How to take your small business online
I am very happy you reading the guide that will change your business life for good. The need to take your business online can never be overemphasized.
These days the customers spend their time online reading, watching, researching and even having fun like playing online games and so on. They also do most of their buying online.
When I say you should take your business online I don’t mean that you should just create a Facebook page or any page on the social Medias out there. While having the social media pages is a great thing to do, they are not good enough for you have your presence felt on the online ecosystem.
Building your platform on other people’s platform is very risky to your business. What if Facebook, twitter or Instagram bans your page? Do you have to start from the ground up?
It is imperative to know that you don’t own the platforms on which you are trying to build your business on. There will be limitations in what you want to do. You will have to operate on what you are given. You have no freedom to bring something unique on board.
One of the greatest disadvantages is that the people on whose platform you are building your business might demand a particular percentage on every sale which will leave you with less profit compared to someone who is not using such platform.
So what does one need to take his business online?
What you need to take your business online
1. Domain Name
Your domain name is the address of your business online. A custom domain name is the name or address customers will use to locate your business.
2. A website
After getting a custom domain name or address, it will be time to build your online store which is a website. A website is where your story is told, display products and/or services. You build trust and expand your circle with your online store.
3. Get social
After you have established your own store you can come to where customers spend their time online more and start building a community online.
You can use Facebook, twitter, pinterest, YouTube, instagram and LinkedIn to promote your business to potential customers. Always seek to build good relationship with your customers.
4. Branded Email
A branded email is a cheap and fast way to communicate with your customers.
Why you should take your business online
The benefits of taking your business online are really great and you should always consider that when lunching a new business.
1. Gain Trust
Taking your business online or having a website for it helps you gain credibility from customers. Gaining credibility means gaining trust. Just imagine how your business will thrive when customers trust you.
Having a website will help you gain more opportunity to make customers trust you more when people write good reviews about your business and they read it.
2. You reach more customers
The world has been a global village with the advent of the internet and devices to use it.
By taking your business online you can reach more both far and close in less time than when you are not online.
3. Beating the competition
Majority of your competitors probably are online. If you don’t take your business online it is likely that someone searching for your product can end up landing on your competitors’ page.
But having an online presence too can help you get more customers on your page and that means more sales.
4. You are open all the time
Having an online presence means that you are all the time open for business.
You can receive orders even when you are asleep and make more money than when you open from 8 to 6PM.
5. You get online reviews
Customers who are satisfied with your business tend to leave a review of your business on the site.
By having such reviews on your site more people will trust and have business with you.
Also read: How to know you were born a blogger
How to get your business online
Knowing the benefits of having an online presence might set you on the way to asking how to take your business online.
In this section I will walk you through the step by step process of taking your business online and make more sales.
Fasten your seat belt and lets ride…………..
Get a domain name
While you can get on in a different number of ways, getting a unique domain name and hosting your website is the best way to take your business online.
Going with free services (wordpress, blogger, tumblr etc) won’t give you that flexibility you need for a business website.
It is better to go get domain on Namecheap or Whogohost and start the process of taking your business online with one of them.
Don’t host your business on someone else’s platform just as you won’t use someone’s email address as your business email.
Build yours and be the master of it.
Get your business Listed on Google
As each day passes by your kind of products gets mentioned on Google and other businesses are taking the review and sales for themselves leaving you out of the equation.
Get on Google and claim the listing for your business as well.
You get the chance to improve your business because of the kind of reviews that will be left on your product.
You will have the chance to join the conversation and get to know what actually your customers want.
Have a blog
Content is the king. Customers want more than just price lists and products offerings from your business. They want something more.
You can start a blog and post content on what you think your customers will be interested in.
Customers really appreciate expertise. Write what benefits them and they may share it with family and friends. Guess what that means? Of course! More buyers.
Always consider content on what will interest your customers. If you are a restaurant owner, you can write about how prepare a particular dish on your menu or something related.
This makes you look like an expert and at the same time getting more visitors to your blog and business.
Check this guide on How to start Blogging to learn about blogging.
Got that?
Lets move on.
Get social
According to a 2019 article on statista.com, 79% of the people in the US are on social media.
Imagine what that means to a business that is online….
It’s a huge number that you can target using the social media.
If you fail to be on social media with such a number, then you are missing a lot.
Get a Facebook, Twitter and Google+ accounts and market your product and services to them.
You can create more accounts on other social medias if you can but you must not use them all at once.
Have Mobile in mind
More percentage of people who use the internet operate it from their phones.
Have the mobile in mind when creating a website or any other thing.
Nobody would like to visit a platform on the internet that everything laps on another.
Make sure your mobile version of your website and even app is good and well designed.
Conclusion
The best way to get more customers and make sales today by taking your business online.
Having your business not online means you will miss out on the real business.
Having read the steps above, am sure you will have more sales and new customers if implemented.
Thanks for reading this post today.
Please share with family and friends………..
