inches and air time by using just one effective message and promoting your wed site address for more details.
4) Interactivity
You web site is alive! It can do so many things that printed materials simply can't. Above all your customers and potential customers can communicate at their convenience, even while you are asleep or your business premises are closed. You return to hot enquiries. Your site can also be set for you to see who's online in real time. You can even offer live help online to visitors who are in your site.
5) Customer Retention
You can maintain customer relationships efficiently as your site acquires subscribers and customers who opt in to be informed of developments, new products and services available, special offers and industry news. You grow a database of customers and potential customers and communicate with them quickly and directly. You database becomes an integral part of your business helping you to build strong, loyal customer relationships and repeat business.
6) Catchment Reach
Without the internet you find you business constrained to your locality either by it's physical location or the prohibitive costs of reaching a wider audience or both. These constraints are broken by the internet. You may be based in London and there may well be potential customers in Edinburgh, Manchester, Birmingham or even Milan, New York and Shanghai. How else can your messages reach them cost effectively? With your web site you call the tune. You can target locally, regionally, nationally or globally regardless of your physical location. The chains are finally broken.
7) Easy Customer Entry
Potential customers aren't always too confident about stepping over the threshold of a shop let alone knocking on your office door. Your web site removes any anxiety that potential customers may feel. They aren't going to face their perceived demons on your web site, no possibility of over bearing sales staff, no risk of embarrassment and no feelings of guilt if you don't have what they want and they have to leave. Your web site helps you to focus on genuinely interested customers that you are able to help.
8) Reduced Stock Holding
If you have a shop or any business supplying physical product you know that in general you can't sell what you don't have. The internet offers a big difference. If you are in the kind of business where your suppliers can deliver goods to you quickly you can leave the stock holding to them. Equally you may be in a business where a delivery period is the expected norm, say fitted kitchens or sofas. Again your site can show your wares virtually and you needn't have these costly items actually in stock, just available in a reasonable time.
9) Level Paying Field
You have a credible business with great products and services and a passion for customer service but you're small. Nothing wrong with that but customer perception is important. You know you can do as good a job or better than the big boys but your shop is on a back street or your office is on the 7th floor is a small provincial town. None of this is an issue on the internet. Your web site can be as sophisticated as any competitor and can project your true business image rather than the image that your surroundings may suggest. Your web site can communicate who you really are or who you truly aspire to be.
10) Passive Income
You're only human. You can't be ready to do business 24/7. You have to eat, sleep, relax and do other things too. Your web site doesn't. Your web site is actively selling and growing your business every minute of every day. If you sell goods directly from your site your balance is growing whilst you're asleep. You wake up to orders in the book and cash in the bank.
Malcolm Cooper is a UK web designer based in Gloucestershire. Malcolm also owns and operates one of the largest online jewellry stores in the UK and applies that knowledge and experience in providing web services to other small and medium sized businesses.
malcolmcooper.com
malcolmcooper.com
The popular search engine Google indexes over 8 billion websites.... Read More
Just like all things in life, the ways to run... Read More
Simply ensuring your website is accessible to screen reader users... Read More
Rosalind wants to share her inspirational poetry with a wider... Read More
Like any area of business your website needs some effort... Read More
One of the most important parts of establishing a new... Read More
An accessible Web site is easily approached, easily understood, and... Read More
Optimize your time. How much time each day must you... Read More
When visitors add your web site to their Favorites or... Read More
Every business needs to know how it is doing. That's... Read More
In a previous ezinearticles.com article,"I Need real visitors, Not Search... Read More
Failure, just like success, is measured differently by each and... Read More
A system development process can follow a number of standard... Read More
Your site is getting traffic, but conversion rates are horrible.... Read More
A simple website stats counter is not enough if you... Read More
It never ceases to amaze me how many people set-up... Read More
"How do I improve web site sales figures?" The CEO... Read More
2 Golden Rules for an Engaging Website35% of visitors fail... Read More
It amazes me how many people try to build serious... Read More
It is an undeniable fact that not everybody is keen... Read More
Customer service questionnaires can help your clients better understand their... Read More
Can you imagine the hypocrisy of spending thousands of dollars,... Read More
URL rewriting are major needs for your sites that produce... Read More
You hear a great deal about the Internet these days... Read More
Fantastico is a 3rd-party cPanel add-on and can be purchased... Read More
quick home cleaning Lake Forest ..The Internet car buyer is an elusive animal. Trying to... Read More
Writing for the web is totally different to writing for... Read More
Better Web Site ROIHow to increase your business profitability by... Read More
Running an effective website is a continuous process. I have... Read More
Why do some sites succeed while the vast majority of... Read More
Is your website Really useful?I had a 'rep' in yesterday... Read More
When a user signs up at your website, you may... Read More
Mini Websites are the most powerful and cost effective solution... Read More
QUESTION: Should I build and maintain my business Web... Read More
If you're an up and coming graphic/web designer just out... Read More
SummaryHere's the scoop on what you must know when designing... Read More
When used to describe a web site, the term "sticky"... Read More
Before you jump into spending coutnless hours on designing and... Read More
So you want to take a look at a real... Read More
Internet Marketing is not a miracle marketing strategy ? competition... Read More
How many Web Sites did you stumble over telling you... Read More
1. Choose a big enough font size. A size 12... Read More
One of my most salient memories from when I sold... Read More
Every good Internet business understands the value of conversions versus... Read More
Although there are significant differences among the various types of... Read More
So your prospect, Mary, is sitting at the computer reading... Read More
Launching a new small business website is often a long... Read More
D.zigns dzignerwebs The Basics Before starting on... Read More
A while ago one of my clients approached me and... Read More
Webmasters deal with a myriad of complex design challenges every... Read More
Web Development |