|
What Will a Website
Do For Your Business
A Website will not increase
your sales. This is probably THE most common
misconception of Websites (excluding
e-commerce/transactional Websites). A
Website will help "facilitate" sales, but it
will not make the sale for you. The goal of
any Website (Non e-commerce) is to get the
prospective customer to take action and
contact you. It is up to
you to close the sale, but if your Website
is properly designed, written and supported,
it will make your sales and marketing
efforts more efficient and effective.
A Website is a more
comprehensive form of marketing
communications. That is to say, it can
communicate more detailed information than other
forms of advertising. If this information is
provided in a strategic, well written
fashion it can help increase your chances of
turning a prospect into a customer. Consider
each customer as if they were moving through
a pipeline. A person who initially contacts
you is at the beginning of that pipeline,
and that customer will move through various
stages until becoming a customer.
A Website can help your
business ONLY if it is incorporated into a
solid advertising plan. Your Website will
make your overall advertising more effective
by providing greater information to your
prospect with which to make a decision.
Since your clients who visit your Website
will be more educated, they will be more
advanced through that sales pipeline than
someone who is calling merely to gather
information.
|
It is important to pause here
and consider what would compel a prospective
customer to call you versus your competitor.
This is your STRATEGY. What your Website,
and for that matter your other marketing
says will either turn a prospect into a
customer, or not. I don't care how
good-looking your Website is, if it lacks
Strategy you will lose to your competitor.
Most basically, Strategy is understanding
why your customers who have done business
with you; it is taking success and repeating
it.
|
Educated customers are
good customers because they are more
likely to make a decision sooner versus
a customer who is still gathering
information. As a result, you spend less
time chasing leads, and more time
closing serious customers.
Your Website is also a
create source of referrals. Ask an
experience business person and they will
tell you that referrals are often a
majority of their business. It is
generally easier to pass along a Website
than it is a phone number. Have you ever
heard someone say, "I can't remember the
number, but go to XYZ.com and check it
out." (Of course this depends on having
a solid domain name. Ask me for help on
this one before you commit to anything.
There's a dozen ways to have a bad
domain name.)
<<
Back
|
