web advertising

Charlie,

Web pages are best for giving your customers an opportunity to view more details regarding all of your services than you could possible provide economically in a brochure. If you advertise locally you can use your web address in your advertising and develop leads with it if you have a form they can complete online. For example, we have an online quote request page that our customers can complete and then we simply call them to schedule the job after we get it. So in that sense you could say that the customers that view our web site request quotes from us so they could be called "leads" but generally speaking they located our web site from another source of advertising than just the web itself. We just make sure our web address is in everything we do.
 
Having a web presence seems to also provide the consumer with a opportunity to shop your company and make a decision without feeling pressured. It also gives them the perception that you are larger than you may be (in company size) and since there is an unknown cost associated with having a web site that many customers believe to be expensive, it also leave an impression of permanence, much like the phone book does.

Yes, it's worth it. Sometimes the leads we get are due to folks seeing our URL in an ad, and they check us out and contact us. Other times, they have found us in a search engine. Either way, it has helped them to contact us, and getting them to contact you is what it's all about.

Beth
:)

p.s. see the "Buy Sell Trade - Manufacturers & Distributors Area" for sale info on having a web site built.
 
Hello Charlie,

The short answer is No.

Lance and Beth said the benefits very well.

We have had a web page for around seven years. When we first started our business (18 years ago) all proposals were typed and sent via snail mail. Then in a few years along came the computer, but we still sent the proposal. Then fax machines allowed us to deliver a proposal.

We now are presenting proposals via email. We can use our web address for extensions for photos that we think might be of interest to the client. Don't need attachments. So what happens is we can develop a proposal with pictures for our customers and have it to them in a heart beat!

Dave Olson
 
Exactly. The web is a great way to speed up old fashioned paper and glossy photo's. Or as they used to describe web sites in the old days - "electronic brochures". That is until they started with the java applets and the numerous advancements since then. A lot of people put their web site on the internet and they expect to build business with it and honestly it 'aint gonna happen. Here's where it's extremely effective - as an additional name recognition tool. If you are on the road and you see one of my trucks on the road near you, what's easier to remember, my phone number 412-881-6652 or our web site pressurecleaninc.com? You tell me? If you remember the name Pressure Clean Inc., you can find our web address. That's what some people forget when they set these things up. They use these names like ifeeltheneedtospelleverythingout.com and they don't consider the fact that people aren't going to remember that.

Go out and buy MicroSoft FrontPage and do it yourself, it's not that hard. Before I got too busy doing the mundane things like making sure my people get paid, I used to do all our web stuff. Go to www.directnic.com and check the availability of your name and if it's available it'll cost you $15 a year to secure it. They will even set you up a site for something like another $15 a year.

If you are feeling really adventurous you can go and hire somebody to set all that stuff up for you. Our guy is named Ken Pajak at kpajak@vkl.net, or you can talk to Beth about it, I think she builds web sites also.

Either way, just remember the shorter and easier to remember the name, the more effective your web site will be for your business. AND put it on everything! Make people see it so much that they confuse your name with your web site address, that's when you know your advertising is effective.
 
Yes, I do build them. In fact, I have built several for folks in the pressure washing industry, and even built one for a client of ours once.

I don't recommend Front Page. Too cumbersome. Same with Hot Metal. I prefer Dreamweaver. Both Dreamweaver (by Macromedia) and Front Page are available for 30 day trials and can be downloaded. Until you are sure you are going to do this yourself, better to download than to spend the money.

Beth
 
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