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Edmonton Business Coach | When Do You Need a Website?
Hi, welcome back to the Edmonton business coach, Inspired Method Marketing YouTube channel. My name is Karen and this is my husband, Trevor.
And today we’re going to be talking about when do you need a website? A very good topic. Actually asked that or they’re concerned about websites when they have a business. So today I’m going to share a quote with you by Paul Cookson and he says, websites promotes you 24/7, no employee will do that. You got that right. And a website can generate business, promote goodwill among customers and prospects and deliver strong marketing messages.
Yeah, absolutely. So with websites they are your business card and a brochure or they are a sales person that’s there for you, 24, seven three 65. And that’s why we love websites as opposed to just focusing on things like social media and uh, other types of advertising like that. So Karen, what are some questions that people might have before you go to the questions?
I actually, have a story. I remember from one of our, somebody, we were talking to you about their marketing and it’s kind of a good way to think of it physically versus digitally. He had a trellis setup in the mall with pamphlets sitting there beside it with nobody there to give out those pamphlets.
But they were there with the display showing what somebody could have in their backyard and amazing setup and just some pamphlets there. And it was like 24 seven or when the mall was open, people could grab those pamphlets and they did. And they got lots of business just by having that sitting there with no person. So I was thinking how that actually, that’s sort of what a website does for you and your business.
A Website promotes your business
You don’t have to physically be there, Edmonton business coach, but it promotes you and people can learn more about you on that website. So I thought that was kind of a good way to tie those two worlds together. All right.
So, business coach, do you need a website built before you start your business? That’s a burning question. Yeah. A lot of people ask that question. Uh, no, I don’t believe you need to have that before you start your business simply because most businesses that we deal with are either service based businesses or their medical or something of that nature where they’re, you know, in contact with a direct to consumer.
Right? So, um, having your website set up ahead of time is not really necessary at the beginning. The most important things are what we’re going to be talking about next. Yes, that’s right.
So what should you always do first before your website, even when it comes to establishing yourself online?
Well first things first you do need to be thinking about what kind of product or service you’re going to be offering. That is, you know, always number one. Um, you can start thinking about a company name that you want to use, but really where you can start is with a Google my business listing because Google, my business listings are free and they’re free from Google. As a business coach in Edmonton, that’s where I start. That’s where you want people to be finding you online even before you have that website going.
So if you are, let’s say for example, I was speaking with a couple of different plumbers this week, have you’re a plumber and you don’t have a, a great website or your website just nonexistent. You set up a Google my business listing and you have to make sure that you are including your address and fill out the information as clearly and as much information as you possibly can and then begin getting reviews. And then when people are in your local area or in your neighborhood where you’re located and they’re looking for a plumber, then you can be found on the map search.
Have your basic contact info in your Website
Yeah, I was going to actually say what happens if you don’t have an address on there, Edmonton business coach? Lots of people are leery about putting their home address because maybe they don’t have a physical address other than their house. If they’re, you know, a solo-preneur. What happens with that? What do you miss out on when you don’t put your address?
What we’ve been finding is when you don’t put your address, you in a lot of cases aren’t actually pulled up on those local searches. So you don’t come up in the little map window that shows up in Google organic searches. So you need to be putting your address down. I know a lot of people may be nervous about that and all people will see my house. Like it doesn’t matter. You want people to call you make the phone ring and take care of their needs. Right? Yeah, that’s right business coach.
So how important is it to have your vision mission statement
Your, you know, what’s problem you solve or maybe your, and your core values. How important is it to have those figured out, before you even get your website built?
Yeah, those are very important things to be considering and they’re all part of the business planning process that we go through here. At Inspired Method small business coaching Edmonton, we help our clients with business planning and all those questions are answered in those meetings. So finding out what problem, what is the big problem that you solve in the, in the market. And then going through and determining your vision for the company include which includes a number.
Our vision is to help a thousand businesses grow in a five year period
Right. And then your mission statement has to be very clear and, and your mission is how you’re going to actually achieve the vision, right? Um, so that is something that’s important you need to have. And then your company values are also, uh, need to be crystal clear because all these things as we are answering these questions, they are what helped determine your brand. And until you, have a brand idea or brand strategy moving forward, it’s premature to start building a website. All right.
What are the consequences if you don’t iron out those things first?
Well, what’ll happen is you will begin developing your website and you’ll probably have to do it again. You’re probably going to have to redo the content for the website over and over and over again and you, and if you don’t have a clear vision and purpose of what you’re wanting to do, then it’s number one confusing for you. It’s confusing for your buyers and potential customers as well as any employees that you want to bring on board.
If you don’t know what you stand for and don’t know what direction you’re taking the company, then how’s anybody else supposed to know? Right? Edmonton business coach, you want to be as clear as clear can be. And this will also help tie into your no brainer offer that you should always have on your homepage above the fold so that it’s crystal clear how people can get started with you, what you’re offering to your ideal and likely buyer in that smallest viable audience.
So that is a, these are all very important things that you need to take care of at the beginning before you start creating the website. Now a lot of these things of course you can use for creating the words or the content for your website. But until you get these solidified, you are, you’re jumping the gun.
So what would you say is the hardest part of creating a website?
The very hardest part is writing all the content, right? That is the hardest part. Um, that is the part that, where most of it falls off the rails for companies is they, they do a little tiny snippets, one or two sentence here, one or two sentences there, and they think that’s going to be enough for number one, Google to see them and they think it’s going to be enough information for people to make a decision on their company where that, that’s not always the case.
Google likes to see content. I’d like to see that you’re an authority or an expert in your field and that’s what’s going to help you to win more in the search engine results pages. So, um, it’s very important that you have a lot of content. Like, what we recommend to all of our clients as small business coaches, is on each physical page of your website, you have a thousand words.
Don’t have an empty website
Even on our contact page, we have a thousand words on our contact page that was a hard mountain and I wrote all of them on our blog page. Apart from the blogs, the page itself, I created a thousand words for that page. You’re wondering, that’s crazy.
Why would you do that photo blog a thousand words about the blog, like what it’s for, um, who can benefit from it. Um, know one of these videos about why are they so crappy? Um, you know, I answer all those questions on there and the reason is we want to be seen by Google as an authority in our field and that our website isn’t a genuine source of information.
So I guess a good place for you guys to go eventually after this video is to go check out our website Inspired Method.com and just see what we’ve put in there and check out all our pages, get some ideas for yourself and that maybe that’ll help someone. Yeah, for sure.
When is the best time to have your logo designed for your websites and for your branding?
Well, you can start thinking about it as you go along, write down some ideas and, I wouldn’t do anything solid until you’ve got your business plan figured out and, um, talk to a professional designer, get it professionally done. Don’t just go with something crazy cause you want to have a good name that’s a, that’s you know, easily found on Google. You don’t want to have some obscure weird name.
You want somebody that’s going to tell exactly what you do and then create your logo around that. Right. That’s my opinion as a small business coach, because I want to be sure that were found on Google as number one and anything, uh, you know, um, what’s the word I’m looking for? Kind of fru fru or, or very cerebral in thought as far as your logo design.
Unless you have, you know, tons of dollars to invest or you have, you know, venture capital behind you in some really quirky, cool marketing and the idea for it and you willing to put a lot of effort into promoting that, you know, um, then I would just say stick to something clear. Yeah. Like Bob’s plumbing or something like that is very, very simple. Very straight forward.
You should be actually the starting to think about that before that we’ll obviously before the website’s built because like ours behind us here, I mean that was built before the website was completed. Yeah. But you know, you can change it as you go if you decide you want to kind of evolve that logo. I mean we, we built at least five.
Yeah. At least five and in multiple renditions of this one before we said, okay, good enough. We’re done. That’s the logo. Yeah. And I’m totally in love with it now. So yeah. Cool. She’s got a tattoo. I don’t say I should. So your website is not finished on time. You guys are maybe had this happen to you or kind of worried about what happens to my website isn’t done. What do you do while you wait, business coach?
Well, what you do is you start creating blog content. So like these videos we’re making now make a lot of those. Yep. Um, and get a whole bunch in the pipe so that you can continually trickle out the information the more you have done ahead of time. So you get, you know, 10 or 30 done ahead of time. You’ve got, you know, basically 30 weeks of content that you can continually trickle out to your website and that is always going to be helping you get higher up in the Google search engine results page.
So do I need a website if I have a Facebook page?
Oh man, this makes me crazy because I, I was building a list of people to contact now for small business coaching services and some of them on their Google my business location. They have the button there for a website, click on it and it goes to a Facebook page. That is a nightmare because, um, it’s very difficult to get a hold of somebody through Facebook, right? Um, they don’t always have a tab there so you can email them or fill out a form, like typically on a page, it’s just not set up for quick contact.
Right. And you can’t dispel all the information about your business on a Facebook page that you can do pretty good. But, uh, if you’re not, you know, taking advantage of even the free website that you can make through Google, you are, you’re going to be missing out on some calls because not everybody has Facebook.
Somebody will click on that and let’s say it’s an older person who’s not savvy on Facebook or just someone who’s not into Facebook at all. You’re going to be missed like that. That opportunity’s going to sail by you and cause nobody’s going to sign up for Facebook just so they can contact you, Mr. Plumber or Baker or whatever you are. Yeah, they’re just going to move onto the next one. So it’s a huge mistake to just have a Facebook page.
And I feel from an Edmonton business coach perspective, like Facebook pages are clunky compared to websites. The information is kind of all over. It’s not organized the same way as you can on a website. A website is very fluid. It should be anyway and easy to find what you need.
So as soon as my website is done and live, will the traffic start to come to it?
Hmm. I wish I wish that had happened that way. No, it takes time. It takes time for your website to be out there. And then, um, while you’re gathering your Google reviews, until you get to both 40 reviews, um, you’re not really seen as a, uh, a real viable business by Google. Um, it’s one of those triggers that helps get you up in the, in the rankings. I’m an, it improves your, your overall score with Google. So you have to have those 40 reviews on your Google my business listing.
And then with your website, I mean there’s, there’s the algorithm changes so often and there’s so many little things that they’re looking for that, um, sometimes it just takes time and websites that have been around longer get more love than ones that are brand new. And that’s just reality and how it is because they’re looking for the expertise, authority and trust factor. So if you have a brand new website, and even if it’s 10,000, you’ll get some views.
But, um, Google is looking for also time. Time is, is one of those factors, right? Yeah. Well thank you so much for answering so many great questions and information for us. And if you liked what you saw, give us a like and a thumbs up or thumbs up and even send us a comment about what you learned, what you still need to maybe know and don’t forget to subscribe to the channel so you keep up to date with all the latest marketing videos. Thanks and have a great day.