OK. So what is the true value of a small business website? One of the very first questions we get is "How much does it cost?". Of course, that's the knee-jerk initial thought. But it is the wrong question to ask. Read the rest of this page to really understand what we mean. It's incredibly important for your business to get this right!
Alright. Let's imagine the following scenario...
You own a horse ranch. There are 30 beautiful horses. You love them all equally, many born and raised by you right on the property.
One day, as you're tending to daily tasks, you notice that one horse, the young, strong, dark brown beauty is showing off. You just bought him from a friend for $3000.00 He's running and prancing around and even getting attention of your visitors. They are telling you how "pretty" he is. What "personality" he has. And that makes you proud! One woman offers you $10,000 for him. She wants him for her teen-aged daughter. That's a valuable horse! Right? So you sell him and make a quick 7 grand. Great!
The next week an older gentleman comes to you and says he wants your very best and fastest horse. You believe that you just sold him. But he points out into the field to your trusty young stud that you have raised yourself. He's your work horse. Your most dependable animal. He's not for sale. He's your horse.
But this man convinces you to bring him out and let him run. He's FAST! The man offers you $5,000.00 which you outright refuse. Not enough money. He's just a horse, but he's a good one.
Being a reasonable man, he makes another offer. He says that if you sell him to him for the 5k, he'll let you continue to use him with one stipulation. That he can have the first male colt born to the horse as his own. You agree.
Three years after the colt is born, the man enters him into the Kentucky Derby. He doesn't win but places 3rd and wins the man $300,000. And he believes that breeding him will yield a new bloodline of potential Triple Crown candidates. The $5000.00 horse's value is now potentially in the millions of dollars. But YOU missed out. You sold the rights to him and his lineage for a mere 5 grand! That's such a shame. But the old man understood the true long-term value of that horse. You saw only the immediate payouts.
Unfortunately, this is what most small business owners do with their websites. They pay someone to make a "pretty" basic 10 page site. They think they are "good". They let it sit there, stagnant..for years. They expect it to payoff big but nothing happens. Then they wonder why and even conclude that "the web doesn't work"!
That is a critical business mistake.The true value of a small business website is in the "offspring". Did I just hear you say, "Huh"?
It's true. You can't just toss up a "website". That's like that astute man buying your used up 8 year old horse that you use only to give hayrides to kids. He was smarter than that. He knew that he first needed a strong foundation. And that he would need to nurture, train, coach and continually fine-tune the lineage if he wanted a big payout.
Your website's "offspring" or lineage is the ongoing content development.. Like the horses, your website isn't a one-and-done effort. Treated that way, it will starve! Just like the horses, you must feed it, nurture it, and grow it into a real champion if you want to win.
Now, that seems like a lot of work and would be very expensive, right? Well. it is a lot of work. And someone has to do it. And most small business owners simply do not have the knowledge or time to go at it themselves.
That's why we're here! We're your breeder! We'll build the foundation. We'll build the ongoing content! We'll work non-stop to monitor, manage, improve and enhance the content. And we'll do it with your input, in full partnership with you. After all, this is your business.
The analogy here then, is winning "races" equals making sales!
Ex. You could pay a new salesperson $35.000 a year to sell your wares. He would work about 8-10 hours a day. IF he/she were good at everything needed to produce a consistent profit...that 35k would be a good "investment". So how does this compare to a well developed website?
You MUST look at it this way:
Remember the offspring? The ongoing content that must be developed in order to win those races? OK. That's the key to the value of a small business website. Each new page of content, each new video, each new blog post, each new social media comment, are all your Triple Crown race horses!
They are not only fast, they enter EVERY race. They enter the races with the highest payouts. The run races all day long- 365/24/7! AND..they..win!
How many 35k, 10 hr salespeople with mediocre abilities would you need to hire to accomplish that? One? Five? Thirty? Let's say it's just one.
And just for illustration, let's say you pay the same 35k for website and development over a three year span. That's about 1000.00 a month if you break it down.
So the website costs only about 10k a year, works 365/24/7, sells everything you offer perfectly. And only sells to the IDEAL buyer prospects, etc, etc. And... uh...it continually reproduces... for FREE!
OK. Now you know the true answer to the value of a small business website!
All you need to do now is choose the right partner to help you achieve this!
(and you know who that is now...right?)
Thanks for reading!