In less than two decades the internet has grown at a rapid pace. What most people began using as a place to email or chat is now something that, if it suddenly disappeared from their lives they’d have trouble coping. One of the most popular things to do online today is surf the web, and thanks to WordPress, building a website for your business is easier than ever.
Benefits of Business Websites
There are so many benefits to having a business website that it’s nearly impossible to list them all. Websites are cheaper than direct mailers because there is no charge for printing materials. Unlike paper advertisements, a website can be updated in a snap. And whether you’re promoting the physical location of your business or educating the public about your products and services, a website improves the credibility of your business. Even if you’re technically challenged and prove all thumbs beyond sending an email or updating your Facebook status, talented freelancers at sites like Elance are waiting to bid on these types of jobs every day.
Outsourcing has outgrown the stereotype of a room filled with underpaid, underage workers off in some third world country that people only hear about on the news. Today’s outsourcers could be anyone, from authors who spend afternoons in coffee shops writing for other people’s blogs to digital artists who work crazy hours while dressed in their pajamas, and just about anything in between. And there are plenty of them who would jump at the chance to create a business for your website at a lucrative price.
Using Social Networks for Business
Is your business a member of social networks? If the answer is no, then you are missing out on a golden opportunity. In the 2011 Social Media Marketing Report by the Social Media Examiner®, 67% of entrepreneurs agreed that social media was an important part of their business. Here are some ways that social media can benefit your business.
- ROI – Social media is free to use and costs very little in the way of financial investment. The biggest sacrifice is the time it takes to set up an account and keep it updated. About 30% of the marketers in that same poll reported that they outsource at least a portion of their social media tasks.
- Leads – The majority of the leads that your business is trying to generate are likely already using some kind of social network. It doesn’t matter what demographic you’re trying to attract – from Tweeting teens to LinkedIn professionals, to retirees who spend their afternoons harvesting crops from virtual farms, it seems everyone is somehow connected to a social network.
- Brand – Looking for a way to increase visibility of your company’s brand? Word-of-mouth will do that faster than almost any other marketing strategy. When you make it easy for others to Like, Tweet about, +1, or Share news of your business, it means a higher potential of people who will visit your website. And the more people visit your website, the higher the chance of increasing your profit margins when they buy into your products or services.
One popular social network for businesses is Google+ which features things like circles, hangouts, mobile apps, and photo sharing through Picasa, an image organizer and viewer for mobile photos.
During an interview on the Affiliate Buzz (on WebmasterRadio.FM) with Expand2Web founder Don Campbell. He summarized it pretty well when he said, “Google has been trying to do social-type efforts for a while. They’ve tried a number of different things. You probably remember some of the things. Orca was one of the solutions they had, and they still have that. It’s popular in other countries but not so much in the U.S. They’ve tried Google Wave. The difference between those other efforts and Google+ is that now, the way people look for things online is changing.â€
A Kinder, More User-Friendly Google
Google understands that because of people have changed how they look for things online, that it needs some kind of a social layer and therefore has put all its efforts behind the success of Google+. For instance, although Picasa’s initial storage space was limited, files which do not reach a certain limit and uploads through other Google products that store photos fall under the Google+ unlimited storage plan.
Google has also tweaked the interface, so that whether you’re sharing photos from an app on your phone or while sitting behind the computer on your l-shaped computer desk, everything is so user-friendly that sharing takes just a few clicks. If you like sharing photos for your business on Facebook, then you will love sharing them on Google+. While the two social networks are similar in regards to photo sharing, such as they allow people to share, like or +1, and comment about each other’s photos, Google+ allows its users to be more selective about who is in their circle of sharing.