Believe it not, every successful small business web site has a distinct purpose.  This purpose is what separates  a successful web site from a non-successful web site.  Executed correctly, the Internet can be a very prosperous medium.

The problem is that most people don’t even know what the purpose of their web site is, and therefore, can’t change it for the better.

If you sell products over the web, your goal is to generate a sale.  That’s it!  Everything else is wasted space and energy.  If you sell services with a sales cycle, your goal is to generate a lead (whether they submit a contact form or call you).  If you have a a local service business like a carpet cleaner, pest control business, mechanic, or doctor, your goal is for people to pick up the phone and call you.  Period!

The preconceived notion of what a web site is for often gets in the way of these goals.  75% of the people we talk to who want a new web site have no goal with it.  They just want a web site because they think they should.  Now that’s better than having nothing, but not by much.  They should want a web site to generate new business - everything else is a waste of their valuable time and resources.

One of the big mental blocks people have is this standard of what a website should have.  For example, everyone thinks that an “About Us” page is SOOO important.  While it’s probably good to have in some sales format, do you really think someone is going to patronize your business just because you have the same credentials as all your competitors?

There is no secret formula - like I said, every business is different.  However, there should be a goal behind every web site, and a way to effectively measure that.  That could be calls generated from the web site or purchases made on the web site or people who requested more information.  If you can’t measure the effectiveness of your website, it’s probably not worth putting in the time.  You could just be spinning your wheels.

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