How Can a Website Help My Business? I Don’t Sell Anything Online.

This is a question I get a lot from prospective clients, especially businesses that are not necessarily selling anything through an online store.

They want to know how a website can help them with their particular business. Maybe they have a service business, a business in a small town, or even just a business at home.

It’s an easy answer…. a website is another (or the only) salesperson. Think about it this way… How would you like to have a salesperson that:

1. You only pay for once (and occasionally feed from time to time)
2. Never takes a vacation
3. Works 24 hours a day / 7 days a week / 365 days a year.
4. Does not need a commission (no matter how much they sell)
5. Takes orders and does EXACTLY what you want when you want.
6. Answers all of the mundane questions you get every day.
7. Helps people find your place of business
8. Educates people about what you do and how to obtain your services
9. Never, ever, ever quits.
10. Once you train it, it will sell exactly how YOU want it to.
11. Can work for you around the ENTIRE world even if your just a one person company.

Please Explain

You see, once it’s built (and built correctly) a website can help you with all of these tasks. Let’s break them down a bit.

1. You pay for a website only once. True. You need to pay for a good website at the beginning and then other than maybe your hosting fees, adding content, and occasional SEO updating, you don’t have to pay for it any longer. It sure isn’t 50 grand a year that you need to pay a salesperson.

2. Never takes a vacation – As long as you pay for your hosting (and that it never crashes), your website works for you no matter what. It does not ask you if it can have a week off to go to his sister’s wedding. It does not talk about who is working this holiday because it worked the last holiday. All it knows is that it’s working today, this holiday, and every holiday (for all time).

3. Works 24 hours a day / 7 days a week / 365 days a year. – See answer above (#2)

4. Does not need a commission (no matter how much they sell) – The only time a website takes a commission is if it’s on a specific platform where they charge you a percentage of sale or an affiliate link. Otherwise, your website sells for you for free. No more worrying about ramping up commissions or trying to figure out a competitive pay structure. Your website doesn’t care. It just sells.

5. Takes orders and does EXACTLY what you want when you want – This is one of the best advantages. No more hearing complaints because someone doesn’t like doing a certain job. A website does it no matter what. No complaining, no backtalk, and no sleeping on the job.

6. Answers all of the mundane questions you get every day – I tell my clients this all the time; “If you get a question more than 3 times, it should be posted on your website with the answer.”

I used to have an online t-shirt company. Once I put a thorough Frequently Asked Questions section on my site, my phone calls and customer service emails dropped by as much as 80%. Everyone wanted to know how to do something, or shipping options, returns, etc. Once I put this on there, it saved me at least 3-4 hours a week. What would YOU do with that extra time?

7. Helps people find your place of business – Maybe not everyone knows what you do, where you are, how you do it, or how to contact you. This is another great place for your website to help you out.

8. Educates people about what you do and how to obtain your services – kind of ties in with number 7 above, but maybe people don’t know anything about you and they didn’t even know you exist? Not only can you tell them about yourself, educate someone about your industry, products, or business, but you can also let them know how to obtain your services (call, email, stop by, etc.).

9. Never, ever, ever quits – One of the worst parts of my business is getting someone trained into a new role and then they quit. Guess what? Your website won’t ever walk out on you.

10. Once you train it, it will sell exactly how YOU want it to – Remember when I said a website is a salesperson? Well, it is. However, you still need to train it and you need to do this correctly. However once it’s trained to sell like YOU want it to, you can rest assured that your one site army will do it correctly every time.

11. Can work for you around the ENTIRE world even if your just a one person company – I sold t-shirts around the world (in more than 95 countries) from a computer in my home. Tell me another business that can do that.

These are just a FEW of the quick reasons how a website can help you with your business. If you know of any other reasons of how a website can help you with your particular business, just leave them in the comments below and we can build a list for others.