4. Jump Higher Than Your Competitor

There’s nothing wrong with checking out what your competitor has online and improving upon it. If your competitor doesn’t have a website, you’ve certainly got the upper hand. If they have a bad one, you can take advantage of that weakness and produce one that better serves your customers. Quite often, unbeknownst to businesses, a customer can be won or lost because of a website.

5. Improve Customer Service

By having a website, you can offer your services 24 hours a day, seven days a week to your customers. A website provides your business the ability to be eternally available for frequently asked questions (your website has FAQ’s, doesn’t it?), to provide manuals or specifications, directions to your business, hours, anything any customer would ever need to know! Utilizing this ability to effectively reach your customers, showing them you care about what they need to know, will bring them running with their wallets.

6. Eternal Salesman, at Your Service

A website offers the ability to sell your services and products to clients without putting on a suit. Testimonials from previous, pleased customers, well written copy that conveys your services and how you meet the needs of customers, not to mention the ability to sell your services online – all of these things contribute to making money while you sleep!

7. Gather Information about Your Customers

Paying attention to things like your website statistics, offering online surveys to gauge customer opinion, and providing a subscription “opt-in” newsletter help you keep your customers’ needs first in your mind. And with all your interest in their needs, they’ll be elated you’re so attentive! A website is an ideal way to keep tabs on your customers, and knowing what your customers want means you can do better business.

8. Your Business Website = Accessible

Think of how much time and effort (and money!) you spend keeping your customers and clients and investors informed. Now think how easy it would be to let people know about your latest press release by just emailing them the web address. Having a website means that all the information you have, sales sheets, PR, downloads, and company forms, can be easily accessed via your website – and that sure cuts down on printing costs! Not to mention that the setup of an inner-company intranet can help your business workings become more streamlined. Your business website puts your business within the reach of everyone who needs it.

9. The Moral of the Puffer Fish

Having a website makes your business look bigger. Having a website can help you stretch your geography - it is the World Wide Web, after all. Having a client order supplies from 2,000 miles away means that your local shop with online ordering now has a national base! It’s okay that you’re a small fish in a big ocean; you can be the small fish with the extensive customer base.

10. Spending Wisely Helps a Business Grow

Let’s say you have a Christmas Sale newspaper ad going out. You plan on spending $1000 on a 2” ad that may or may not reach your target market. Now, let’s say you spend half of that putting together a good email newsletter that goes out to your current and returning customers, right to their inbox in front of their nose. Not only does a website save on printing costs, but since you’ve successfully corralled your customers into a contactable base, you can advertise directly to them! With such an easily updatable source of information, you’re continually able to reach your customers and clients with the most up to date content about your business. Having a website keeps your costs in marketing and advertising lower, saving you money and bringing you more.

11. Networking

A lot of what passes for business is simply nothing more than making connections with other people. Every smart businessperson knows, it's not what you know; it's who you know. Passing out your business card is part of every good meeting and there are many people out there who can tell more than one story of how a chance meeting turned into a big deal. Well, what if you could pass out your business card to 10, 20 or 30 million potential clients and partners, saying this is what I do and if you are ever in need of my services, this is how you can reach me. You can, 24 hours a day, inexpensively and simply, on the WWW.

12. Make Business Information Available

What is basic business information? Think of the Yellow Pages ad. What are your hours? What do you do? How can someone contact you? What methods of payment do you take? Where are you located? Now think of a Yellow Pages ad where you have instant communication. What is today's special? Today's interest rate? Next week's parking lot sale information? If you could keep your customer informed of every reason why they should do business with you, don't you think you could do more business? You can on the WWW.

13. Answer Frequently Asked questions

Whoever answers the phones in your organization can tell you, their time is usually spent answering the same questions over and over again. These are the questions customers and potential customers want to know the answer to before they deal with you. Post them on a WWW page and you will have removed another barrier to doing business with you and freed up some time for that harried receptionist.

14. Open International Markets

You may not be able to make sense of the mail, phone and regulation systems in all your potential international markets, but with a Web page, you can open up a dialogue with international markets as easily as with the company across the street. As a matter-of-fact, before you go onto the Web, you should decide how you want to handle the international business that will come your way, because your postings are certain to bring international opportunities your way, whether it is part of your plan or not. Another added benefit, if your company has offices overseas, they can access the home offices information for the price of a local phone call.

15. Create a 24-Hour Service

If you've ever remembered too late or too early to call the opposite coast, you know the hassle. We're not all on the same schedule. Business is worldwide but your office hours aren't. Trying to reach Asia or Europe is even more frustrating. But Web pages serve the client, customer and partner 24 hours a day, seven days a week. No overtime either. It can customize information to match needs and collect important information that will put you ahead of the competition, even before they get into the office.