I had my vehicle in a local audio shop getting a component installed yesterday.  It took a bit longer than anticipated, so I went back to the office to wait it out. It started to get later in the afternoon and I knew that I would need to pick it up before they closed, so I googled the company to find out when they were closed.  I found their web site with no issues in Google, I proceeded to click the listing and all I got was a completely blank white screen.  Nothing. Zilch. Zero.

When I went to pick up my vehicle, I mentioned to the manager that his web site was down, he didn’t believe me right away and navigated to it at the cash register, only to find the same blank white screen that I had found.  I of course mentioned that I make my living building web sites, etc, gave him my card and he says to me: “It doesn’t really matter that the web site is down, most of our business comes from word of mouth anyway.”

Word of mouth only goes so far when people can’t verify your existence online.  More and more, people judge a company and it’s presence by its web site.  Take yourself for example, when you are browsing or shopping online, would you give your credit card to an amateur looking web site? Would you call a business to come into your home and repair your appliances if their web site looks terrible? Perception is truly reality, and your prospects are making  judgement calls about your business way before they take an action.  Consider this scenario: Bob refers you to xyz company, you google xyz company, xyz company appears to no longer exist.  Game over. You move on to the next company in the search engine results.

Does your online presence instill confidence in your existing customers and / or prospects? If not, give me a call: 866-998-6886, let’s discuss your Internet marketing plans for 2010!

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