Some tips which can help with your internet presence is what I’ll focus on here.
Most people these days find what they need by searching the internet and gone are the days of scrolling through a newspaper or a leaflet for a service.
I remember when we didn’t have the money to get a website setup and have someone look after our SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).
I remember researching how to setup our own website because I didn’t have the slightest clue on how to do that.
But I studied it and I learned that you can download free software to setup your website, I also found out that there are web hosting companies who don’t charge much money at all.
I remember setting our website up with some free software, thinking to myself that this was great, this was all we needed, but I soon realised that without SEO, nobody was going to see our business unless they know the website address.
After gaining only a few hits, which were of course myself and people I knew, I looked into Google AdWords, which was a pay as you display type of service.
You put money into your account, setup an advert and publish it, so when people search for something in particular, they would see your paid ad appearing at the top of the listings.
Back then it was more obvious who was paying for adverts with Google than it is today. It used to be highlighted in pink from what I can remember.
I knew when I wanted to look for something that I rarely clicked on these paid adverts because I thought anyone could pay to be at the top of Google, and that it should be the companies who have a good ranking that I should be looking into.
After we got a few jobs through Google AdWords, we wanted to look more professional, so the only thing we could do was to get a proper web designer to design our website and get someone to deal with the SEO.
It took a couple of months or so to being noticed on Google without the need for AdWords which was our aim.
There was of course a huge difference in the look of our new website and the website which I designed using the free software.
At that time of designing the website myself, I remember thinking this is perfect, it has everything that we need including pictures, contact details and our logo.
I then compared the old website to a real professional’s website and saw how bad the old website really was.
I thought to myself, if I was a customer and I came across my old website, I wouldn’t even bother contacting them because it looked so cheap and nasty, apart from the logo which was very professional looking, but the website just didn’t help very much.
Having a professional looking website is an absolute MUST. First impressions are usually the most important, and you don’t want people clicking off and going to a competitor who might not be as good as you are but who’s website is a lot more attractive than yours.
Another service which I think is excellent is Google Plus, which is another type of website for your customers who are searching for what you offer would come across.
Some of the things that they would see are your contact details plus how many rating stars that you have from previous customers.
This is also one of the first things that you should get setup right away, is a Google business page because most people search for what they need on Google.
If you have a Google business page then you will eventually be noticed in the searching’s, providing that you keep it up to date and put new content onto it every so often.
You could deal with this yourself as it’s pretty straightforward but a lot of reputable web design & SEO companies can also deal with this for you.
You can add onto Google where you are located on Google Maps, you can show images of your premises inside and out, and you can have customers leave reviews which helps with bringing in new customers.
There are lots that you can put onto this and because it’s Google, it will help with you being seen higher up on Google’s rankings.
It also has a great insight to your business searches which show the statistics of how many people searched for you, how many people asked for directions to your business and a lot more.
There are also free website directories which are alright as well because it helps put you onto different business listing websites which helps with your rankings on Google, because Google can see your details more often which I presume makes you a more reputable search term, so to say. I wouldn't hope for a lot of business this way though, it's purely to get your name noticed by Google.
It’s also good to have some sort of social media presence with having a Facebook page, a Twitter account and maybe an Instagram page. These things will help with Google rankings as well because these media platforms are very popular.
We have had some customers who have found us through Facebook with some of our posts which shows our before and after gallery.
It helps as well if you have to close for the day or your telephone lines are down, that you can quickly make a post onto these platforms so that customers can see you are having issues or whatever it may be.
Of course, it helps if you have also had a link to your social media platforms on your business page, otherwise people may not go looking for you on social media.
Having a website is an absolute MUST as I said earlier, and if your website doesn’t look good then you could be chasing away many potential customers.
I would suggest to everybody looking to setup a website to even start off with a Google Plus page which looks professional and reputable because it’s on Google.
I always found that my old website looked a bit dodgy to be honest, but it was a little more difficult a few years ago than it is today. Google are really making it easy for businesses, in terms of trying to help businesses being visible to potential customers.
@sheeshkababage