What can a website do for my business?

Getting a website is a bit like choosing a form of transport. You have to decide where it is you want to get, and how much you want to spend. Below is a very broad outline of the sorts of options available to small business that are looking for websites with roughly translatable modes of transport for price guides as a useful (but not to be too heavily relied on) analogy...

Website as barefoot - free and dirty
These days, more often than not you'll have been chatting to a great potential client, they'll be keen on using your services, and then they'll say: 'Have you got a website I can check out?'

Now you have three choices:

You can say no, you don't have a website, they'll have to take your word for it that you do what you do.

You can look shifty, nod reluctantly, making excuses about it 'just being something my brother-in-law knocked up' and how it 'doesn't have the latest work you've done.'

Or, you can...

Website as Bike - cheap and light
...beam broadly and say yes, proudly giving them your business card and declaring the domain like you can't wait for them to check it out. So if a potential client meets all three of these people, who is he going to pick?

At minimum, for about the price of a half decent bike, the website can be an online brochure for your business. It can contain images of your products, services and work you've done and testimonials from previous clients. It shows that you're serious about what you do and solid enough to have invested in a professional website.

Website as Car - affordable and versatile
A step up from that you can start having your website work a bit harder for as little as a cheap second hand car. It can find you new clients all on its own with great search engine optimization and a little promotion. If the site is well written, well presented with clear Unique Selling Points and an easy route to contact, leads can start rolling in. Increasingly people are using the Internet as their first screening for new services, and if you don't have a site there, you never leave the starting blocks. With a good site, easily found, you race past the rest.

Website as Limo - expensive but impressive
Go a bit further and you could make it more of an interactive experience, offering online services to visitors and clients alike. With e-commerce, enquiry forms, online quote requests, members' only areas, surveys, instant calculators and comparisons, your visitors could start off using the free services provided on your site and -impressed by what you can afford to give away - convert into paying customers. Clients may then find your private services invaluable and remain loyal.

Website as Air Force One
Finally you could go for a complete online business, offering secure banking services, or a web based application. Not for the layman.

If you have any comments about this article or would like any further advice, you can email us at services@simplewebsitedesigns.co.uk.