5 Ways to Know You Need a New Site

1. You purposely don’t tell people about your site.
We see this all time: business owners who are not proud of their site for any number of reasons and so don’t tell people about it. I know some business owners who, when asked if they have a web site always respond, “Yeah, but it’s old and I haven’t touched it in awhile.”

What impression are you leaving with the people you connect to when you talk about your site?

The fact is, business owners who are proud of their site have more traffic because (drum roll) they tell more people about it.  Ta Daaa! Like a proud parent showing off pictures of their children, business owners with killer sites sing about them every chance they get.

Finally, business owners who have gone through the process of getting a professionally-designed site simply have a greater general knowledge of web technology than other business owners. They get asked about their site, or asked to explain concepts they use in everyday language and what results is their site is noticed more.

2. You pay or paid little to nothing for your site.
I know I will take some hits about this reason because it’s so self-serving, and rightfully so, but hear me out. First, I have never met any business owner who was ecstatic about their free site (see reason #1 for the implications of that). The fact is “free” web services are never free. You pay for them – as sure as the sun rises. True, you may not remit actual cash for them, but you pay in time, frustration, inflexibility, poor branding, bad first impressions, unanswered phone calls and unreturned emails.

Free site services are actually fairly expensive.

3. It hasn’t been touched since it originally went live.
Any readers out there with “that sinking feeling” right now? This is a big one. Try this: start a 60-day recruiting effort to find a new key employee to launch a new sales channel. Then hire her and start paying her each pay period. Now, here’s the easy part, don’t look at her, speak to her, train her, give her any attention, tell anyone about her nor utilize her at all for 18 months straight. Simple right? Now here’s the question, who’s to blame if her sales aren’t what you expected?

That’s your website.

4. It appears as if it were designed by a plumber.
Please don’t judge…I am not hating on the plumber. Insert any profession there. The fact is, when I need a sink installed, I call a plumber. When I need a trademark filed, I call a lawyer. The point is so many small business owners pay good money for an attorney, carpet installer, HVAC specialist or mover and then sit down and “cobble a site together.” Why is that exactly?

How you look online is important. And the design of your website, or any materials you use in your business, is communicating something about your company right now. Do you know what impression your website is making today? Does that fit with what you say about your business?

5. You don’t have a site right now.
“My customers are not online.” I still hear this. Can I clear this up once and for all? Yes they are. The truth is, you are not online. And you would like to believe that fact to be universally true. It is not.

Everyone is looking for more efficient ways to reach more people. You may actually need to broaden your reach beyond the people you have been calling on for the last several years.

A website and some ideas about how to use a website are usually a good place to start!