Is Your Business Ready For The 21st Century?

You might answer, I think so, but if you haven’t been keeping pace with today’s technology your marketing and sales may be lagging behind. Your customers want to know that they can find you, do it 24/7 and that your business is in tune with developing marketing trends to mobile.

At the end of 2010 there were 78.2 million smart phones or PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants – read: tablets, iPads, notebooks etc.). That number has significantly jumped in a very short period of time as these devices become more affordable and desirable to the masses. Consumers, and your potential customers, want instant gratification. They want to find you now and if they can’t they will move on down the virtual street.

You can’t help but notice the people around you, no matter where you are, be it the grocery store, doctor’s office or getting an oil change, who are connected to their electronic gadgets. They have time to kill and do so by pulling out their cell phones to research new clothing lines, best restaurant coupons and even buying from Amazon right there and then using their phones.

Imagine a soccer mom with two kids that have different after school activities on the same night. She needs relief in the “what to do for dinner” category. While she’s waiting for the kids to get their stuff together mom checks her smart phone for local pizza specials. In an instant she has the pizzeria on the line and she’s ordering dinner for pick-up in an hour. If your business does not have a mobile-friendly, mobile-ready website for her to use she is on to the next pizza parlor.

So what does this all mean for you, the local business owner? You need to stand out from the crowd. With a really simple, well designed website that is optimized for smart phone users you will get more traffic. If the “other guy” has a website that can’t be read without thoroughly frustrating the user customers will run to you and your business every time.

You’ve heard it a million times and I’m going to say it once more: “Do not try this at home.” What do I mean by that? Let a professional build you a mobile website. Make a great first impression when someone comes to you via their smart phone. When you do your visitors will return again and again to learn more about your business and eventually buy from you.

People who use their phones to search the Internet love to find websites that are mobile friendly and easy for them to navigate. They will bookmark those sites and return to them often. How long would you be willing to wait for a website to load on your device only to then discover it is way too difficult and frustrating to navigate?

Have you checked your company’s website on your smart phone recently?

Do you want to quickly hit the back button and look for this week's coupon on your competitor’s user-friendly mobile site??

This could be happening to your business every day without you even knowing it.

What a waste. Your mainstream marketing brought them to your site but then they couldn’t find what they were looking for without expanding the page view or scrolling side to side or squinting just to see the info on your page.

The solution is simple. With a mobile-friendly website you’ll be able to reach your customers and win them over to your business. It’s just that easy.