Starting a Website

So, what does starting a website bring to your business?

No matter what bricks and mortar business you operate, you will benefit by having an on-line presence.

Never, ever think that you are too small or have too few customers to warrant your own web presence.

Once you start your own business website, here is what you get as standard:

• Free 24hr advertising for your products and services
• A fully stocked online showroom of your products and services that's open 24/7
• Easy means of communication with your customers and potential customers through email or contact forms, anywhere and at any time
• The ability to generate commission free sales and accept cash payments up front
• An endless source of customer information to better analyse customer wants and needs
• A source of product information to easily analyse popular product demand and update production requirments

Forget the excuses, you really must create a web presence for your business.

Whether you're a one man band financial consultant, a lawyer, a car mechanic, an organic gradner or a supermarket owner, starting a business website is essential.

How To Build Your Business Website ....

Starting a website for your business requires some real thought. Firstly, don't do anything until you have decided three things.

• Who will you be trying to reach through your business website? Will you be selling to them or only supplying information to pre-sell?
• What specific services or products are you going to offer online?
• How are you going to promote your site so that it stands out from other business websites?

Take time to lay out an online business plan before starting a website, and then decide ..

• How are you going to run your site
• How are you going to create your content
• And lastly, decide on a name that fits your business or at least that part of the business you want to promote online.

If the name of your business is still available register it as your domain name and do so under every TLD you can, (that's the .com, .us, .co.uk or .net suffix).

Even if your business name isn't your product or service make sure you still register your business name and then re-direct those domains to the website name you are promoting.

Starting & Planning Your Business Website ...

Now start planning your website presence by getting online and checking out your main competitors websites, even have a look through your principle suppliers websites.

Consider their layouts, how comprehensive are the web pages, how much product detail do they have and how many products are they displaying.

How do they communicate with their customers. Try sending a communication and see how they respond.

View their images, check their spelling, and decide if the website is engaging.

Decide if you, as a customer, trust the site and whether you would be happy to buy from it or contact the company through it.

Does it add credibility to your competitiors product and their overall business.

Now, no matter what your answers, no matter what your decisions, tell yourself that you will build a better business website.

This is the time to note what you want in your business website and how you want to display your products and communicate with your potential customers.

Whether you want to sell directly or pre-sell and have customers contact your sales department to take their orders.

Whether you want to process online orders and payments or if your product or service has to be delivered / collected prior to payment.

Think about how you have used business websites yourself, to order personal items or business supplies and factor those experiences into your notes.

Forget the technical aspects and focus on the functions and solutions you want to build in.

It will be down to the website designers to make those solutions a reality or to tell you why it can't be done.

For now forget budget restrictions and simply conjure up your ideal business website.

It may not all be possible due to budget or technical constraints, but deciding what you want as an ideal, will give your website designers something to focus on.

Finally consider your business competitors website design, is it simple and easy to navigate. Does it get their message across. Do they need all those graphics.

Your business website design should be all those things. A credible website that can be trusted and that allows your customer to get at the information they want, easily.

At the same time your business contact details should always be upfront and easy to see.

Include the name of the person your potential customer will speak to, your business address, telephone number and your own email address. NOTE: make sure those email contacts are answered promptly.

Get all this planning on paper before starting a website. Then pass it to your website designer to give it some thought.

Actually Building Your Business Website ...

The first issue that will always impact building your business website is budgetary constraint. How mush cold hard cash can you commit to starting a website?

Now, anyone who can switch on a computer can eventually learn enough to be able to build a website. There are books and a great many web sites that will help you create your website.

Some of these even offer all you think you need for zero cost, nothing down and no money upfront.

NOW STOP, and consider one important factor ... Your Business Credibility.

Free site builders destroy business credibility, they may be fine for an eighteen year olds personal blog or diary site, but you're starting a website for your business.

Your existing and potential customers will rate your products and services on their first impressions. The first 4 seconds of viewing your business website.

FACT ...

• If your website takes more than 3 seconds to load they will be gone.
• If your business website does not clearly show what it's about, they will be gone.
• If you do not include simple, effective navigation they will be gone.

So, if you can only budget for creating a freebie website, don't waste your time.

It will disappear into the muck and mire of the other 150 million free websites on the world wide web, never to be seen and never to add anything credible to your business.

If funds are a problem and you need to keep your business website budget to an absolute minimum then you want the most effective bang for your buck.

As an example of starting a website for your business by spending as little as possible, let's look at what you can create for $299 dollars.

Let's use Business Management Basics as our business website example, a website I started from scratch and which took a couple of months (part-time) to develop.

I had also been managing a full time bricks and mortar business, and it was extremely difficult to devote more time to creating this site, in fact probably impossible for me, due to long hours and other commitments.

Hiring someone to build the website was the obvious answer here and although it need not have cost a fortune. I also wanted to invest in the learning process, to make sure I understood the internet and the website building process for future projects.

I tried a few things before I was referred to SBI (SiteBuild-It) and their excellent Action Guide, needless to say the results speak for themselves and three years later I am happily running Business Management Basics, still part-time, for a very nice profit on the $299 I invest each year.

If money is not a problem and you can budget for outsourcing your business website development, so much the better.

If you are going to outsource starting a web site, remember to have thought it through and planned your website outline well, before looking for a website designer.

Check examples of their previous website designs that are operational and make sure all aspects of search engine optimization are included.

Present your website designer with a detailed outline and monitor progress to ensure they produce a business website that you covers all the points above and that will impress your customers and add credibility to your product and your business.

You might consider SiteBuild-It for outsourcing, as they also offer a full website design service and very cost effective seo and website building solutions. I have been more than happy with Site Build It and can personally recommend them.

So, starting a website need not be a hassle or a chore. But; when your business website is up and running it will need visitors, as many as you can attract.

Website Visitors = Potential Customers

Visitors to your website are your potential customers and customers are the measure of e-commerce website success.

Starting a website is part of your marketing effort and so should fall within your marketing plan. Good marketing and product merchandising should attract attention and encourage potential customers to take some action that grows your business.

In the same way, your business website should also encourage visitors to take action.

So. as long as this webpage is, it cannot hope to fully cover starting a website. Here though, are some ways of attracting visitor traffic and potential customers to your business website ...

• Your site must be optimized for the search engines. Your website designer should do all this for you
• Advertise your business website on all your business stationery, invoices, statements, business cards, press adverts, etc.
• Collect email addresses and contact detals from all your customers, invite them to register for a newsletter or special offers
• Use customer emails for special promotions that attract customers back to your website
• Provide every opportunity for your visitors to buy online. Ensure you utilise the latest SSL site security
• Send out a weekly or monthly newsletter, with special offers and link it to an offer page on your business website