Click on the links below to discover how to really make your website worthwhile!
What's the big secret then?
A few years ago, when a customer wanted to find a business, any business, whatever they were looking for, they would pick up the Yellow Pages and simply look in the relevant classification. Behold; they would then find lots of numbers they could call to get their job done, or their product sourced. Lots of companies spent huge amounts of money on advertising space hoping to seduce the prospective customer into calling them.
Nowadays it's all changed. Did you know that 76% of people in the UK now do a quick Internet search for whatever they are looking for before they even think of picking up that famous book? Well it's true, they do. Strangely though only 21% of UK busiinesses have any kind of web presence! Isn't that amazing? 76% of all customers being served by only 21% of all businesses! Does that suggest something to you? Is there an untapped opportunity for your business there somewhere?
"OK" I hear you say. "I have signed up to this site and am creating a website that contains my contact details, so job done; isn't it? My business is now on the web so I am part of that 21%, customers can find me right?" Well, yes and no, actually, mainly no! Creating a website is clearly the first step, without that nothing can happen, but as always there is a bit more to it than that.
There are two aspects that you should consider. Firstly you need to arrange for your website to be presented to the customers when they search for your type of business and secondly, when they do look at your website you need to present a polished and professional image and include a personal touch, hence the picture on your page and the 'About Us" sections. If you can take care of both of these aspects then your website will immediately become a very powerful sales tool. The second part; presenting a good image takes a bit of time and thought. Choose the right pictures for your gallery, see our tips for making your site effective and you will easily achieve what's needed.
But how to tackle the first part? Like I said; you need your site to be presented to people that search for your type of business. It's not enough to just publish your site and forget it. If you do that it's like making an impressive full page advert for the Yellow Pages and then not actually putting it in the book! It looks good, but not many people are ever likely to see it!
When people search the Internet for something they obviously use a search engine. There are many of them, Google, Yahoo, Ask and so on. What many people don't realise is how they actually work, I don't mean how to use them, rather, how they rank different sites and what criterion they use when they choose which sites will appear on that all important first page.
Doubtless these search engines will find your site over time. They will categorise it and it will be in their databases, but it is unlikely that it will appear on page one of a search. This is because of the way that they rank sites. It can be done, and some companies, mainly the really big ones, spend stunning sums of money making sure they appear on page one. Luckily for us smaller fishes there is another way to get to page one.