Why do you need to careabout your website?

As with any business investment, you have to ask yourself what you plan to achieve from it. A good website can:

• Differentiate your business from those which have no website or only a simple one/two page template from one of the large business directory businesses. This makes it appear as if you are a bigger or more reputable firm, and can make the difference when potential customers are researching which firms to contact for quotes. You would otherwise not know what business you might have been missing out on.
• Clarify the scope of work you undertake. This both helps in pre-qualifying customers who will not bother you for toally unrelalted work. It also allows you to promote areas or aspects of your business, including unique specialisations, in order to direct more queries of those types. For example, reading a list of solicitors in Bath will not help identify their specialities, but a quick scan through their websites easily spots the Family Law, Employment Law and Probate specialists in the city.
• Become easier to find. You may be used to referrals and repeat business, but if your customers can quickly find you through a simple search query on the internet, this will make it more likely to call you again rather than someone else.
• Increase your sales. Beware of salesmen suggesting your phone will ring off the hook simply by having a website. Your site will reinforce the other methods of advertising your business, and can also be used in conjunction with other offline/online advertising to encourage prospects to contact you

As with any business investment, you'll want to know how you are going to measure success:

Websites come with automatic measurement tools which are often free and easily applied, more complex reports are also available (usually for an additional service fee). To get started, just ask your website provider to provide you with some basic regular reports, such as at annual renewal time. What's important are:

• Unique visitors to your site. This measure will filter out where a few individuals and/or automatic search engine servers repeatedly call up your website, and gives a truer indication of how many different people have viewed it.
• Referral Source. Websites can record where people have clicked through from, and even record the search engine keywords used when searching for your site. Very useful feedback
• Pages per visit. Whilst you won't expect every viewer to scrupulously visit and read every page on your site, it gives some indication of whether viewers are interested or not.
• Time on your site. Are people calling up your website and then immediately leaving because its not useful? If the majority of people leave after 10 seconds then you know something is wrong.

There are also elements you will perceive from your own daily business. Do people mention your website when you ask them where they heard of you? Did they find it easy to get your number when they wanted to call you?

Ultimately, you need to work out the value to your business of each new and repeat customer which has been affected by your website, and then budget appropriately. You can spread the cost of your website design over at least 2-3 years, and the ongoing costs should be minimal. Promotional advertising (pay-per-click) can be turned on and off quickly depending on your needs and your budget.

For additional information about websites for businesses and how to go about it, you can view and print off free guidance from BusinessLink.

Next: learn the lingo