Do You Need a Small Business Web Site?
A Home Business Article Contributed by Abe Gardea
Do You Need a Small Business Web Site?
It's the question mulled over by thousands of small business owners across the nation: Do I really need a web site? The answer is that it depends on what your business is doing now, and what your plans are for the future. There are certainly some businesses that cannot do without a site, but others are walking the line: they could probably survive with or without one. The real question shouldn't be, "Do I need a web site," but rather, "Could a web site improve my business? "
In most instances, the answer is yes. Have you thought about the ways a web site might change the face of your business? Here are two crucial arguments in favor of small business web sites.
A small business web site will give your business credibility.
Let's imagine that you see a product at your friends house, and it intrigues you. You think that you might like to purchase one, but you need a little more information first. If you're like most Americans, the first way you'll try to get that information is to look for the company's web site. And if you don't find one? Again, if you're like most consumers, your first instinct will be to wonder what's wrong with the company.
In a day when everyone from job-seekers to plumbers to fortune 500 companies have a web presence, it's difficult to imagine a company without one. And the truth is, if you're a small business trying to gain market share, one of the quickest ways to tell everyone your size is to skip the important step of creating a web site.
A small business web site will automatically increase your customer base
Today's consumers are busy, which explains why so many of us are doing our shopping on the web. Why else would the major department and chain stores have web sites, if they weren't afraid of losing out on internet business? One way to insure that your business stays small is to ignore this growing customer base.
A small business web site will make life easier for your existing customers
Successful web masters understand that many people use company web sites as a way to interact with a company. For example, in the above mentioned scenario, we talked about someone who was interested in a product and tried to find a company website to gain more information about it. Just what could she have found if there had been a site? For starters, she could have found the price and any warranties that were offered.
Then, she could have checked the availability, color options and ordering information. If interested, she might have chatted online with other customers from the site, read posts on the company's discussion board, filled out a questionnaire for more information, signed up for the company's monthly newsletter, or even sent an email to customer service for clarification on some aspect of the product.
In short, she would have walked away filled with enough knowledge to make a decision about whether or not to make a purchase, and she could have gained this knowledge at her convenience -- not during regular business hours.
