10 Reasons Why your small business needs a website.
A website is a collection of publicly accessible, interlinked web pages that share a single domain name.
Website can be created or maintained by an individual, group, business or organisation to serve a variety of purpose.
If your business has gotten this far without a website, you might be wondering: do I need a website for my business? What’s the point if my business is already successful without one?
A website offers a wide variety of benefits for small businesses, and most of these benefits increase in value exponentially year over year, just like the Internet itself.
Here are 10 reasons why your business needs a website:
Your Customers and Prospects Expects It
Table of Contents
Your customers expect you to have a website to find more information about your business. Think about this, when most people want to buy something, they first search for it on Google, find out more about the product before heading to the market. So when they search for a product or service that is close to what you do, your web site will pop up and they can go ahead to purchase from you.
Your prospects go online to search because they expect you to be there. Brick and mortar store is gradually fading away and you too need to up your game.
2. It is the only place you have full control
Your social media handles don’t really belong to you. You can get kicked out if you don’t follow the community guidelines and terms.
Your website is the only place you can have full control. You decide what you post, the kind of contents, when to take it down. Since your website is your property, you have absolute design freedom unlike with social media platforms. You can share user reviews, videos, images, and whatever else you desire.
Also, you don’t have to follow the constantly updated rules of social media platforms. Your website and its contents are safe and can’t go on blackout like social media use to.
3. It elicits social proof
It means that someone has tested your products or services and approves it and is happy with your service. Customer behavior is driven mostly by what others have to say about your business.
There is what is called Google review, where people who have experienced your services write a review and say nice things about your business. Since prospective buyers are already looking for you online, including customers testimonials on your site is a great way to impress potential buyers and provide social proof.
It helps your prospects have confidence and trust in you.
4. It enhances your credibility
Is there any big business you know that doesn’t have an online presence? If you too want your small business to grow big, you must have a website.
75% of online users accepted to judge a company’s credibility based on its website design. In the end, people are likely to engage with a company they can trust, and the website is the stepping stone towards building that relationship.
Whether your business is a one man’s business, people will see it as a corporation, they can see you as a big business. A website makes you look professional, 84% of today’s consumers think a website makes your business more credible than companies who only have social media profiles.
You can also showcase any professional certification and awards that your business has.
5. Competitive advantage
You, a small business can comfortably compete with giants in your business line. Being present on the search results page is one of the many ways to challenge your industry Goliaths.
Therefore, if you don’t dominate the Internet, you are giving your customers a reason to buy from your competitors. The people buying from you don’t consider who’s bigger or smaller, all they care about is if you can deliver your products and services then you get your money.
Before now, small businesses can’t compete with bigger businesses because they cannot afford to pay for adverts on radio, Tv, newspaper and the rest. But today, both big and small businesses can compete with the help of a website.
6. Showcase your products and services to the world
It cannot be stressed enough that a website is the first interaction of your target audience with your brand. Another thing you can do is publish important information about your products and services on your website to make sure you’re attracting the right customers.
How you position your business is totally in your control. You can also provide short videos or downloadable PDF instructions. You can also highlight your awards, testimonials. This increases the average time your customers spend on the website and perhaps influences their decision to contact you.
You can show potential customers what they’ll get when they work with you by displaying high-quality photographs, to give people a sense of what it feels like to enter your physical location.
7. Your business is open 24/7/365
It simply means that there is no closing hour. Having a website means that your content is available to users anytime of their convenience.
Your business runs at night, during the day and weekends. When you’re on vacation, your business is still open and running. So whether someone visits your website in the dead of the night or during the day, in some way you’re always interacting with them.
Being accessible at all times supports marketing and increases sales dramatically.
Remember, during covid 19 pandemic shutdown, a lot of businesses suffered because they don’t have online presence, all physical shops and offices were closed.
The only place that wasn’t closed down was the digital space, it was still operating. People were ordering things online and it was delivered to them at home. A lot of businesses leveraged on it and COVID-19 pandemic didn’t affect them as it did to you.
8. Attracts new customers
To encourage continued success, you need to attract new customers, and one of the best ways to do it is by making yourself more visible on Google. More people will discover your business, once people go on Google to search for anything close to your business line, you will pop up.
Also, once the people come into your website and find what they are looking for they will buy from you. From leads ( people who are interested in your business) , to customers, from customers to repeat customers and they can become advocates (they bring other people to patronize you); this will help you reach to more people and sell more, make more money.
The phrase “search engine optimization” might be intimidating, but in practice, it’s fairly simple. You enter words and phrases related to your business into a keyword research tool, figure out which ones are getting the most traffic on Google, then build your content around those phrases.
9. Saves time
Saving You Time + Good Customer Service. Communicating with potential customers takes time. Your website can save you that time by providing answers to common customer questions and inquiries while you can spend your time doing more valuable things. If you miss a call, the customer is left unhappy.
A website can reduce these calls and increase internal productivity. At the same time, it helps customers find useful information without needing to call, which ultimately provides an all-around better user experience.
You can also link your social media handles on your website and they can also travel from your website and chat you up directly, and you can give them tailored made service.
10. Keep your customers updated
When there are updates, upgrade, information or announcements you want to pass across to your customers and the general public, your website is the best place to drop it, thousands of people can access it at the same time.
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.
Conclusively, the decision to either create a website for your business or not is ultimately yours to make. However, if part of your business goals is to improve lead generation, visibility, social proof, authority and of course sales, then creating a web site is an excellent place to begin.
