First, there is big corporate businesses, then small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and small personal businesses. The first two don’t have much trouble when setting up their online presence since they might already have a following or the staff they need to build their online presence.
Small personal businesses, on the other hand, always have a hard time since you are a one or two-person team of desperados trying to make it in an otherwise competitive online world.
Does that mean you should ignore the internet and keep marketing your business on other platforms? Perhaps not.
According to VPN Mentor, the internet had over 3.7 billion internet users by the end of 2017. Coupled with the fact that over 64 percent of all in-store sales (approximately $2.2 trillion) had some connection with the internet, it is evident to see how much your personal business can benefit from owning a website.
Are you ready for the website?
Most personal businesses have to do significant trade-offs when choosing what to invest in and what to ignore for the time being. You will have to decide whether to spend a couple of thousand bucks on a website or whether to put that money into paid per click campaigns and social media campaigns.
A quick cost-benefit analysis will help you do a short-term evaluation of priorities and choose what will keep your business growing and running.
- Don’t spend too much on your website if the business isn’t yet stable unless your business plan revolves about the website.
- You have to be willing to invest time, money and effort into building a reputable website that will convince people your brand is the best.
- Don’t expect instant results. Be prepared to let search engine optimization (SEO) and other content marketing processes to run their natural course before you begin making sales.
Getting started with the venture
The trick to benefiting from your website is building quality. However, since getting brand specific domains is a bit tricky, most people will prefer grabbing their domain name and let it sit until they are ready to set up a decent online retail website.
Others will get an affordable and reliable hosting account and set up a simple blog explaining what they do. Just something simple and enough to keep the domain occupied and the few people who might search for you online covered.
Is this a good idea? Well yes. Some online presence without spending anything on it will help you drive subliminal sales to your website. Moreover, this simple setup will be a way to gauge how hard it will be to penetrate your local search for your business specific keywords.
Your Starter Website Must Have Professional Content
Professional content with the right keywords will do you justice on the search engines. Most of the times, people, and search engines will be looking for information on the internet rather than hunting for refined products.
Focusing on creating great content around your niche with the location name mentioned a couple of times and then drafting an elaborate about us and contact page to tie you to the niche will help you build your credibility as you build other aspects of your business waiting to invest on a reliable web design.
Content creation will always be cheaper than a comprehensive web design. Running an informative website as a starter will kick things in motion and prepare you psychologically for the massive investment you will make when getting that custom website.
Your final design must look and feel professional
With almost 1 billion websites out there, yours must be outstanding if you are to make any impression on your audience. First impressions matter. All your visitors will judge you depending on how good or how bad your website looks.
At all times, keep your appearance neat and professional. Emphasizing on speed and user experience is way better than any graphics. Convince your visitors that you are serious about business and they will do business with you.
Getting your business online gives you access to more customers. However, to succeed, you need strategy and a unique way to add value to your local audience.
