We often hear, “I had a website built and it did nothing for us. We didn’t even recoup the cost of the build and so we just let it expire and die”. Does that sound like your story? Is that what you’re afraid of when it comes to making the step to an online presence? 
The first question we usually ask is, “What did you do to use it? How did you drive customers to it and use it to convert sales?” That’s usually met with blank looks or some mention of the web builder put them in some directories or made some linking scheme. Essentially, they let it expire and die from the moment it went live, long before they stopped paying the hosting bill.

The most important thing you need to understand about the web and building a presence here is that it’s a sales and marketing tool. No different than a brochure or tradeshow booth, signage on your building/vehicles or any other form of advertising. With the same rules as those other forms of marketing, if you leave that brochure in its box or those ad wrapped vehicles in the garage, you would expect them to do nothing. Online is exactly the same. If you spend no effort or time into making it visible in as many places as possible, putting it in front of people, you should expect no return.

If it’s not an extension of your marketing and sales plan and used as such, you shouldn’t be wishing for any kind of sales result. That means a unified, consistent theme to not only the way it sounds , looks and functions on its own, but everything else that your business sells and every way your business sells.

It won’t matter how cool it looks or the nifty cutting edge tech it has if no one ever uses it!

If you don’t approach it as such, it’s never going to deliver anything to you.

The days of simply having a page and thousands finding you seemingly randomly are over. There are hundreds of millions, if not billions of sites and pages out there now, all competing for eyeballs. What do you think the chances are of yours becoming the magical one that flourishes with no time promoting it?

The good news is, it doesn’t take a lot of time or energy to make modest gains in your visibility online. But like exercise, it has to become a regular habit, a continuing and deliberate plan of spreading the word where people congregate and keeping your message fresh and alive.

When you stop talking about your business, so will everyone else.

We’re often surprised that a web address doesn’t even make it to the voicemail message, front door of the business or even the business card. It’s not on invoices or proposal headings, stationary or envelopes.

Frankly, that’s crazy.Those, and many, many more, are some of the very minor or no cost ways of promoting your site through your regular daily activity…offline. Online, from classifieds, forums, blogs, social media, articles, etc., there is a dizzying array of free or low cost ways to make your business visible to potential clients, fans or customers. Add to that low cost, targeted marketing and you can really use the web in a way that was never possible (for the $ and timeframe) from traditional media for reaching new clientele. No printing or shipping costs, the ability to smooth or shift your message in an instant, to add motion and sound to augment or replace traditional printed materials and being available to billions of people 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

The web has a lot to offer to those that put in a little effort.

So, what will it be for you this year? Will you take advantage of the power of the web and get into the game or will you prefer to remain invisible to your potential clients, fans and customers?

DDA Media builds web and social media solutions, along with traditional sales and marketing pieces, for small business that are driven by marketing and sales efforts first. If there isn’t a plan to make it act like a valuable extension of your business instead of a free floating, confusing mess, we won’t build it.

Join us on Facebook for continuing help in powering your business online and off. Let us help you extend and understand the tools you have available to you and how to use them wisely and effectively!