Establish Your Online Presence With A Great Website

Let’s face it, we’re now living in the 21st Century and a business that doesn’t show it’s presence with a website is living in the past. Now some of you are saying “What do I need with a website. I’m just selling toenail clippers.” Well, do you know how many people in the world need to clip their raggedy toe nails. Believe me, after a trip to the beach, a lot. So why not expand your horizons and stop thinking only of local sales. There’s a whole planet out there in need of toenail clippers.

All corny joking aside, a website can do two important things. First a well designed website can put you on the same playing field as the big boys (the giant corporations). After all, a website is a website. Believe me, a potential customer doesn’t know if you are operating from a multi billion dollar, fifteen story office building or from a one bedroom apartment building in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. It doesn’t matter to the customer as long as you have a product or service he is willing to pay for and you deliver the goods.

Second, the internet is worldwide. As if you didn’t know that already (Even Sponge Bob knows that). And this means that through your website, you have the capability to reach millions of potential customers both in your immediate area and the rest of the world. Of course if you’re Joe the local plumber, you probably won’t be getting any clients seeking your services in Istanbul. But the fact still stands, that even for local advertising, having your own website can be a great asset to your business.

Concentrate more on making your website effective rather than turning it into a circus side show. Your home page is the most important page of your website. If you have multiple pages, your homepage is the gateway to your home based business. Steer clear of creating your website with gaudy, eye popping colors that assail your eyes with all the fire power of a level 10 military assault. Simplicity is the best way to go. Do not make your website hard to navigate or your customers might get frustrated and seek another provider thereby costing you a possible sale and a possible repeat customer. Flash intros may be cool looking but some potential customers get impatient waiting for the darn thing to load before getting to your home page.

On your home page, describe your home business and resist the temptation to over blow your home business and make claims that you cannot back up. Be truthful with your potential customers. Tell them what you provide, whether service or product. Sell them on what your service or product can do for them. You want these people, after reading your website to investigate further, if you have additional pages(product photos, list of services your provide, etc), what your home business is all about.

Make sure your website gives current, up to date contact information regarding your home business company. Your home page and every page on your website to have: Company name, mailing address (PO Box also), phone number, fax number, email address. Also provide directions to your company if that is necessary for customers to do a face to face.

Provide a few testimonials and other backup material from customers to give potential customers a feeling of knowing you are a legitimate business and not some home based scam artist. With all the countless online scams coming from the internet, customers want to know you are real and trustworthy.

One thing you will want to be concerned with, if you have a home based business that can appeal to customers outside your local area as well as worldwide is how to raise your search engine ranking on Google so that you are on the first page of a potential Google search. The best method is to get other websites to link to you. The best way to do that is to publish information on your website that other websites akin to yours will want to place a link on their website that links back to your website. This link exchange is a good way to increase your presence on the internet and bring more customers to your home based business website. Also writing articles for other websites with a link back to your website is another good method to increase your web visibility to potential customers which will translate into greater potential sales.

To build your website you can either hire a professional website designer or there are a few webpage creation software programs on the market that will enable you to build your own website without having to know programming language. Basically with these programs you simply select a template website page and using the easy to use and easy to understand web creation tools to create your own personal home based business website. Web design can be as simple as 1-2-3.