Why does a small business need a professional website ?
For small businesses investing in a professionally designed website is absolutely essential with more people going online every day. It has tremendous potential to grow your business and gives you additional credibility. According to Clutch, 64 percent of small businesses have a website and half of those who don’t, plan to own one soon.
A business’s online presence, regardless of industry, can have a massive impact on its success. In this day and age, some businesses still don’t realize that a majority of their customers will visit their website before making a purchase.
The good news is that there’s a solution out there that will work for you. If you still need convincing, here are the top reasons it’s important for your business to have a website:
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Online Identity and Brand Promotion
A professional website acts as an informative online business card for your brand. It can inform your potential customers about your products or services in a clean and concise format. With a professional design, your target customers are readily attracted towards your brand. Without an online presence, your competitors will fill the void unoccupied by you and gain customers that might have chosen your business.
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Keep Your Business Open 24/7
Unlike a commercial establishment, the Internet doesn’t have operating hours. Your customers can find you 24/7. There are no holidays and you can “work overtime” without incurring extra costs.
Thus, a website can be an effective way to improve your customer service.
If you have chat support available, all you need is to hire customer service agents who can manage incoming inquiries and concerns, and have them addressed immediately to the right person or department of your company.
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Generate Leads
Lead generation is an important component of email marketing and your website is the best tool for capturing email addresses.
When someone gives you his email address, he is giving you permission to send content to his inbox. If you ask your friends, family, and network of contacts, they will gladly give you their email addresses.
What about a complete stranger? A person who just visited your website?
He will not surrender his email address to anyone without getting something of value in exchange.
With a website, you can offer a free monthly subscription to a newsletter, an e-book, or limited access to premium content.
By doing so, you add value to your business, enhance your reputation, and most importantly, gain the trust of a potential customer.
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Updates And Announcements
Since your website is on 24/7, it’s easy to post updates and announcements to your customers. It’s a way to keep them up to date on everything that you’re doing. When something is particularly relevant to them, it increases the chance of you being able to upsell them.
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Provide better service to your customers.
With the right small business website, your customers can learn a lot and do a lot without ever having to talk with you directly. They can learn what customers are saying about your business, learn more about the products or services you provide, learn about your return or exchange policy, schedule a consultation or appointment, and shop. Best of all, they can do so whenever it’s most convenient for them, even after business hours.
Your website can help you serve your customers more efficiently, which will save more of your own time as well as provide your customers with a better experience.
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Save more on marketing.
When you have a website, it opens you up to the wide world of inbound marketing, which is not only much cheaper than traditional forms of advertising, it’s also more effective.
With outbound marketing strategies, like billboards, television ads, etc., you’re paying to get your name out in front of as many people as possible, whether or not they are in your target demographic. But, with inbound digital marketing, you’re only paying to market to people who are already actively searching for what you have to offer.
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Advertising
A website is more environmentally friendly when it comes to advertising and marketing. There are many ways to promote your products or services online. One example is Facebook ads, an advertising feature provided through Facebook. Another one is called SEO, short for Search Engine Optimisation. This is a major benefit for your business. Having good SEO can boost the ranking of your website which quickly results in increased sales and larger profits.
Conclusion
If you want an effective website or one that can help you take your business to another level, you have to be prepared to invest in one. In a survey of small business owners, 19% identified cost as another reason for foregoing a website.
“A website is not an expense. It is an investment because you should expect a return on your money within a period of time.”
If you’re still hesitating whether or not to invest in website development, look through these benefits of a website for small business again. If you seek professionals to make a website for you, write to us and we’ll discuss the details.