why do i need a website?

People expect you to have a Website.

Over 50% of all small to medium businesses have a website.

By having a website you are showing your clients and prospective clients that you are a professional viable business, not having a website may cast suspicion and give the impression that you are too small to deal with their needs or a fly by night business.

Having a website gives you a professional domain name for you to use for E-Mail addresses, most people will more readily deal with a company that mails them from bob@yourcompanydomainname.co.za than bob@gmail.com or even yourcompany@gmail.com .

Your Competition forces you to have a Website.

Most businesses out there today have a website.

The chances are that your competition have a website are extremely high, even if you are in a specialized niche market. This gives them a competitive edge, portraying them as a larger, better established professional business, giving them a bigger piece of the pie.

The newer generation of customers out there rely on the internet for most everything, as statistics show internet users worldwide are well over a billion. These customers will demand you have a website, and will likely pass you over in favour of someone who does have a website, at the low cost of implementing a professional website to give yourself the competitive edge and not having clients pass you over in favour of your competitors, why not take a bigger piece of the pie?

Run with the Big Dogs who do have a Website.

All big companies have a website.

With the internet age, websites give smaller companies the ability to successfully compete with the larger corporate, gone are the days of brick and mortar storefronts to promote your business which are very costly compared to a website.

With a professional usable website, proper search engine optimization and an effective online marketing strategy, your website can be as good (if not better) than your larger competitors. A well crafted website can also give your current and prospective clients the impression that your business is larger than it really is.

If it is that easy to give yourself the competitive edge at the low cost of implementing a professional website, why not do it?

Out with the old, in with the New.

Most Clients today use the Internet to find what they are looking for.

If you are old enough to remember back in the days before the internet, the yellow pages was considered the only means to get the word out about your business. If you did not have an entry in the yellow pages, customers might not have any way of knowing that you exist, or knowing how to contact you.

For today’s Modern generation, the yellow pages are an old, retired relic of the 20th century history, from the period of the dark ages.
This does not mean that some small business owners that still rely on the yellow pages don’t still get some customers coming through the yellow pages, the local community of customers who themselves don’t know how to use the Internet to locate businesses. But by not having a website, you are leaving far too much money on the table.

Today’s modern generation use the internet for most everything, including Searching for products or services they may be interested in, which could be your business.

Websites never sleep.

Your Website is like a 24 hour a day Salesman that never sleeps and is always ready to assist customers.

Whether it is helping current clients with questions they may have about your company with a frequently asked Q & A page, or explaining your products to them in greater detail with a products page, or even allowing them the opportunity to provide you with useful feedback using a feedback page, or introducing new potential clients to your company and its products or services.

A website frees up valuable time, additional in today’s time people prefer using the Internet to research prospective suppliers and choose the best one to service their needs, with 49 percent of the population being introverts most people prefer to get their questions answered without having to ask, people want to be able to do their research, most people use the Internet as a tool before they will ever knock on your door or pick up a phone, without a website, how much are you losing out on, especially considering the cost.

Improve Communication with your Website.

Effectively Communicate using your Website.

Although brochures and flyers can be a great way to promote and advertise your business, the effectiveness is vastly improved with the use of a Website, as a carefully crafted Website can guide your clients, suppliers or even employee’s through page after page of rich information about your company, products and services, at a relatively low cost.

Even if you are not using brochures and flyers , just by adding your Website address to your business cards give potential clients the ability to become familiar with your company, products and services anonymously from the comfort of their own home or office without the pressure of a salesman in front of them.

Also remember that a Website address is easier for your potential customers to remember than a phone number.