An online business presence in it’s simplest form is a business listing detailing information about your company together with ways of contacting your company. An online presence allows people on the Internet to search for and find information about your company.
While ideally a company should have their own branded website in practice this is not always possible for small start-up businesses on a stretched budget. If they are unable to afford a website then there are other ways they can get an online presence.
Types of business Internet presence
There are a number of business directories on the Internet that offer free listings. By getting a business listing on one or many of these directories they increase their chances of being found by anyone searching for them. A downside of business directories is that you oftern find your listed along side your competition, and with a free listing there is no way of ‘standing out from the crowd’.
Having a ‘brochure website’ is recommended if you can afford one. A ‘brochure website’ is a small website consisting of just a few pages (typically between 2 and 5) that incorporates your company logo, colours and branding. A ‘brochure website’ can simply be a 2 page site consisting of a ‘homepage’ and a contact page. The homepage should contain information about your company, details on core products and images of products or service-sector images. The contact page should have your phone number, address, map and contact form for people to email you. All pages should have your phone number in a prominent position.
Social networking can also be a good way to tell others about your company, products, services and ethics and works on a ‘word of mouth’ type principle. (I’ll discuss social networking and it’s benefits in a later post.)
As your business grows so should your online presence. I’ll be talking about ways to plan for a website strategy and what’s involved an future posts.
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