One of the common things I've noticed with many small businesses is - many business owners don't utilize their website to its full potential. Many of us tend to want to get our website up and running fast because people ask about it. We primarily use our website as a bullentin board to post some basic information, add a few pretty photos, contact info, and a blank contact form. Weeks or months later, we come to find out that our website neither generate or bring much value nor transactions to our business. On top of that, you still do a lot of manual admin work/customer communications behind the scene - even with a website. Then we think - a website is just useless and expensive. Can you relate? Do you feel this way?
Many webstie packages (even the basic ones) often come with many tools, features, apps, bells, and whilstles. The problem is - most of us do not have the time to explore those options to see how those tools and features can do to help your business. Do you know that I also offer a "Reserach, Integration, and Implementation" service if you don't hae the time to research?
The truth is - your website can do much more to offload your one-person business in many areas. I'm showing you some of the work that your website can do for you:
Electronic form designed for www.iPupFit.com
1) Get sick of having to answer the same old questions over and over again? - Create your FAQs page. This part is painful, but as soon as you get this done, your business life will be a lot more pleasant. I know many of you are thinking - people will still ask even when I list those frequently asked questions, what's the point?
I agree with you that some people won't take the time to read, but some do. One of the biggest issue worth looking into is - how well did you design and organize your information on your FAQ page? If the informaiton isn't well thought out, orgnized or designed, people will not want to take the time to search for the answers. I'm going to do a separate post on how to effectively design your FAQ page, stay tuned.
Make sure to organize your questions into an easy to follow order (as if you're a customer not knowing anything about your business), highlight those questions/keywords, and include as much details in your answers.
From now, if anyone asks you those questions again, you can simply send them to that page.
2) Minimize the back and forth emails with your customers: Not that we don't want to communicate with our customers, but this will also show that we value and respect their time as much as ours. If it takes multiple emails for your customers to do to order a product or get a service, your chance to capture them can be thin. Why? We get easily distracted these days - the same goes with our customers. They may be reading your email with an intention to reply but get distracted , then you have to follow up which prolongs the sale process or worst case you lose that sale opportunity. That isn't what we want to happen.
Make the best out of you website design to ensure that:
Your customers/clients can quickly locate your products and services: some small ecommerce businesses don't list their products on the 1st page which is a big no-no. Your customers are ready to buy so showcase them as soon as they land. The About You / About Us / Our Story can be in a different area/page.
Focus on fewer or one clear call-to-action: when a customer goes to your website, you want them to focus on doing one thing - either to contact you if you're a service provider OR to buy your products if you sell products. The more call-to-actions we have on our websites, the more distracted people can get. You can still put your button in different areas for easy access, just be sure to focus on one thing for them to do.
Utilize your Contact form to obtain specific info: this is espeically critical for service based providers. Just like my business, I don't have products to sell on the website so I want my potential clients to contact me to kick off my discovery call process.
If you have a similar setup which requires a discovery call to talk to your customers iniitally to find out if you both would be a good fit, focus on your clients to easily find where/how to reach out to you. Create a Contact form that specifically asks inital information upfront to help you prepare for your call. This will not only help you understand what your potential client is looking for, but this can also minimize spammy messages.
3. Build your email list: This is the most important part. Your website has great designs and information but it would be a waste of time if your customers/potential leads don't know anything about it right? I know we all get about 500 emails per day (I'm being totally exaggerated here but it sure feels that way right?).
People buy from people/businesses they know and trust.
Every Thanksgiving, we all got so many promotional emails. Opening rate can be a hit or miss and some people may argue that email marketing is a waste of time. What ended up happening for me year after year was I clicked on the emails from businesses I knew, trusted, and loved their products - I bought their products again and again.
With sooooooo many choices and options, our lives are better than ever BUT it's so overwhelming - don't you agree? If you've established a good relationship with your customers and won their hearts with your amazing quality, chances are...they will buy from you again and again. You just have to remind them sometimes that hey, I'm over here ready to serve you - because we all know life is hectic and a little reminder can go a long way for businesses.
4) Explore marketing features and automations: The way I think about automation is - it doesn't take away "human connection". It comes in handy to help small businesses operate smoothly so we can focus on serving our customers better.
Many small business owners do not have a luxury to hire a marketing team, so we rely on the beauty of automation and apps to help us operate more effectively
Several apps and features can help you track your customer communication/transactions so you don't have to manually take the time to go to your Instagram or Facebook messenger. Many business owners I had spoken to share that having to check their DMs and Facebook PMs took a big chunk of their days. It's worst when you couldn't access those platform altogether when FB had technical issues this year and back in 2020. It affected small businesses who primarily relied on social platforms like FB and Instagram because there was no other way they could reach their customers. Now they're thinking about a backup plan or a more reliable platform of their own like a website instead.
I hope these points are helpful to you in some ways to help you take a deeper look into your website and how to improve them so it can serve you better. If you're up for having your website reviewed to see how to make it better to help you run your business more smoothly, schedule a discovery call so you can start your 2022 strong :)
Have a lovely week,
Tat