If you think you can get by without a website, you may be correct in the short run. But in the long run, though, you ‘II soon find that owning a website, and perhaps several , is absolutely imperative. Here are four good reasons why I say that.
Creating a Website Imposes Organization, Discipline, and Focus. The process of building your website imposes reasons to rethink, revisit, and redefine your company’s marketing and merchandising appeal, its identity, its unique selling propositions. and its raison d’etre. Given that we’ve discussed organizing and publishing your own express catalog and price list, you’ve already done a lot of the heavy lifting in organizing your website. (Conversely, if you start the process with the development of your website, you’ve got the essence of your own express catalog and price list in hand).- It Ain’t Rocket Science. If you lack the skills for creating your own website, there are many good providers that’ll be happy to execute one for you. Yes, how much you budget for your website will vary by who does it, how extensive it is, and how easy it is to navigate, but even basic websites are afford able today to design and maintain. Your options range from working with leading industry distributors, several of whom have turnkey software and hosting deals available, to creating yours from the ground up. Additional solutions incorporate both aspects to a degree to portray the best of both worlds – a website that provides ample information about your products, services, and pricing as well as telling and showing your company’s story. That story includes the company’s owners, key people, your production or representation capabilities, noteworthy attributes, and other reasons buyers should favor you with their patronage and loyalty.
- It Shortens the Buying Process. Established accounts who peruse your company and its offerings online get real-time , 24/7 answers to their basic questions along with some understandings about their more complex concerns. The issues that aren’t addressed for pressing specific situations are the ones you really want to deal with at the time they come up. Your website, properly executed, saves your customers and prospects time and your company time and money. Trying to answer every conceivable aspect of every order and every detail isn’t critical and the effort to do so is probably somewhere between folly, unnecessary, and overkill. But those owners who insist that handling routine information and price quotes over the phone gives them a better chance at closing a sale just don’t “get it.” They don’t realize how poorly they look when compared to other companies that show a modicum of respect for the buyer’s time and intelligence.
- Website Enhances Your Credentials. Every company that is a “player” — or wants to be — will have a website. It’ll be a prerequisite for being thought of as a leader in your market or your backyard. If your local TV station runs a news story, it must be important. If you advertise on radio or TV, you’re likely to be thought of as a bigger company than your competitors that don’t advertise on radio. And if you have a website, there’s a whole world of companies who feel more comfortable doing business with you. Perhaps more importantly. there’s a world of companies who figure if you don’t have a website, your company isn’t worthy of their further consideration.
