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Business website strategy needs to be smart [The Gleaner, Henderson, Ky.]
[October 04, 2014]

Business website strategy needs to be smart [The Gleaner, Henderson, Ky.]


(Gleaner, The (Henderson, KY) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Oct. 04--HENDERSON, Ky. -- If businesses intend to be in the game, they'd better be on the Internet -- and know what they're doing there.

"It's more than putting a brochure online," according to Mike Edge of Owensboro, who works in business development and sales for Upright Communications, a Cincinnati-based Internet marketing company.

"All sales really start online today," Edge said during a Kyndle Brown Bag Series presentation in September.

Well, that isn't altogether true; people don't necessarily turn to the Internet as they prepare to shop for groceries or fill up their car with gasoline.

But for a tremendous number of purchases, consumers do go online to research their options, compare features and prices and so on. "The buyer is in control of all the data," Edge said. "They are 60 percent of the way to make a purchase before they contact you.



"The sales process begins online," he said. "If you're not online, you're not in business." Businesses need more than an attractive website. "Design is a foregone conclusion," Edge said. "What sets you apart is your anticipation of your buyer's questions." Ironically, that might mean limiting how much information you try to squeeze onto the home page. For example, "You don't need to put on there how your father started the business," he said. "You can put that into your 'About us,'" the section of a website in which a company or organization puts information for anyone who is interested in such information.

Edge outlined a five-step process for optimizing an online strategy: 1. Define your ideal customer.


"The answer isn't 'everyone,'" he said. It might be moms with kids under age 10 or a particular kind of engineer or someone who can afford to pay $400 for a smartphone. Knowing who your best and most likely customer is can help you tailor a website to meet and appeal to them.

2. Develop a way to attract them to your website, whether by making the address of your site well-known or by learning how to make your site attractive to search engines such as Google.

3. Impress visitors and make them want you, such as by answering their questions.

4. Convert them to starting the sales process, whether through an online order or by contacting you to place an order or get a quote.

5. Keep score by having a process for obtaining statistics from your website that show you, for example, at what point someone leaves your site without placing an order or contacting you so you can evaluate how to prevent that from happening.

"If you don't keep score on your website, you're losing," Edge said.

Such information is available using tools such as Google Analytics -- and speaking of Google, there's a strong chance that's how your prospective customer finds you.

While it's simple for consumers to use, Google is an extremely sophisticated tool that can even tailor search results on factors such as the physical address of the business and the approximate location of a consumer based on the network address of the device they're using.

For example: While the reporter writing this story was working, he went to Google and typed: hardware store.

Because his computer was connected to a network located in the Evansville-Henderson, Google generated a map showing some hardware stores in the Evansville area. The first page of 10 search results also included links to two hardware stores in Henderson -- Norris Ace Hardware and Lowe's -- plus a link to the Facebook page of the former Homefolks Hardware here. And in the vast majority of cases, Google searchers don't look beyond that first page.

"Google has defined the game: 10 listings on a page," Edge said. So it's vital that a business website lists its physical address, including zip code.

The great news for family businesses: "The little guy can compete with the big guy," he said. "The Internet is the great equalizer, and it's all about information." Another trick: Knowing how to identify the products that prospective customers will search for. He gave the example of Southern Tank, a manufacturer of storage tanks in Owensboro. From the company's perspective, it makes aboveground and underground tanks.

But shoppers "use the industry terms" common in their field, Edge said. "Instead of 'aboveground tank,' it could be 'fuel storage (tank)' or 'farm (tank)' or 'double wall tank.'" Incorporating those terms onto Southern Tank's website was among Edge's recommendations.

The company, he said, was skeptical that a website would help it very much. But by employing such strategies, Edge said Southern Tank went from a regional supplier with customers in Kentucky and a few surrounding states to a nationwide vendor with customers in all 50 states.

"It's all because of the Internet," he said.

Businesses can also differentiate themselves from their competitors through charts on their websites that show goods or services or advantages they offer versus what their primary competitors offer. "Be bold," Edge advised. "Go ahead and show the competition." If customers offer testimonials, ask their permission to post them on your website.

And to test the usability of your site, find people to test it; ask them if they can figure out how to locate a particular product and fill out an order or find your address or a map locator of your business.

Then take technology to the next level. You -- or even your website designer -- might not know the best place to place a link to "contact us" or "request a price quote." But a sophisticated web marketing company can offer what is known as A/B testing; rather than make a possibly wrong decision, it can test two or even more locations and provide statistics to measures which is the most effective is real-world use. Essentially, you let your customers and visitors show you what is most effective.

Finally, use those and other statistics to evaluate how successful your site is for producing orders or driving people to take the next step and make contact with you.

"At the end of the day," Edge said, "if you don't keep score, you're probably getting beat." Business Editor Chuck Stinnett can be reached at 270-831-8343 or [email protected].

___ (c)2014 The Gleaner (Henderson, Ky.) Visit The Gleaner (Henderson, Ky.) at www.courierpress.com/news/gleaner Distributed by MCT Information Services

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