There are many benefits of having an institutional website for your business. If you are part of the statistic of businesses that don’t have a domain on the internet, it’s time to reconsider some points.
What is your biggest challenge today?
- Dealing with the number of customers I already have
- Attract new customers
- Attract customers with better purchasing potential
If your answer was any of the 3, your business needs a website.
A website is the most cost-effective tool for any business when it comes to marketing.
If you want to sell, you need to make life easier for your customers. And that’s exactly what a website does.
When someone needs something, the first thing they do is usually Google it.
Google has about 5.6 billion searches a day.
font: kenshoo
The companies that appear in the result are those that will meet your needs, from here you just need to look for the opening hours, contact details, description of the services and everything the person needs to make a purchase decision.
All your company information will be gathered in one place, and I’m not just talking about contact details or address, I’m talking about a complete description of your products and services.
site: glass sp (portfolio)
All this is where? On your website.
Imagine how many daily calls you would have to make to reach this highly qualified customer for your company, how much would that cost?
Also, how many times have you given up on buying something because you can’t easily find contact or company information?
There are thousands of benefits to having a website, but we are going to name a few here so you can make this investment in the best possible way!
- Reach potential customers 24/7
- Bring authority to your brand
- You can compete with big brands
- There are thousands of people looking for your services online.
- You can find more customers with ads
- Has the best return on marketing investment
- Answer your customers’ questions
- Increase your brand’s reach
- bring social proof
- All of your biggest competitors have a website
REACH POSSIBLE CUSTOMERS 24/7
One of the biggest benefits of having a website is being able to be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It’s as if your business never closed, as if you always had an employee there, ready to meet people looking for your services and write down all their data so you can return a call or send an email later.
Accessing the internet to look for a solution is the first attitude we take, it is already automatic and happens at the most unlikely times.
Imagine that you are at your house at night and you have decided to change your life the next day. At the time, the idea came: tomorrow I’m going to wake up early and go to the gym.
What do you do? Probably a Google search.
The gym that has its updated information on the internet will definitely be your first option to start exercising.
Even if you don’t have a website yet, you must have at least one entry on Google my business ! This form makes it possible to appear on google even without having a website, which helps a lot for companies that are starting out.
You will still need a website to bring authority and show your services, but this step will definitely help you increase your company’s revenue and lose the fear of going to the internet.
BRING AUTHORITY TO YOUR BRAND
A brand without a website is an unknown brand. If someone is going to research your company, it’s important that they get to know what your strengths and weaknesses are.
When the site is yours, you control the narrative.
Your company may have several certifications, awards, testimonials and several other important points that will help your customer to trust you and your product. What’s the point if none of this is available for them to see?
A well-designed website can compete head-on with big brands. Being online, it is possible to position yourself and show the quality of your products, your history and above all: how you can solve your customer’s problem.
All of these are extremely important in the customer discovery process.
Let’s go to a practical example, looking for lawyers in a neighborhood of São Paulo, I came across two situations.
Lawyer A does not have a website, and therefore only has the Google contact form:
On Google, I was able to find phone number and contact address. So far ok, however, he was the only one of 20 offices that did not have a website.
The second example, in addition to the Google file, had a website with more information:
In addition to being beautiful, the Dias de Souza website had all the services, professionals and contact information I needed to consider hiring.
It is evident the positive impact that a website brings to your brand when it comes to generating authority.
YOU CAN COMPETE WITH BIG BRANDS
Off the internet, a consolidated company can be on the best streets, paying the most expensive rents on the market. A renowned store will probably have a unit of its franchise in a very busy mall, always attracting customers who will buy its new collections.
On the internet, it’s the same. Okay, big brands will have more money to invest in marketing and have privileged positioning, nothing prevents customers from reaching you, especially if you have a specific niche!
You can be a new company and convey confidence with a beautiful design and a website that is easy to navigate.
Your client will be delighted and be sure they found an amazing opportunity. After all, who doesn’t want to know new companies that solve their problem better than the big ones that we’re always conditioned to use?
No matter your field, on the internet you can reach search pages with infinitely smaller investments than in real life and with a guaranteed return. This works because most ads charge per click, that is, it is as if you only pay for the people who enter your store looking for your product.
From this point on, just present the solution and the sale is done.
It is important to have your own website to be able to promote yourself without having to always pay for ads.
B2B companies that use blogs produce 67% more leads than companies that don’t.
Font: Hubspot
THERE ARE THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE LOOKING FOR YOUR SERVICES ONLINE
The title is wrong, there are billions of people! It all depends on where you are focused and what you offer.
There are practical ways to know how much your product is being sought at the moment for the region you want to focus on and, with that, define the best strategy to start selling in that location.
With the free Keyword Planner tool, you can have a forecast of how many people are looking for your service right now. Let’s do a test.
A bike shop in São Paulo, is it worth having a website?
With a brief search on Google Keyword Planner, it was possible to visualize an average of more than a thousand searches just in the city of São Paulo for this product:
Just with keywords like “buy a bike”, “bike price” and others linked to the purchase, we were able to have a forecast of 65 thousand impressions in the search results.
YOU CAN FIND MORE CUSTOMERS WITH ADVERTISEMENTS
There are currently several ad platforms for websites, the most common are Google Ads and Facebook Ads.
Google ads has several types of ads, which can be search network, youtube, display, but that is a subject for another topic.
The focus here is: if you advertise on this channel, your return on investment is guaranteed. That’s because you pay for clicks from people interested in your product or service. These are people who need your solution and your website is there to show you how to solve their problem.
Continuing with our bike shop in São Paulo, I made a small forecast for the next month, investing R$410.
With the same keywords that were used in the previous example, I arrived at the following result:
There are 460 people interested in buying bicycles in the city of São Paulo alone. Sounds like a good deal, doesn’t it?
HAS THE BEST RETURN ON INVESTMENT IN MARKETING
They are investments in clicks interested in buying your products, in your region and who found your website.
Here, we once again highlight the importance of having a well-designed website. As much as you decide to do it yourself, it is important to study some design concepts to ensure a good experience for your user.
The return on investment of a website can only come from organic search and this is unpredictable. A company that made a website for a thousand reais, for example, may have organic visits to the website (visitors who find you in searches without needing you to invest in ads).
The average conversion of clicks into sales using Google Ads is 2.35% according to Wordstream. You can still have amazing ads and a higher rate, as in the example below:
Applying the theory in our example of the bicycle store and considering an average ticket of R$400 (this bicycle is actually quite cheap), we would have a turnover of:
R$4.400
It is more than 10x the investment made initially. Have you seen any other investment that brought these results?
ANSWER YOUR CUSTOMERS QUESTIONS
How many times have you had to answer a phone and answer negatively to some questions such as: do you work on Saturdays?
Or even to find out about shipping, product availability, address, opening hours and job vacancy availability.
A website answers all these questions. Sections like FAQ, description and contact group together all the frequently asked questions and give you much more time to focus on your work.
In fact, FAQs greatly increase the conversion rate. Think from your customers’ perspective:
- They don’t know your company
- Are reluctant to make a purchase
- Need more information before spending money
- Too lazy to send emails (unless you really need to)
Customers will arrive much more prepared to purchase your products or services, as most of the questions have already been answered before they even decide to call you.
It’s as if you have a perfect salesperson who only sends you customers ready to buy.
INCREASE YOUR BRAND’S REACH
In “real life” we are conditioned to serve in our region. Hardly anyone who lives in Rio de Janeiro will know your store in São Paulo.
Speaking only of Brazil, if we are to consider it internationally, this truth becomes much more concrete.
Currently, there are many policies to encourage the export of products to other countries, such as tax exemptions and the clear difference between the dollar and our currency.
You don’t have to limit yourself to selling regionally, with one website you can dominate the world.
Having your online presence, it is possible to communicate with buyers from other cities, states and countries, with an unbelievably higher demand than any location in your store.
It doesn’t matter if you have a clothing store installed in the center of the busiest city in the world, with the internet you can reach many more people.
A great example of someone who invested in this from the beginning is Luiza Trajano, owner of Magazine Luiza. Its growth in relation to other retailers is evident by the simple fact of having invested in the internet.
On December 4, 2015, Magazine Luiza was at its worst moment in history, when it decided to undergo digital transformation.
On December 4, 2015, Magazine Luiza was at its worst moment in history, when it decided to undergo digital transformation.
BRINGS SOCIAL EVIDENCE
A happy customer is more important marketing than any perfect sales copy you can create.
Positive experiences bring more conversion and make the product/service more tangible.
A real photo with an evaluation of your product brings credibility to the brand and makes you want to buy.
Testimonials from happy customers cannot, under any circumstances, be discarded. By using these testimonials on your website, you can show that other people trusted your service and didn’t regret it. Once again, here you control the narrative and can highlight the testimonials that you consider most important for your company.
There are a lot of social proofs you can bring to the site:
Approval from an expert
An industry expert has used your product and written a review
Approval of an influencer
Many brands use influencers to promote their company, a positive experience from one of them can increase your sales.
company credentials
While reviews bring value, credentials bring confidence to your business.
Awards won
Did you receive any awards or honorable mentions? Featured on your website. Everyone wants to find the best company to solve their problem and awards thus highlight their quality.
Which one works best? It’s important to test and get to know your audience. Data from hubspot shows interesting numbers based on user behavior:
- 88% of consumers trust user reviews as much as personal recommendations.
- Placing business customer logos on a company website can increase conversions by up to 400%, according to Voices.com.
- Influencer marketing has long been considered the fastest growing consumer acquisition channel.
- The average consumer reads 10 online reviews before making a purchase decision.
- 57% of consumers will only buy or use a service if it has at least a 4-star rating.
- For 50% of all consumers, the next step after reading a positive review about a business is visiting their website.
ALL OF YOUR BIGGEST COMPETITORS HAVE A WEBSITE
Let’s face it: you’re being ripped off when you don’t have a website.
The most common thought is that maybe it’s not the time, it’s better to wait to grow with the company before doing something, etc.
The problem is that your biggest competitors already have a website. And I’m not talking about those big companies that serve as a reference, I’m talking about companies that compete directly with you, that have a close income.
Today they may even be at the same level as you, but in the future they will have exponential growth that will be difficult to achieve.
The internet is full of these successful cases, several entrepreneurs who have achieved their success on the internet and are getting richer and richer.
Want to take a test? Go to Google Maps right now and enter your service in your region. If you live in São Paulo and have a law firm, enter this in the search.
In a quick search, I noticed that the vast majority of the recommendations that Google gave me on the site, offer a site with more information. Make no mistake if your company appears in their search, Google loves you as a user and will try to please you.
Ask a friend to do the same research and be surprised.
CONCLUSION
A website, unlike a logo, can change over time. So even if you can’t have multiple product pages right now, make an institutional, one-page or two-page website.
The whole theory is useless if the practice is not well applied. Website builders like Wix, for example, bring all the ease of “drag and drop”.
That’s nice? Certainly! But without all the knowledge beyond what’s covered in this article, you won’t be able to make a website that converts your visitors into customers.
