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Get a Website!, Register Your Domain!: To Website or Not to Website?
If you're fairly new to the Internet scene, you may just be a bit overhelmed with family members, friends, collegues, and advertisements urging you to get your own website for your business. Typically, this is good advice for businesses. However, for most small local businesses, running your own website may not be the best idea. Here's why:
Websites Take Time to Build. Whether you're buying your own WYSIWYG software to design the site yourself or you're hiring a skilled web designer, it will take time to decide on a good domain name, plan the site, create it, and then get it running online.
Websites Cost Money. There are a few basic costs:
- Domain name registration fee
- Web design fee
- Monthly web hosting fee
- Applicable setup fees
Plus, because a website needs to be "findable" in order to be beneficial for your business, you will have to, at minimum, invest in additional services such as:
- Search engine optimization fee
- Web maintenance fees
- Online and offline advertising for your website
Websites Take Time to Maintain and Alter. Your website will need at least some occasional modifications to keep it current. Most busy business owners simply don't have this kind of time.
Your Business is Local. Unless you are planning to actually sell and ship products worldwide via your website, you probably don't need to have your own website for your local business. Most local businesses simply need local exposure and an online presence.
The Bottom Line
If you already have an existing website, we sincerely hope you will have great success with it. However, if you have a local business, and you are looking for a way to build local exposure and have your business's details easily found online by your target customers in your area, local online directories that focus on retail shops, restaurants, and services may be the key.
The author is one of the original co-founders of The Socal411 Directory website, the popular lifestyle directory in Southern California. He is a promoter of small business in the Los Angeles and Orange County area, and often speaks on topics such as the importance of advertising locally on the Internet to get ahead of your local competition. For more information see, How to Promote Your Southern California Business Using the Internet.
Guidelines for Web Page Optimization
Below, I have listed 8 simple steps that you can take to optimize your web pages. By following these, you will improve your chances of increasing your rankings:
Your Biggest Mistake When You Create a Website?
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Making The Business Case For Web Standards
Through the explosive growth of the Web, companies have realized the benefit of building a strong online presence. By publishing a website to the Internet, companies are able to build their brand, market their products, support existing customers, release publicity pieces, and even take orders. Lost in the feverish pace of growth however, has been an eye on the effect that their current web-building practices have on the bottom line and the future of their online presence. Not only does the website content itself have an impact on the company's income but so does the way the site itself is created.
Make Your Own Website - General Website Design Tips
Wow, we`ve already taken a domain and chosen a web host. Great job ! Now it`s time for something special: making your own website. You could`ve completed this step before, but at the time you`d had finished it, the domain name could`ve been taken. We don`t want any complications right ?
Using Mini Websites - Powerful Way to Direct Marketing
Mini Websites are the most powerful and cost effective solution to promote and market your brand. Normally people go for a large site which have 100's of pages of selling nos. products, which confuse visitor and most of the pages remains unviewed by the visitor. Generally people do the search in search engines on specific topic and like to get the specific results only. The normal web surfer spends very little time on sites and does not go beyond 3 to 5 clicks on a site. If the visitor landed at your site and does not found what he was looking for in first two clicks he will automatically switch to another site which he found more relevant. I always advocate the concept of direct marketing as it provide user more time to do research on specific product.
Earning From Your Website
Before you start building your site, ask yourself "WHY?". Why did you decide to build your own web site. How are you going to earn money? Creating simple homepage will not get you any money at all nor you receive lots of visitors. Your website must be the part of your business. It also must be the part of your business plan.
So You Want To Have A Website
So you want to have a website. You have gone on to the internet and surfed but you have no idea what developing a website involves.
The Dos and Donts of Launching a Small Business Website
Launching a new small business website is often a long and painstaking process. And for most small businesses, the endeavor rarely ends in success. The terrain is mapped with freelancers, firms, and consultants that don't offer the same services and most certainly don't charge the same prices. Projects are often riddled with unclear expectations, missed deadlines, and ridiculous hourly rates. What's worse is that many developers have the audacity to ask for even more money halfway through the project. Even after all of the hard work is complete, most companies don't even see a return on investment.
Lead Generation How to -- 10 Tips On Generating More Internet Sales Leads
Many millions of dollars are being wasted on promoting and sending traffic to ineffective lead generation websites. Here are my top 10 tips to make your site generate more leads for you and your company.
Autoresponders Make You Look Like A Pro
People like to get immediate responses to requests. Autoresponders are great for letting people know you are on the job and that their requests are being taken care of. These are much better than thank you pages.
Seven Daft Things Not To Do To Your Website
1. Splash pages
Building eCommerce Websites that Work - Part 2
Succeeding with an eCommerce website is a dream for many these days. It may seem nearly impossible at times, but it can be done. This series covers some of the basic success factors - things you must consider in creating, implementing, managing and developing a quality eCommerce web site. There are many ways to do business on the internet - and, not surprisingly, a lot of ways to both make and lose money. Mainly, I'm focusing on eCommerce sites intended to sell products of various kinds. Not every factor is going to apply to every site, but since a major failing of many internet entrepreneurs is the lack of multiple income streams, you'd do well to carefully consider all factors and apply them as needed in developing alternate revenue streams.
Websites for Writers ? Why You Need One and How to Get Started Today
It may seem like the publishing industry's equivalent of Beanie Baby madness- everyone is talking about writer's websites. Freelancers and authors everywhere are jumping on the bandwagon, publishing sites to promote themselves and their work. This craze leaves many writers wondering if it's just a fad or if it's really worth the expense and effort. While it may seem like an overwhelming or frivolous endeavor, there are some solid business reasons why you should consider setting up your own website.
Maximizing ROI via Web Site Traffic Analysis
We are clearly well past the innocent "golden age" of the Internet ? Darwinian economics have become the order of the day today. Any company worth their salt must maintain a web site as an information resource and/or to generate incremental ecommerce revenue. Qualified traffic is the name of the game, as it's the oxygen that keeps a good ecommerce web site thriving. Consequently, it's very important to have an understanding of your web site traffic or visitor activity; i.e. baseline information that includes the number of visitors during specific time periods, originating location (domain), where the visitors went on a site and how long they stayed on specific sections or pages of a web site. The de facto industry standard traffic analysis tool application is Web Trends, manufactured/supported by netiQ, Inc., which we will focus on in this article.
Your Website Reflects Your Business
Some left shoes are in isle 5, while the right shoes are in isle 3. Shoe hills are in random places. You can barely walk through the store without stumbling over a shoe.
50 Ways To Use Your Website
A website is the most versatile and cost-effective marketing tool on the market. It is also an investment. After all, you are building a shopfront. In a nutshell, you can use your website to: Enhance your professional image 1. Look professional and as BIG as large corporations. 2. Pre-sell yourself to new clients even before you meet them. 3. Supply a meaningful and intuitive address related to your type of service. It is easier to remember www.marketingcues.com rather than a long ISP email address such as www.yourInternetServiceProvidername.com/~marketingcues. 4. Provide a permanent address with up-to-date contact details and opening hours. You can change Internet Service Provider or move physical premises and your customers will always find you and your marketing efforts are not lost.
Are You Being Scammed By Your Web Design Company?
This is a growing concern amongst many business owners. Does your web design company own you? This may be possible if you've allowed them to host your web site for you and also register your domain name for your company.
4 Marketing Tips for Resourceful Webmasters!
The internet is a sea of knowledge. Getting your information to 'float' by the right audience can be like finding that one special grain of sand on the seashore. Paying big bucks for marketing can strain your already limited budget. What is a webmaster to do? Let's discuss four valuable and proven ways to market your site without breaking the bank.
Art, Artists and the Web: Part 3--What to Put on an Artist?s Website
What to put your the website if you are an artist.
Web accessibility for screen magnifier users
The needs of screen magnifier users are overlooked when implementing web accessibility on to a website. Screen magnifiers are used by partially sighted web users to increase the size of on-screen elements. Some users will magnify the screen so that only three to four words are able to appear on the screen at any one time. You can try using a screen magnifier yourself by downloading the Zoomtext screen magnifier from http://www.aisquared.com/Products/ZoomText8_mag/FreeTrial/Z8FreeTrial.htm for a free 30 day trial.