Starting a business online

30:10:2009 | Startup Guides +

Starting an online presence for your business might seem like a very complex, time consuming and expensive venture. This guide is going to help clear up some of those misconceptions.

It’s true that choosing the proper online services and making the right decisions is important. Mistakes cost time and money.

But you don’t need a year or two of research to fully understand how to create an online presence for your business. Whether you have a bricks-and-mortar venture that you’d like to bring online or you’re starting an online-only business, there are steps you can take to achieve online success in an easy, cheap and profitable way.

Don’t worry about what type of business owner you are or how small or large your business might be. You could be a sole operator working out of your living room, a small business owner, or a multinational company - that’s not important to getting online. You’ll follow the same steps, no matter who you are.

Of course, if you already know the difference between your index finger and index.html, this article is likely not for you. It’s for business owners who need some handholding or a push in the right direction, and it offers a comprehensive five-step plan with clear descriptions of the stages involved in starting and operating a business online successfully.

Step 1 - Getting Started
• Static, dynamic or enterprise?
• Registering a domain name
• Choosing a web hosting provider

Step 2 - The Website
• Hiring a web designer
• How to choose the right web designer
• Who controls your website?

Step 3 - Going Live
• Launching & reviewing
• Analysing for improvements
• Submission to Google, Yahoo! & Bing

Step 4 - Traffic
• Word of mouth
• Search engine optimisation
• Link Building
• Search engine advertising
• Social media advertising

Step 5 - The Future
• Email marketing
• Building relationships
• Bricks and mortar

Step 1 - Getting started

Static, dynamic or enterprise?

Your first step involves deciding exactly what your website will offer to its visitors. There are generally three options for businesses:

Static Website

A static website is one that isn’t updated often and has little to no administration involved. It sits on the web, serving as an interactive online brochure about your business and the services you offer.

A static website typically contains links to other websites you may own, and it may list your business partners or suppliers. It offers a means of contact to website visitors, such as your email address, the physical business address, a map to get to your location, and a contact form so that people can send you messages directly through your website.

You may also offer visitors material they can download, such as forms or product and services in Adobe PDF format. Some static websites also offer video and audio downloads.

Dynamic Website

A dynamic website is one that is updated occasionally or frequently. These updates might include business news, blog posts, articles, video or audio downloads, or other content you want to make available to your website visitors.

A dynamic website is now one of the most common types of websites a business will begin with online due to its flexibility.

A dynamic website is typically built onto a Content Management System (or CMS) that allows a site administrator to have all the tools he or she needs to update the material on the site and make it available to visitors.

What’s a CMS? A CMS can be simply described as a website that supports the creation, management and discovery of information. It handles the complete lifecycle of your website content, providing simple tools to create, publish and archive its content. It also provides the ability to manage the structure of the website, the appearance of the site’s pages and navigation that allows visitors to explore the content you offer them.

eCommerce Website

An eCommerce website is one that is similar to a dynamic website and also offers you the ability to sell products online through commercial transactions.

Products you offer could be physical items, like t-shirts, makeup or computer parts, digital goods such as ebooks, music files or software. An eCommerce website might also be one that lets you sell subscription services and membership courses or offer credit card charging features so that people can pay you for your products or services online. It does not need to display a product catalogue at all.

You can even create a website that offers a combination of static, dynamic and eCommerce features as the perfect online environment for your business. A combination site lets you achieve continued, lasting success and a constant return on your initial investment of creating an online presence.

Once you’ve decided the type of site that’s best for you and your business, you’re ready to plan the infrastructure you need to maintain technical requirements.

Registering a Domain Name

A domain name is the website address (or URL) - for example, www.google.com is the Google company’s domain name. A domain name allows people to find and visit your website via their web browser (like Firefox or Internet Explorer). Choosing a domain name for your online presence can be simple, fun and rewarding!

You’ll need to register the domain name you choose to become its owner. Once you register the domain name, it’s yours forever (providing you continue to renew it). You can choose from many domain name types, but a top-level domain (or TLD) is the most common for business registrations. The .com TLD is widely accepted as the international default.

A good rule of thumb is to select a domain name that reflects your actual business name as close as possible. Unfortunately, many domain names that might have been perfect for you are already registered and owned by other people or businesses. It can be difficult to find an available domain name to register that would fit well with your business.

Don’t get discouraged. There are many variants of good domain names that will work just as well for your business. For example, if you wanted “www.greatbiz.com” but it’s already registered, you might find available variations like “www.yourgreatbiz.com” or “www.onegreatbiz.com”.

It’s also a good idea to register the available variations of the domain name you choose. For example, if you register “www.yourgreatbiz.com”, try to register the .net, .biz, and .info variations as well. Doing so helps reduce visitor confusion, as all variations of your domain name points to your business. Having more than one domain name variation can also come in handy if you decide to expand into a global market or increase your online exposure later on.

To register your domain name, visit an authorised domain name registrar for your country and search for your desired domain name(s). Once you’ve found a name you like, go ahead and register it!

We suggest a minimum registration period of two years, with ten years being the safest and most secure way to ensure your domain name remains yours for the long haul. Domain name registration can cost as little as $10 for a 1 year .com domain, depending on your location.

Note that during the registration process, you may need to pass through various levels of control or security in order to take ownership of the domain name like supplying business details and registration numbers.

Once your domain name is registered, it’s time to think about website hosting.

Choosing Website Hosting

Many people wonder, “What is web hosting?”

Well, think of domain names and web hosting like your phone number and telecommunications carrier. You choose a phone number, and your phone service provider offers you the equipment and services you need to make calls and let people call you. Your domain name would be like your phone number, and web hosting would be like the equipment and services you need to make calls.

Essentially, web hosting lets you store all your website files and content online so that visitors can find and access your website.

Web hosting can be confusing. Depending on the type of website you’ve chosen to have, you may need some specialised technologies (PHP, MySQL), hardware requirements (CPU, RAM, HDD) and usage allowances (bandwidth, storage, email, ftp etc). It’s very important to anticipate your hosting needs before starting a website project as being unprepared can costly in terms of time and money.

Luckily, most web hosts today offer packages that fit various website requirements and offer them at different price points. After deciding what type of site you want and the features you’d like to have within it, a quick consultation with your website agency you confirm the web hosting package you should budget for.

There are typically three types of web hosting: shared, dedicated and VPN (virtual private network). Rarely will a typical business require a VPN or dedicated hosting solution, with the right reputable web host a shared hosting package will be more than enough.

Here are some technical terms and descriptions that may help you decide the right web hosting package for your needs. Knowing what these terms mean and how they apply to your website can help you save a lot of money in the future.

Storage Space
Storage space is the number of megabytes (MB) or gigabytes (GB) that will be allocated to your web hosting account. The more storage space you have for your account, the more files and content you can store on the web host server.

Bandwidth
Each time your website has a visitor, it “serves” them a web page to view. This “serving” needs to be accounted for and adds to the cost of your web hosting. The more “serving” your website has to do, the more bandwidth you need.

How much bandwidth you need depends on the type of website you’ll have, what content you’ll offer and how many visitors per month you anticipate will visit your website. You’ll receive a monthly allocation of bandwidth with your web hosting account, which is reset each month.

POP3 Mail
POP3 mail is a method of storing and retrieving email accounts. Each email you wish to have for your website, such as info@yourwebsite.com and jerry@yourwebsite.com, requires one POP3 email account. The more email addresses you want, the more POP3 accounts you need.

For most businesses, five POP3 emails is enough. Unlimited accounts are great. But keep in mind that the use of POP3 email counts towards your storage and bandwidth usage as well.

If you have a web mail service already, such as Gmail, you can continue using it to capture your website emails by pointing your POP3 mail accounts to the Gmail service. Or, you can download your POP3 email to your mail client service to read from your local computer - mail client services can include Outlook, Thunderbird or Apple Mail.

Sub-domains
A sub-domain is self-explanatory: It’s a sub-section of your main website, and uses the main domain name within its own domain name, such as in the case of “hyyp://subdomain.yourwebsite.com”. They do not usually use a www. prefix.

Sub-domains are handy when you need to set up different sections for your website, like a separate forum, or when you want to have access to a hosted web application, like a project management application.

MySQL
MySQL is a type of database used to store data for dynamic and eCommerce websites. The more databases you have, the better the scalability of your website for future growth.

FTP Accounts
FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol, and it allows you to upload files to your website and download files from your website to your local computer. An FTP account is accessed via FTP software like Filezilla or CuteFTP.

In general, you’ll only ever need one FTP account, unless you’ll have multiple website administrators or want to allow site visitors to access and download large files. They can bypass your website and download the files they need using a username and password.

SSL Certificate
An SSL certificate lets your website encrypt and transmit data securely, providing you with non-forgeable proof of your website’s identity.

An SSL certificate also gives customers confidence in the integrity and security of your online business. It’s a must-have for private information transactions, allowing visitors to send personal information securely over the Internet, and to the right place.

In fact, customers are becoming increasingly aware of SSL security and often refuse to purchase goods or services online from non-secure sites. All major web merchants use SSL security to reassure their customers and encourage sales.

SSL security isn’t limited to eCommerce websites, as you can also encrypt forms and other data that travels back and forth through websites and web browsers.

Step 2 - The Website

The internet is a rapidly changing environment. As technology evolves, what we can achieve and build online becomes more feature-rich and powerful every year.

While there are many companies that offer packaged website solutions (usually subscription fees apply), these website packages are generally designed to cater to everyone, and they don’t always address a specific or unique need. Some website packages also only usually provide a very basic template for your site that makes it difficult to display your unique design, style and brand trapping you into a “boxed” environment.

The good news is that a custom designed, professionally built website is affordable, and the investment you’ll make is often quickly recovered. A good website pays for itself by giving you exactly what you need - fast.

Hiring a Web Designer

A good website designer (or agency) works with you to ensure your business brand is a priority. A skilled designer will create an architecture for your site (think building blueprints), and then they design and develop a website that creates and maintains the best possible communication between your website and your visitors.

Typically, good website designers will custom-design and build your site with a strong framework foundation to make sure your site is fast, looks great, performs well and delivers results. Scalability is the key to online growth.

Unfortunately, it can be difficult to know which website designer is the right choice for you. You may know someone who “builds” websites, like a friend or a family member. There are also many website designers out there offering cheap packages - but buyer beware: You get what you pay for.

The reality is that website design and development is very different to what it was ten years ago. Rapidly evolving technology and high-level skill sets are a must these days. Amateurs may get you a cheap website, but that website may not get you results, and that will costs you money and so much more.

How to choose the right Web designer

The process of working with a web designer to build your website is generally going to be (or should be!) as follows:

Consultation
The website designer learns about you and gets to know your business, your customers and your ultimate goals. He or she studies your brand image, in both form and practical function. Armed with this information, your web designer can strategise a plan to build the best possible result for you.

A consultation also helps you and your designer determine the type of website you need for your business, and it assist you on choosing a domain name and the right web hosting for your requirements.

Technical
A web designer ensures that domain names are registered, web hosting has been set up and that all platform (CMS) technology is ready for building. He or she can also assist in obtaining any required licenses and SSL certificates.

Architecture
Website architecture is the building blueprints of your website, providing a set of instructions for the web designer and developer to follow. It makes sure every element of your website, such as images, navigation, text and layout, is in the proper position before progressing to the bulk of the work of actually building your website.

Architecture isn’t just about design. It’s closely tied to web development, your online marketing needs, and website optimisation (which we’ll be discussing shortly in this article). Depending on the complexity and scale of your website, web designers may even build a rapid prototype to ensure visitor interactivity functions as expected.

Design
Once the website architecture is approved, your creative team begins working on the visual designs for the project. This is sometimes referred to as user interface design.

Your web designer presents you a series of static images that show how each page of your website will look and ultimately function. These images are the creative, branded portion of your website project, and they’re also usually the most exciting phase as you watch the look of your website evolve!

Development
The proper website design that considers usability, technological restrictions and your target market gives your web developer (which could be the same person who created the design) all the visual cues he or she needs to know exactly how to build your website for standards compliance, speed and interactivity.

Your web developer goes to work on building the “front end” of your website (or what your site visitors will see). Your website is developed into a series of web pages or a development platform, usually a content management system. You’ll be invited to periodically review progress and test features or functionality throughout the process.

Your website should be built to strict standards that ensure maximum compatibility with various web browser software, and it should be optimised for your web hosting server. Good developers create fast, secure and reliable framework to increase the longevity of your website and maintain search-engine accessibility to correctly index your content.

What that means is that your web developer makes sure your website operates quickly, smoothly and can be easily found by search engines and ultimately, your visitors.

Who controls your website?

Almost all websites today are built with a content management system (or CMS) in mind. Even smaller, static sites are developed with a CMS so that website owners can update content on their own.

Website software is much like software you install on your computer. It’s just installed on your web hosting server space instead, and integrated into your website. You can typically access your website by visiting a login page and entering a secure username and password.

A content management system like WordPress or Expression Engine, or an eCommerce management system like Magento allows you to update key areas of your website. You can update text, change the navigation, add new pages, remove old content, update products and process visitor information like forms or product orders.

Having control of your website content is smart. It lets you save time and money, as you won’t need to hire a professional to make small adjustments on your behalf.

Step 3 - Going Live!

Once your website has been developed, passed quality assurance testing and is built to specification, it is time to “go live”! You’re ready to launch your new website and start doing business online.

Launching & Reviewing

Now that your website is live and operational, you should monitor it for a short period to see how your visitors manage navigating around the site and accessing the information they want.

Don’t expect thousands of people to visit your website every day just because it’s live. Only those who know your website exists or those who randomly happen to stumble on your site will visit. This is not such a bad thing (in the begining).

This slower period gives you a good opportunity to take a close look at how your website performs and make any adjustments that might be needed for when more visitors start coming to your site. While these adjustments may incur additional costs, since they’re typically outside the original scope of your website project, they’re an essential part of having a great site that gets you results. This is also part of ongoing reporting and analytics.

Analysing for Improvements

Go ahead; ask people for feedback on your website - the honest kind. Ask existing customers, friends, family and business colleagues to give you their opinion. They’ll generally be open to the question and tell you what they think.
You could even pay for a user study - and that’s a smart option to consider. User studies involve placing a group of people in a room and asking them to complete a set of tasks or perform actions on your website. The results of having first-time visitors exploring your website are often worth every investment!

User studies also let you analyse improvements and adjustments you could make before actively marketing your website. Let a few people spot any problems or sticky points, rather than have thousands find them! Also, a user study helps give you peace of mind that every visitor who comes to your website enjoys a rewarding experience online.

And if the user study results prove positive, and there’s nothing to adjust? Then you know you have a winner.

Submission to Google, Yahoo! & Bing

You should now consider submitting your website to major search engines so they can index your content and make your website available in search results. That means when people type a search request into Google, for example, your website may be one of the lucky ones listed in the results.

Submissions help your website achieve “organic” visitor traffic. Organic traffic means that people find your website naturally, simply by entering a search term, and organic results are very different from those achieved through an active marketing campaign (which we’ll discuss shortly in this article).

There are ways, though, to increase your exposure and result ranking for organic results. Submission to Google, Yahoo! & Bing is an essential one. You can submit your website to these services yourself, you can hire a trained professional, or it can be included in part of a paid online marketing campaign.

Of course, while submission to major search engines is very important, it isn’t a magic bullet to online success. You’ll still need to perform marketing campaigns and work on advertising your website, as you would with any business.

Step 4 - Traffic

Website traffic means getting people to come to your website through various means, like search engine results, links to your site from other sites, or online advertising. If the Internet is a highway, traffic is the people in cars driving around - and you want them to drive on over to your website!

Statistically, the more traffic the better, but realistically you want to make sure you get the right kind of traffic: people who are actively seeking the information, services or products your website offers. Having 10,000 visitors does you no good if only one person buys. It’s a better idea to have 10 visitors, and each one becoming your customer.

This section covers various ways to get traffic moving towards your website. We could write an entire article on every single one of these sections (and we will!), but in this guide, we just want to provide you with basic understanding.

Keep in mind that each technique listed is very important to your website success. A strategy that includes them all will bring you (and your website) some serious results!

Word of mouth

By far, the best way to get people visiting your website is through word of mouth or traditional referrals. Make sure you constantly tell people your domain name at any given chance. Get those business cards out! Include your website domain name in email signatures or blog comments!

This is one case where the more visitors you have coming to your website, the better. These visitors may not actually be overly interested in your products or services, but they have seen your domain name, identified with what you do, heard your website’s clear message, and may pass on this information to friends, family or business colleagues.

You may even get lucky. People might post a link to your site on Facebook, Twitter or other types of social networks, and that link might be exposed to a few of the right people… or even thousands of them.

Search Engine Optimisation

Search-engine optimisation, commonly called SEO, is the practice of optimising your web pages and site in such a way that it earns good ranking in search engine result listings. This means when people type a search request into Google, your website has a better chance of appearing higher up on the list of results. The higher up your site is on the list, the more likely it is that people will see your website.

The SEO process begins during initial development of your website and continues well after deployment and adjustments are made.

SEO techniques include integrating the most commonly used keywords of search requests in your website content, as well as including those keywords in your website’s meta tag. A meta tag is a little piece of code at the top of a website page. It’s hidden from visitor view but tells a search engine exactly what’s in your website content so that the search engine can list your site correctly in search engine results.

SEO isn’t just about getting good results with search engines. It’s also about having great content and page copy (text), as well as having a site with good, clean code to make the web pages load faster and function better in web browsers. All of this comes together to get better rankings with search engines.

Link-building

Link-building is one of the most important factors to achieve good search engine result rankings. As well as ranking websites based on good content and clean code, they rank websites according to general popularity of websites on the Internet. Basically, if many people like your site, it tends to rank better in search engine results.

Search engines measure popularity through inbound links. Inbound links are when other people add a link to their site that points to yours. The more inbound links your website has, the better. It’s even better when you have higher-ranked websites pointing to yours.

It pays to have a good link-building strategy. There are many ways to go about getting links pointing to your website, such as paid links through advertising, reciprocal linking (they add yours; you add theirs) and syndicated content (websites republish the published content on your site and link back to your original content).

Search Engine Advertising

The most common and well-known form of search engine advertising is called Pay-per-Click, or PPC, advertising. This is exactly what it sounds like: Each time a person clicks on a link to visit your website, you pay the service displaying the link for that click.

All major search engines like Yahoo!, Google and Bing offer PPC services, so you can advertise your website on their search result pages in a prominent, well-positioned location. Your PPC advertisement also appears on other web pages running advertising programmes with these search engines. You only pay for clicks and not per the number of times the ad displays on the pages.

PPC works, because ads are targeted for people already seeking your product or service online. For example, John signs up for PPC ads with Google. When a visitor types “sydney cake maker” into a Google search, the search results page may show John’s advertisement in a prominent location. The visitor sees exactly what he’s looking for in John’s ad, and if he clicks the link in the ad to visit John’s website, he’s considered targeted traffic, a visitor that’s already looking for what John’s site sells.

(Note: John’s website might also show up in the search results list Google returns to the person because of SEO techniques for organic traffic.  The searcher may see both the organic results and John’s PPC ad - the more exposure, the better!)

The benefit of using PPC is that it allows you to create almost-instant targeted traffic to your site. New websites take time to rank well in search engine results, but PPC has the potential of giving you instant sales.

Unlike organic search listings, you control the information visitors see and where the visitor is directed to on your website, such as a specific sales page you want that person to read.

Another benefit to PPC advertising is the opportunity to tap into international exposure. Organic search listings vary in different geographical regions. With PPC, you control where your ad gets seen.

You’ll typically set up your PPC on your own (thought you can hire professionals to carry out PPC campaigns for you). You can define how much you want to spend for each click, and you can select keywords, keyword phrases, keyword groups, or categories in which you want your advertisements to appear. Also, you control the traffic of your PPC campaign and can turn traffic on or off.

Advertisers willing to spend the most money for a relevant advertisement are generally listed first, but Google’s PPC ranking system assesses CPC (cost per click), ad relevance, click-through rate, and daily budget, so the order in which ads appear on their search result pages is based on a number of factors.

Social Media Advertising

Until recently, search engines were big players in the online advertising market, but social networking websites like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube etc are breaking into offering their own advertising programmes. These can be as equally important as search engine advertising.

Social media advertising guarantees targeted ads, making sure the right people see your advertisements. Generally, you’ll have better advertising options and opportunities, like dedicated landing pages, fan pages, groups and more. Features are also typically very interactive, and it’s almost like having a mini-website of your own on the network - only with a potential connection to thousands or even millions of users.

If you’re starting a new business online, consider it essential to integrate social media as part of your online marketing strategy. Include Facebook fan pages and groups, Twitter notifications and even YouTube videos into your plan - and each can be easily integrated into your website as well!

Step 5 - Into the Future

Once your website is established and optimised and once you’ve worked on link-building and maybe dabbled in paid advertising and social networking, it’s time to think about your future.

This section is all about generating traffic from new visitors. You need to have your site visited and hopefully browser-bookmarked by a potential customer, but you also need to keep reminding these potential customers to come back again and again.

In the fast-paced world of the Internet, the old saying “out of sight, out of mind” often rings very true.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is possibly one of the best (if not the best) way for you to stay in contact with your website visitors. Also known as permission marketing, email marketing lets you receive people’s explicit permission to contact them for reasons associated with the services or products you offer. They are a targeted prospect for your business, and they offer a greater chance of becoming a lead for a sale or even a customer.

Email marketing goes far, far beyond the simple Outlook contact list. In fact, this method of online marketing has evolved in leaps and bounds over the last few years. (And we’ll note, so have the local federal laws and regulations regarding sending email and SPAM messages.)

Email has come a long way. Today, you can create email that includes design, graphics, and interactive features. Unfortunately, not all email content displays the same on every computer screen, so make sure that your emails have a nice layout and carefully designed to ensure that each recipient sees the same content, in the same format, and without errors.

One mistake could mean missing an important sale or visit to your website.

Measuring the results of your email marketing campaign and newsletters is also very important. A good email campaign service lets you send and manage your subscriber list, as well as measure how many people have opened your email or clicked on links within the messages. You can also schedule automated deliveries of emails to occur on certain dates and at specific times.

To have people subscribe and accept to receive emails from you, your website must include an area where visitors can enter their email address and other information you can request. This information is captured and stored in a database that you can sort and manage.

You can also obtain verbal permission to add people to your subscriber lists. When you meet people at social gatherings, networking functions or anywhere else, it’s a good idea to get the green light to make further contact with them.

Subscribers must always have the ability to unsubscribe from your mailing list and stop receiving emails. These subscribers also have the ability to unsubscribe at anytime by visiting a link in one of the emails you send them.

Be careful, too. There are many legal ramifications for those who abuse the power of email marketing.

Building Relationships

Just as you build relationships offline by interacting and keeping in contact with customers, you can do the same online. The best way to build online relationships, other than by offering fresh and exciting new content to your website on a regular basis, is social networking.

Your website is an interactive presence that visitors can enjoy 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and right from the comfort of their home, office or even on the go via mobile devices. You can offer a richer, more engaging experience to people by tapping into social networking websites on a regular basis.

Social networking websites allow you to link right into their content, effectively letting you add your account updates to your own website or post them from your website back to your account, offering a 2-way content management solution.
Have your website developer tie Facebook or Twitter into your website so that new material you add to your website automatically displays on your account page or vice-versa. This effectively cuts down your content management tasks in half!

Facebook
Create a fan page and offer people interesting and unique ways for them to become involved with your business. You can create applications that let people better engage with your products and services. You can keep in touch with your potential clients via your status updates, or you can offer them videos, photos and more.

YouTube
You can use the power of YouTube to keep your customers interested and informed. Add how-to videos of your products and services, or post video reviews or installation guides. Create a simple video using your digital camera and introduce people to your storefront, your office or your services. You’d be surprised at how much people like to watch short videos!

Twitter
You may have already heard about Twitter, and with good reason. Twitter is very popular, and it’s now tied into major search engines. The service allows you to post status updates instantly, letting friends, family and potential customers know what you’re doing at the moment. You can even engage people in conversation on Twitter - as long as your sentences measure 140 characters or less!

You can use Twitter from your web browser, from your mobile phone and even from your own website (with a little web developer help). Twitter is the perfect way to post news, links to articles and stay in touch with customers worldwide.

Social networking works, providing you stick with it, and it’s simple to use. Update your accounts as often as possible and continue to enjoy the power of cross marketing social networking offers.

Best of all, accounts with social networking websites are free!

Bricks and Mortar

Everything you do offline should be echoed online, and vice versa. Truthfully, setting up an online presence is not very different from setting up a bricks-and-mortar business. Some of the tools may be different, the landscape may be different, but the business-building principles remain the same.

Market your website at every opportunity, and consider it the first point of contact for all your new business prospects. Remember that a website allows you to provide people with a great deal of information, and the more informative content you provide, the greater the chance of converting a visitor into a customer.

One great advantage of getting your business online is that you can make it 100% portable, allowing you to do business from anywhere in the world, any time you’d like. Just because you have a bricks-and-mortar business or you’ve created an office for your online business to work from doesn’t mean you need to spend all your nights and days there.

Software solutions called SaaS (Software as a Service) offer you customer relationship, scheduling, planning, sales tools and more, and they’re all cost effective and easy to use, letting you take your business with you everywhere.

Many of these SaaS solutions also connect with each other so you can link up your administrative systems, from customer accounts to project management to invoicing to payroll.

So go ahead and knock down those physical walls with a new website for your business - but remember to leave one standing. You’ll need it so you can hang all the certificates of achievements you’ll earn!

This guide was written by Steve Barrett for Emotech, a website design and development firm operating from Adelaide, South Australia. Permission is given to reproduce this content with credits to the author and a link back to http://www.emotech.com.au.

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