If you are a small business owner or you’re just starting out and secretly wish you had an online business, do you really need a website?
Perhaps you’re working from home or dreaming about quitting your 9-5 job, you may think there is no benefit in having a professional website since you can do everything on social media.
Or maybe you think you can’t afford to have a professional website, so you may get a free website and do it yourself or ask your friend’s son who builds websites on weekends.
Perhaps you’re in the generation that didn’t grow up with computers, you don’t use a computer so you think your customers don’t use computers either. Maybe you think if you are not tech savvy why bother with a website anyways. Perhaps you have been relying on word of mouth for so long that you are doing very well this way, why invest in a professional website?
Here are some stats: The new 2018 Global Digital suite of reports from We Are Social and Hootsuite reveals that there are now more than 4 billion people around the world using the internet. Well over half of the world’s population is now online, with the latest data showing that nearly a quarter of a billion new users came online for the first time in 2017.
More than two-thirds of the world’s population now has a mobile phone, with most people now using a smartphone. eMarketer estimates that non-voice time spent per day by smartphone users will have risen from 2 hours 18 minutes in 2014 to 2 hours 42 minutes by 2019.
Our online behavior has been changing with the rise of more affordable devices and data plans.
Table of Contents
9 reasons you need a website for your business or side-hustle:
Reason #1: A professional website is the window of your business
People use the internet to gather information every day for any reason. That you are a local business or not, if you are not on the internet, someone else is and will get the business.
Finding out about your hours of operations, address, contact, or trying to find a solution to a problem, getting a menu, booking an appointment is all accessible via the internet nowadays.
You will want to have your business available virtually online where anyone can find you and contact you.
In addition to providing pertinent information, a website is also a window to your business where you can promote new products and services as well as explain, with all the tools available (text, audio, video, imagery, etc..), what your business is about and how it can benefit the viewer.
Reason #2: A professional website is always open for business
Your website is working for you 24/7. The online world is never closed and no matter where you are in the world, someone can access the information, services or products you have available at any time of the day.
Building your list, selling programs or products is no longer limited to working hours. Your professional website is doing this for you and without you.
Reason #3: A professional website enables you to target a wider audience
A website is available anywhere. The World Wide Web is available to anyone with internet access. That means your website can be viewed from anywhere in the world.
Brick and mortar stores product-based businesses can also sell to a wider audience with the help of an eCommerce store. Think of all the people who can’t get to your bricks and mortar store that you could sell your products to.
Service-based businesses can also serve anyone around the world. With the abundance of affordable communication channels, it is now possible to do business with anyone, anytime. A website makes it much easier to attract new clients in the global market.
Reason #4: Do business your way
With your website, you can do business however the way you want. You set the tone of who you are as a business owner and how you are interacting with your customers. You are free to imagine and create your online world and choose the business model that will attract your ideal customer.
Reason #5: No website means losing business
It is clear that not having a website means losing sales to another business. However a bad website is worse than having no website as it is promoting a bad image of your business.
Having a professional, polished looking website that functions easily and offers customers clear navigation, strong imagery, professional quality content and an overall experience that engages your customers enough to want to do business with you is key.
Reason #6: A professional website saves you time
Reason #7: You control your content and offers
You have the opportunity to make new offers, provide new and updated information, remove products, offer discounts at anytime. You can change the look of it with the push of a button and launch a new product in matter of days or hours.
Reason #8: A professional website saves you money in the long run
I have seen countless business owners believe that once you have a website, customers will come and buy. This cannot be further from the truth.
In order to be found on Google, you will need a robust SEO (SEO is a three letter acronym short for Search Engine Optimization. Search engine optimization about trying to rank higher in search engines.)
You also will need a way to capture your ideal customers’ emails to grow your list and have a way to convert those customers into repeat buyers.
If you don’t strategize your investment from the beginning, you will lose more money by having a designer redo the site and help you put the necessary elements in place so that you professional website generate leads and sales for you.
Reason #9: A professional website is not just a website
Yes, websites are becoming more user-friendly for a business owner to build their own website, and still look good. But in addition to looking good, your website needs to be the extension of your business and work for you 24/7.
Your professional website needs to be generating leads and sales.
You website needs to represent you as well as attract your ideal customer. You website needs to be more than just a website.
It needs to be a list-building & money machine.
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