Benefits of Having a Website for Small Business Owners

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the economy, but as of 2022, the number of small businesses in the U.S. is on the rise, surpassing 33 million. These numbers will only grow in the future. You can imagine the competition. That is why in today's digital world, the first necessity for all types of businesses is the ability to attract potential customers in all available ways. One of these ways is having a website.

Websites have a long history, from the early days of the Internet to the present day. In the early days of the Internet, websites were mostly text-based with very limited graphics or design elements.

The first website was created on August 6, 1991, by British programmer Tim Berners-Lee. On April 30, 1993, the first web page was created and the World Wide Web (WWW) went live in the world. The website was an explanation of what the WWW is, how to own a website and the legal aspects of it. It also contained various links to other websites, most of which related to CERN - the European Organization for Nuclear Research. And although the world's first website was lost, CERN employees were able to restore its data and appearance, which you can find at the link here. The history of the creation of the WWW is here. By the beginning of 1992, there were only 10 websites in the world. Over time, their number grew, and in 1994 there were more than 3,000 of them.

With the development of the Internet and web technologies, websites began to contain more graphics and interactive elements. Today's websites are often highly interactive, with multimedia content and a wide range of design options. Websites have also become more sophisticated with powerful content management systems, database solutions, and other advanced features.

As of 2022, only 76% of small businesses have their own website. 24% of them use this amazing tool to promote their business online only as a showcase for their products and services. 17% created a website for the opportunity to sell, 17% to increase brand trust and 14% want to be found on search pages.

Despite the fact that we live in an increasingly digital age, almost 1 in 3 small businesses still do not have a website. This can be explained. Since the beginning of the pandemic, many owners have created pages on social networks such as Facebook and Instagram to develop their businesses. It is also a useful tool for increasing customers, as they say, it should be. But is there a possibility of full-fledged development only thanks to them? This is a good question and I will try to answer it.

Attracting customers using social networks is effective, but has limited power. Manual promotion of pages on the network takes a lot of time, and even using advertising services provided by social platforms, in addition, requires additional funds. Websites are also not free, but for example, using it as a showcase generally requires fewer resources than promoting a page on any platform. But most likely, there will be no links to social networks on the first pages of the search results, if it applies to the search for a local business. In most results, it is the website itself.

So, when searching on the platforms, the problem is solved, but then you know that thousands of external searches are bypassing your business every second.

I already wrote about this above. For many potential customers, it's important to check out a business's website, look at reviews, and start the process of building personal trust in your brand. Learn about your company and product or service (by the way, this is the first stage of the sales funnel) At that time, you can create a page on a social network for free without much effort, and do it an infinite number of times, limiting yourself only to access to new mailboxes and phone numbers. It is important to note that more than 70% of users search for a website before visiting a physical location of a business.

The website removes restrictions on the use of commercial tools, allowing you to customize the process of purchasing or ordering artists. Also makes it easy to set up payment and shipping features. It also increases the convenience factor for customers, which in turn can lead to increased sales.

It's probably no secret that blogging encourages search engines to rank your website better while updating social media posts doesn't make your brand stand out from the crowd without using additional resources.

Using a competent local SEO business intelligence strategy will help make the website visible in local business searches. Also, the use of relevant keywords increases search rankings.

Encourage customers to provide their data. For example, a discount when providing an electronic address, or a phone to download a presentation with services. This will later allow you to collect your customers' emails and contacts. Although e-mail or SMS looks like something that is not very relevant at the moment. But of the more than 4 billion people who use email, more than 20% open it to read the content. 95% of SMS messages are opened and read after delivery. And I think that I will not announce anything new when I say that the percentage of people who watched ads on social networks is much lower. For example, the average result of Instagram reach is 13.5% in July 2022. These are statistics of regular, non-advertising content according to Socialsnsider data.

When planning future marketing campaigns, you can use the data collected on your website. Namely, the number of visitors, organic conversions, time spent on pages, number of rejections, and much more to create a clear portrait of your client.

Also, while writing this article, the statistics of the growing industries for attracting traffic to the website from Semrush caught my eye. Among the industries that showed the greatest traffic growth from 2017 to 2022, I would like to single out the following: Food and beverages - 1896%, Entertainment - 1657%, Insurance - 1108%, and Restaurants - 1064%. At the same time, the percentage of the same industries according to Facebook data is as follows: Food and drinks - 205%, Entertainment - 48%, Insurance - 138%, and Restaurants - 212%.

With all of the above in mind, I'm not saying that small business owners who don't have a website should leave social media and stop promoting on popular platforms. Creating a website or page on a social media platform for your business can be an effective way to reach more potential customers. A competent marketing strategy includes both tools. The general needs of the present imply a presence on all possible online resources. Social networks help to attract users to the website as well, and from it, you can get additional experience in attracting your Instagram page. Use multiple platforms – for example, create a website as your main hub and launch social media campaigns to increase brand awareness and drive traffic to your website.

Contact HQWS and we will help you develop a website for your business and create a competent marketing strategy to promote your brand.