We live in a digital world, where not only young people and their parents, but also their grandparents, are increasingly using the internet. Just think, while 10 years ago grandparents didn’t know what the internet was all about, today they can be found on Facebook and many can shop online.
And the global market is growing: according to research by eMarketer and Statista, online retail sales will reach $6.51 trillion by 2023, and e-commerce websites will represent 22.3% of total retail sales.
These are unimaginably huge numbers, and if you want a slice of the cake, it’s essential to have your own website in 2023.
But what does the website help with? How can you exploit the potential of the online space in ’23? In this article we show you how.
Why have a website?
In short, the role of a website is to generate sales, collect leads or share information with interested parties.
So you can create a website to sell one or more products. In such cases, the website must contain all the necessary information:
- what the product is,
- what are the benefits,
- what its main function is,
- how much it costs,
- and how can be purchased.
But a website can also promote your restaurant, bakery, cake shop, hairdresser, lawyer or doctor services.
Of course, it doesn’t have to be a money-generating site: if you have a hobby that you’d like to share with others (such as knitting or other handicrafts), you can create a website for that purpose too.
The key is to have a purpose for the website. If it’s to sell, it is, and if it’s to provide information, that should be the focus.
7 reasons why you need a website in 2023
Let’s take a closer look at why you should have a website in the new year.
#1 This is what consumers dictate
As we said in the introduction, the older generation is already active users of the internet, so all audiences are there, just to different degrees.
Now that everyone is so comfortable in the online space, it’s no exaggeration to say that a website is more like a shop window than a traditional shop window.
As people “walk around” in the digital space, they see your website – your shop window – and “visit” you. And if they like what they see, they will buy or use your service. But if you don’t have a shop window, i.e. you don’t have a website, you will simply be invisible to the people of the internet.
And this is bad news because people are spending more and more time online: on average, they spend 7(!) hours a day online worldwide. So assuming we sleep 8 hours out of 24, we spend almost half of the remaining 16 hours online. This is an incredibly high number already, but it will rise even more in the future.
#2 The online presence itself
Imagine that someone, somewhere, sees your poster, likes you and searches for you online, but can’t find you. What do you think he’ll think? Most likely it will be that the company has unfortunately gone out of business and you can’t buy from them.
A website is also needed to send the message that I am here, I am working. Going further, it communicates to prospective clients that you take your work seriously.
Here you can share information about your products, services, hobbies, get to know your customers better, and even meet customers from across the country or around the world.
It’s called the World Wide Web for a reason: it spans continents, giving you access to potential markets that a traditional physical shop or office could never reach.
#3 Keeping up with the competitors
Sooner or later, digitalisation is inevitable, but the main question is whether you will be the first to go or your competitors. Whoever is able to reach their target audience in the online space first will have a huge advantage over their competitors.
And with the right energy investment, you can even compete with industry giants.
#4 Social media is changing
If everyone is on Facebook, why not just have a Facebook page?” you might ask. However, Facebook (Meta) has been abandoned by many people recently, the younger generation is not interested at all and prefers to use TikTok or BeReal.
Social media is constantly changing and evolving, and you need a very strong marketing team to be present and producing content on all platforms.
However, a website is like a massive stone pillar in the social media storm, which you can keep up to date and help the search engine rank you higher with every piece of content.
In the long run, this naturally leads to more organic reach, for which you don’t have to pay.
And here we go back to Facebook, where organic reach is steadily decreasing. There are competitive markets where you really have to burn huge amounts of money to get people to interact and get the message to the target audience.
#5 Flexible working hours
In a physical shop, you have to get up early, open early and stay until the end of the working day. On top of that, if you don’t own the space, you have to pay rent and overheads, which are sky-high at the moment due to the energy crisis.
By contrast, you can run an online shop from anywhere, and there’s no obligation to be in front of your computer at 8am.
There are no overheads, only hosting and possibly maintenance, but these are a fraction of what you might spend on a traditional shop each month.
Moreover, if your site is well automatized (newsletter, credit card payment, online invoicing), your administrative efforts will be practically zero.
And you can even replace customer service with a good chatbot to reduce the workload even further. And you can spend that time getting more customers and growing your business as you get bigger and bigger.
#6 24-hour customer service
A website never closes (except for maintenance) and is always available. Even if someone thinks about shopping at midnight, they can still place an order with you, or check in with you the next day to use your service.
Plus, if someone has a question, the chatbot can answer it. And if the answer is not satisfactory, you can answer it yourself, within 24 hours. The bottom line is that you can do your job more efficiently, in less time and with more money.
#7 Good return on investment
When people think of investments, they usually think of real estate or some kind of stock, share or capital fund. Maybe a start-up. But there is a much simpler but profitable investment, which is, not too surprisingly, a website.
You can accelerate your return on investment, or ROI, in a number of ways: SEO, well-placed CTAs, super high-quality images, useful information and easy ordering and booking.
If you think you need a good return on your investment, check out our references and if you like us, contact us.
