As any small businessman worth his salt knows, being successful depends on two factors: hard work, and … commonsense. The secret of winning is being just that little bit better than your competitors – that’s all !
Web commonsense is that you take the time to understand what a website can bring to your business, and treat it as a proper marketing tool. In my experience about 90% of SMEs expect very little, and as a result give very little. Let’s see how close I get to your scenario. A business which is turning over say £250,000 per year might be making £20,000 to £30,000 net profit, so they can’t afford to spend to much on marketing, say £5000. That money might be divided as follows:
£4000 traditional advertising
£ 500 yellow pages
£ 300 miscellaneous
£ 200 website
I’m excluding the initial website build of course, which might cost anything from £500 to £2000.
Forward looking businesses need to be using more of their marketing budget for website promotion. Most SMEs consider advertising an evil necessity that seldom pays for itself, but it’s worth remembering an advert is a one-off whereas a website is for ever !
… the more belief, the more you will succeed. Interestingly, I have two client websites that offer exatlly the same service. One site has been neglected and slipped from 3rd in the Google rankings to the bottom of the second page. The other website is constantly seeking ways to improve, the result being number two in the Google rankings for exactly the same phrase.
