About ten years ago every company needed a website. They would need to make sure that they had a way of people being able to find them online. The website would be a way that they could appear in search engines and people could find out their contact details, more about what they do and possibly buy products online too. However, these days this might not be so necessary for all companies and reasons for this are listed below.
Social Media
The biggest recent change to the Internet is the use of social media by individuals and businesses. These days it could be possible for a company to use a social media page ad have no website. Or at least have a website and solely market it via social media. This will depend on the business but it can be a great way to communicate with potential customers. Obviously, you need to know your market well and be aware as to whether they are social media users or not. You also have to be aware of whether they use specific social media sites which you will need to target. Also think about what sort of content you want to share such as videos, photos, text etc and which of the social media platforms will be most appropriate for this.
It is important to understand that social media is best updated regularly. Some people check it a lot and you will have the opportunity to post as often as you wish so that they can get a reminder of something you are doing, thinking or selling. You can also shares posts from others, which could be useful if it is relevant to your business. Of course, ideally you want people to share your posts. This means that you need to make sure that they get as much exposure as possible and that they have motivation for sharing. This could be because you are highlighting a good deal, new product, something funny or something else which people like. Not every post will be shared but if you can get likes and shares then you are more likely to get even more exposure on social media.
Directory Pages
Some businesses do not need lots of information to be put out about who they are or what they do but just need customers to be able to contact them. This includes small businesses or individuals who provide a service such as emergency plumbing or roofing. Although some people will want to see examples of their work or read customer testimonials, many will prefer to invite someone to come to their home and give them a quote for the job and then find out more about them face to face. There are many free directories online as well as paid ones where listings like this can be found.
Some people may feel a website is key for any business but if you are small, cannot afford a web designer, do not have the time to deal with it yourself and have very little to show customers, then it could be a waste of time. It is worth remembering that a website is only useful if customers see it and so you would have to work on marketing as well as design and this could be time-consuming and costly.
Word of Mouth
One of the best ways to pick up customers is by word of mouth. If someone you trust makes a recommendation, then research has shown, you are much more likely to take that on board and act on it, then you form anything else. So you could look at a website lots of times but not buy anything until someone tells you that it is worth doing. Sometimes it can be a much better use of your time to work on providing good customer service than worrying about a website. Then you will get recommendations and people are also more likely to want to buy from you again.
It is difficult with word of mouth as people cannot be forced to talk about you. In some cases, it can be that you do not do things right to start with but do an excellent job of sorting it out and people will discuss that more than if you just do an outstanding job to start with. However, if you do a really poor job, they will also talk about you but in a negative sense. Therefore you need to make sure that you get things just right.
