Is Your Business Homeless?

Today we’re going to talk about your business credibility, or at least a part of it.

Is Your Business Homeless?

Before the internet, most businesses had what are known as brick and mortar locations, a storefront or at least a physical location. There were some exceptions, but for the vast majority of businesses, your physical location was a key component of establishing credibility.

Then the internet came along and has slowly been changing our world. I recall the Windows 95 computer operating system and dial up internet connections that used a hardwired telephone landline to connect to the World Wide Web and it was pretty cool to be visit websites from that big clunky computer at home.

Enough reminiscing, those were not really the good old days of the internet. Although every month I run into business people who are seemingly stuck back in those days.

Your business needs a website.

I’ve been saying that for over a dozen years.

There are some businesses that still don’t have a website.

Your business not having a website is the equivalent of your business being homeless.

If your potential customers cannot find you online with a simple Google search, your business does not exist.  Say you are a plumber. If I ask Siri to find me a plumber and you don’t have a website, according to Siri, you don’t exist, but your competitors do.

Personally my phone is not an iPhone but an Android and I can talk to it and it does the same, maybe better than Siri.

For those of you who are stubbornly resisting getting a website for your business, you might as well sell your business to someone who will bring it up to speed before your business dies a slow agonizing death.

Next, I want to talk to those of you who have not updated your website in the past 5 years.  Your business may not be “homeless” online, but your business presence is most likely obsolete.

You are not alone.  I see dozens of outdated websites every month.  This is hurting you more than you realize.

First off, if I find your business website and it looks dated, you are losing credibility simply because of the first impression your old website presents. Even if you are the very best at what you do, if your website looks like it hasn’t been kept up to date, I don’t know if your business is trustworthy.  This judgement call isn’t even a conscious one we make.

Another way your old website is hurting your business credibility is that Google and the other search engines will penalize your business website if it does not meet the standards that they deem are important.

Google uses two primary criteria to decide which webpages show up when we search and one of those is the technology that powers your website.  Starting in April 2015, if your website was not mobile friendly, Google began rolling out an algorithm that made your site less visible to people searching for what you offer.

Right now Google is in the process of another algorithm update for those of us that use the Chrome browser which is powered by Google.  If your website does not have a security certificate, Google may warn and block users from visiting your business website. This is used as an assurance that any information we give a website is securely managed.

Please, if you have not updated your business website to make it secure and mobile friendly, make that a priority.

Before we wrap this up, I want to address those of you who are attempting a work-around, and avoiding having your own website and instead relying on Social Media accounts like Facebook to be you online business presence.

It’s not legit.  It’s not a real website and it’s not adding to your business credibility. Besides, since you don’t own Facebook, Facebook can basically do what ever they want and change the rules of how you can use their platform.  It’s all in those pesky “terms of service” updates that all of us, me include ignore and blindly agree to when they come our way.

Yes, Social Media including Facebook is recommended for most businesses, but only in conjunction with your own up to date, secure and mobile friendly website.

Want to talk about this or need more details?  Let’s connect.

You can also listen to this as a podcast each week: