Technology has opened new doors to the small business owner. In the generation of our parents, there were straightforward needs: a phone number, a list of contact names, and the simple determination to market the business. The World Wide Web changed all of that. Now, while you still need that phone number and a list of names, you also are expected to have a website and – with Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn sites dominating marketing news – a social media plan.

Do you need to have all of this in place before you begin marketing your business? Of course not. However, it does help to have a place to start and, increasingly, marketing experts state that place is online. So before you place your first call or send your first email promotion, you will want to have a website ready to receive your first customers.

Why Is a Website Important?

A website is now considered the core of the small business marketing portfolio. It is as important as having a number that your customers can call and a business card that you can distribute at a trade show. Why? In increasing numbers, consumers are no longer turning to the printed Yellow Pages for information. Rather, they are going online and using search engines like Google or Bing to find everything from basic directions to a nearby retailer to recommendations for a new family restaurant. According to an ongoing consumer-focused study published in March 2010 by BIA/Kelsey, nearly twice as many survey respondents (90 percent) used search engines as the Yellow Pages (48 percent).

Because the first step to a successful marketing effort is being where your customers are, it makes good business sense to be online and findable.

Why is Purchasing a Domain Name the First Step?

There are many ways to get your business online with its own website, but the first step is to purchase a domain name. Domain names – like buymecoffee.com or insertyournamehere.com – are simply the addresses whereby a customer can find your website.

You will read from some advisors that you do not need to buy a domain name of your own to create a business website. In fact, some companies promise everything to you for free: an online address and the tools to build your own site. But these offers come with strings attached: The first is that the address that they provide (yourname.theirname.com) is merely an extension of their business marketing. Place that domain name on your business card and you provide the other business with free promotion!

The second problem is that their tools often come with their branding. Perhaps you have already seen websites like this: the text and banner advertising points the visitor to different sites all together. Surely you do not want your site to direct customers away from your core message!

Finally, just as if you were subleasing an office from a primary leaseholder, you take on the risk of the other company. If their business site closes, so does yours. This may be an extreme circumstance, but being a savvy business owner means anticipating the possible.

Are these the problems that you want your small business to take on in exchange for “free”? With prices for domain names at less than $10 per year, do yourself a favor and buy your own, unique name. Just remember to make it simple and memorable.

What Else Do I Need?

In addition to a domain name, you have two very important choices: a web design that provides the online polish to your small business story and a website host to show that finished product to the consumers looking for your business.

Design: Beyond the free sites come there are many inexpensive ways for you to launch your small business website to the world. At sites like TemplateMonster.com and ThemeForest.com, you can purchase complete website designs and hire developers at a fraction of the cost of an original design – a blessing to both your checkbook and your peace of mind. If you need a more complex site – with a shopping cart or a regularly updated blog, for example – there are free, open source programs like Zen Cart, WordPress and Joomla with which you can have your site built. These content management systems (CMS) are well-developed and often backed by passionate communities of users – many just like you.

Of course, hiring a designer to craft a look that uniquely represents your business is the best choice. But if you do not want to make that investment at the start, these options are available.

Hosting: Once you have purchased a template or a unique design, the next choice is to find a company that will serve it up to your potential customers. Prices for hosting companies can vary widely and so can service quality.

It helps to know what matters most to you and your business before you begin shopping. For example, how important is it to you to have 24/7 access to a customer service representative? If you have a small writing consulting firm, unexpected server downtime may not be as critical for you as it is for the owner of an auction site.

Use review sites like VistaInter.com and FindMyHosting.com to help you choose a host that provides the right balance of industry standard tools, pricing plans, and customer service.

What Comes Next?

These decisions, while small, serve as the foundation upon which your small business marketing can grow. With a memorable domain, a great design, and a strong hosting infrastructure, you can turn your attention to what really matters: the use of your website to promote your business to potential buyers of your products and services.

With inexpensive domain registration and equally affordable designs at your fingertips, online marketing of your small business is simply business smart.

Help your customers find you today with your first small business website.

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The author, Tammi L. Coles, writes for Archer Targeted Communication, a boutique marketing and communications company. Does your business need assistance in getting on the web? Call her for a consultation at +1 (202) 470-6815 USA or email tammi.coles@archertc.com.

As a fellow small business owner, what would you advise the shopkeeper to do?

Dear Madame:

I am writing to express my distress about the encounter my friend and I experienced in your shop on Saturday, July 9. I am also writing to suggest a remedy.

My friend and I were first-time visitors to your store, but eager to shop there. I had seen your shop a number of times on my way to the city center, and a co-worker and neighboring resident had expressed her enthusiasm for it. In any case, my friend is soon to be married in September and, because she wears an usually large size, I thought this would be the perfect place to take her for a wedding gift.

As first-time visitors, we were very taken with the intimate-wear on the racks. I was pleased when a shopwoman approached us regarding a fitting, and my friend readily agreed. Not surprisingly, my friend had been too consumed with checking out your impressive selection rather than reading any wall signs. So was I. That means she received an unpleasant shock when she was told that the fitting would cost her $5.

Although my friend apologized for her ignorance and the shopwoman agreed to waive the fee, the situation still escalated unpleasantly. Indeed, both the shopwoman and you, the owner, insisted that a couple of signs stated the $5 policy. What was troubling, however, was your insistence that we should have noticed the signs, which we inferred as either (1) “any dummy could have seen it” or (2) “you deliberately chose to ignore it so you could misuse our services.” Not surprisingly, we left without shopping further or expressing an interest to return for a later purchase.

Because I have worked in customer service positions, I am not so foolish as to assert “the customer is always right.” But I do believe that customers should be given the benefit of the doubt and that deferring to misunderstanding more often than not serves to shore up good feeling and repeat business. Why did we not hear “we’re sorry for the misunderstanding, please come back again” from you or your staff?

Well, there is still opportunity for that. I would like to support a boutique shop such as yours and would like to recommend your business to my similarly-busty peers. I am enclosing the address of my friend below and I am requesting that you send a note of apology to her for yesterday’s incident and an invitation to her to return. I am certain that she would receive it well, and that she would signal to me a willingness to shop at your store again. Her name is Name Withheld and her address is 3200 Nameless Avenue, Apt. 301, Anycity, VA 12345.

Thank you for your prompt action. I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Your Customer?

Readers, your advice for the shopkeeper?

Flickr photo credit: James@mannequindisplay.com

Philip Eggers has started six medical device companies in his Dublin, Ohio, hometown. His last five followed a pattern: Eggers would develop the product in his Ohio lab, fly frequently to the Bay Area or Boston to raise money, then relocate the company to one of the coasts when ready to commercialize the product. But Eggers has a different plan in mind for his latest startup, Cardiox, founded in 2006 to develop a noninvasive way to detect heart shunts: He wants to find funding locally and keep his five-employee business in Dublin.

As the economy reels, Eggers is one of many entrepreneurs quick to tout the ease of doing business in small or midsize cities. Plenty of factors make the city of 38,000 outside Columbus attractive for starting up: Abundant, inexpensive office and lab space; a major university, Ohio State, nearby; a growing population; and good local schools to attract workers with families. “It draws the highly skilled and educated people you need to bring in, especially to a high-tech startup company,” Eggers says.

In high-growth and more conventional businesses, many entrepreneurs find that bigger isn’t always better when it comes to selecting a place to start a company. …more at The Pros of Planting Startups in Smaller Cities – BusinessWeek, published 27 March 2009.

Flickr photo credit: Feuillu

If you’ve been freelancing for long, then there’s no doubt you’ve read some of the horror stories about bad clients. You may have even run into a few bad clients in your own business.

Over the years, I have noticed that most bad clients seem to fall into certain common patterns. In this post, I share those patterns with you. Keep in mind that none of these bad client types are specific to any one client that I’ve ever worked with. Rather, these examples are a generalization of the many different characteristics a bad client can take. Personally, I rarely ever have to deal with a bad client in my business, and I’ll explain how you too can avoid them later on in the article. …more at 10 Types of Bad Clients and How To Avoid Them – FreelanceFolder, published 17 March 2009.

Flickr photo credit: marblegravy

But those of us who run small and home businesses have a different perspective on outsourcing.

For us, outsourcing is the “secret sauce” that lets us pull together the resources to handle temporary work overloads, reduce fixed costs, speed products to market, simplify distribution, provide more or better service to our customers, and compete with our deeper-pocketed competitors.

Much of the business that small businesses outsource goes to other small and home businesses within our own country. Often those freelancers or subcontractors are business owners we’ve met at local business meetings or events. Sometimes they’re people we’ve “met” by participating in a mailing list or forum, or via specific Web sites, like Elance.

But the key to successful outsourcing has little to do with where you meet the subcontractors and freelancers you work with. Like anything else, it takes planning. Here are 18 ways to get the best results when you outsource work… more at 18 Tips For Small Businesses That Outsource – SmallBizResource, published 19 March 2009.

Flickr photo credit: markhillary

It’s a shame that most of you will only meet Marcia through the printed or electronic page because her enthusiasm and energy are contagious. Being a multi-mistake-maker myself, the first thing I said to Marcia was “I bet you have a long line of small businesses who want to be in your column.” When Marcia told me that she literally had to beg companies to share their ‘Biggest Mistake’ I couldn’t believe it.

“Let’s just say I have no problem doing my part to convince people. I’m not too proud to beg,” she said with a big smile and sparkling eyes. She was undaunted by the multitude of rejections she’s received over the five years it took to pull together over 260 small business lessons, from which just over 120 stories made the book. …read more of this at Book Review: My Biggest Mistake And How I Fixed It – Small Business Trends, published 4 March 2009

Flickr photo credit: julsatmidnight

If not, it’s time to get a better handle on your advertising’s ROI. After all, why waste money buying advertising that isn’t working?

You need to look at two things: which specific ads bring in customers, and which advertising media results in new business. An ad placed in a weekly shopper-type publication may draw new business week after week, while the same ad place in a local, tabloid-format newspaper may not attract any new customers. Or, vice versa.

You can find out which ads and media are producing customers by tracking responses to your ads. …read more at How To Tell Which Ads Are Working – SmallBizResource.com, published 5 March 2009.

Flickr photo credit: Bright Star

“The idea that they don’t want to talk to salespeople isn’t true,” insists Illig, a senior consultant with FranklinCovey’s Sales Performance Group. “They just don’t want to talk to all salespeople.”

Clients want a competent salesperson focused on their numbers and needs, not on his or her own sales objectives, says Illig. They want an efficient sales process that results in good decisions that work to their benefit.

“And the process should add value to customers by exploring choices and assessing the impact of those choices so clients can decide with confidence,” he explains. “Because at the highest level, the biggest fear clients have is that someone will talk them into a poor decision and a bad outcome.” ..read more at Making the Most of Your Sales Pitches – NFIB.com, published 4 March 2009

Flickr photo credit: Shutter Daddy

Businesses cannot exist without customers, so it’s sadly ironic that many, if not most, businesses, actually understand so little about them. As a company grows, a smaller and smaller percentage of the staff interacts with the customers. In fact, those folks on the “front line” (think call centers, service counters, retail stores) are typically among the lowest-paid and have the least authority.

Meanwhile, back at headquarters fundamental decisions are made with extremely limited information about customers. There, understanding the customer is often considered someone else’s responsibility, because, “we have a department for that.” No department has a complete view of the customer, however, and so in place of true understanding are models and frameworks that attempt to describe the customer. Many companies don’t go beyond demographics and market segmentation. While it’s helpful to know how they break down by age, sex, income, region, and other easily measurable characteristics, there’s actually very little you can actually do with that information. In order to become customer experience-driven, you need to go beyond who your customers are, and understand what they do. …more at It’s Not Who Your Customers Are, It’s How They Behave – Peter Merholz – HarvardBusiness.org, published on 11 February 2009

Flickr photo credit: Roger B.

A: You probably can’t.

The new client concluded, fairly or unfairly (but fairly, I think) that if things are going wrong already, at the start of your working relationship, it does not bode well for work down the road.

But I suggest that a bigger issue is at play, namely, the value and power of first impressions. And especially in this economy, first impressions are more important than ever.

Back in my UCLA days, I once got a job as at a new pizza joint. My roommate at the time gave me some advice that has served me well ever since. “When you get a new job,” he told me, “work extra hard the first month. Do extra without being asked. Say yes to everything. They will see what a good, hard worker you are, and forever more will look at you through that lens.” I must say that I have since found this to be quite accurate. …more at Ask an Expert: You’ve got to impress clients from the get-go – USATODAY.com, published 16 February 2009

Flickr photo credit: cursedthing