Christmas 2009 will go down in history as the year the small businesses sector realised they needed to get online. Consumer behaviour appeared to change forever as people preferred to go online to do their Christmas shopping. Consequently high street retailers struggled like never before, while their online counterparts enjoyed record sales. Something had to change and the government launched a scheme to help small businesses develop an online presence. However, getting a website is only the first step to realising your businesses potential online.
As with all marketing activity, your website must have a clear objective; do you plan to sell directly from it, do you want it to drive footfall offline or will it act merely as a brand platform? It is vital you define your objectives from the beginning, only then can you begin to measure its success.
One of the main reasons why online advertising has overtaken all forms of traditional advertising, from television and radio to print media, is due to the transparency it offers. The same applies if you are running your own website. You can track all activity on your website and –crucially – gain an understanding of your customers and the way they interact with your brand.
Matthew Wright, owner of jewellery business Smith & Sons comments; “Our business was badly hit by the recession and we knew we had to adopt our model. So we built a website and have been completely overwhelmed by the value it has added to our business.”
Where can you find details of the government scheme to help small businesses develop an online presence as mentioned above.
Hi Martyn,
Many thanks for your comment.
The scheme is called ‘Getting British Business Online’.
Hope that helps and let us know how you get on.
Kind regards,
The Companies Made Simple Team
Of course, what a great site and informative posts, I will add backlink – bookmark this site? Regards, Reader.
Lots of fantasticinformation and inspiration.
I had a look at the ‘Getting British Business Online’ site and there are some good things about the scheme, but unfortunately a lot of bad things. First of all the good things:- The site itself provides a wealth of information and links with regards to creating and using websites. If you are thinking of starting up a website, its definitely worth a look.
Now the bad things:- The basic claims of the offer are true, you do get free webspace and a domain name, but this does not include any email accounts e.g fred@yourdomainname unless you are willing to pay £33 per mail address. As you can imagine with a few employees this soon adds up to a tidy sum. The other problem is the site building tools are very limited to allow you to create anything more than something basic.
Just to finish off my previous comments, if you do want a website the better options are:-
1) If you feel confident to use a site building tool (if you can use MS Office at any level, thats enough), low cost hosting is available that includes unlimited space and email accounts plus a good site building tool for £60/yr.
2) If you are not sure, there are website developers that will get you online for £99 for a single page and £49 for subsequent pages.
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