Why Do I Need A Website?
Have you ever Googled your company name before? Were you able to find information about your company? If you found information about your company, was the information correct? Not having control of what people are seeing about your company online can be catastrophic. If you don’t control the information on the sites that come up first in the search engines, people searching for you could be given incorrect telephone numbers, bad information about the products or services you provide or worse. Having your own website allows you to control what people see about your company to ensure that they receive the correct information. The goal is to have your website be the first site people see when they put your company name into a search engine.
Networking and advertising are great ways for you to get business. But when people research your company, how do they do it? They go online and Google your name or the company’s name. If they cannot find your website, you have just lost credibility and most likely the job. Here is an example of networking gone wrong: Let’s say your sister-in-law tells her friend that you own a home inspection business and that she should call you to do the home inspection on the house she is looking to purchase. Some time passes and the friend now needs to have a home inspection. All she remembers from your sister-in-law is your name and that you do home inspections. So she goes to Google and types in ‘Larry Smith Home Inspections’ and nothing comes up other than your competitors. Now she wonders if you are still in business, she doesn’t know your phone number, and worst of all she just called one your competitor.
Websites are the perfect solution to reinforce your networking and advertising activities. Websites are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week and provide you with a cost efficient way to let people know about your products and services. Everyone is searching online for the right company for the job. Think about it, what happens at trade shows? People walk around and pickup business cards from companies that all sell essentially the same products or services. They take the cards home and have to decide which ones to call. They start by researching the companies on-line. If your card was one that they picked up but you are not online and four of the other companies are, do you think you’re getting a phone call from that potential customer? Unfortunately not.