Okay, so you’re a business owner. Your company has been up and down. Sometimes you worry about making payroll. Other times you wonder if the recent advertising expense will pay off. Then again, you are always wondering, “How can I make my business better, more appealing to prospective customers, and more profitable?”

There are so many hats to wear as a business owner. You’re making all the executive decisions. You’re communicating with multiple vendors. You’re trying to listen to what your customers really want. You’re doing everything you can to maximize the goods or services your company offers. At the end of the day, you might ask, “Is there just one more thing I can do that will help.” Consider this. How effective is the money I’m putting back into my business? How effectively am I growing the company? Is each dollar being maximized that I put back into the business? What can I do better?

One element that is critical now is how a company is presented online. Is there an online presence? Can my product be sold online? If my product can be sold online, am I selling it online? Is my competition selling theirs online? Am I loosing sales because I have zero or poor online presentation? Or, is what my internet guys are doing enough? Are they charging me too much and getting zero results? Do my internet guys know what they’re doing? Should I be using a different internet person to market my company online? Is there any information that attests to people in my small community using the internet to find my products? Well, in short, there is.

There are 300,000,000,000 (300b) online searches per day 30% (90b) of online searches are for products we want to buy – just around the corner (i.e. hair salons, home improvement, restaurants, auto service, etc.) 7.5 billion local searches each month are performed by people who want to make a purchase off-line locally.
Overall, revenue for businesses without online presentation is slipping fast. In the March 2011 article in Bozeman Magazine I shared how E-Commerce purchases are outstripping physical retail locations by 243% (see p 26 March Bozeman Magazine). This information comes from the U.S. Census Bureau reports on E-Commerce for retail goods.

You are doing all you can think of to stay on top of sales, but you notice your competition is slipping ahead, and you ask yourself, “How does that guy get that kind of business?”
Have you considered developing an extensive business profile and web presentation? What is that? How does it look? Do you already have a website? How effective is it for drawing in more business? How do you know? What tools is your internet guy handing over to help you understand your return on investment? You want the answer to all of these questions, but are uncertain where to look for the answers. Who can you trust? It seems like everyone wants to dip deeper into my pockets and very, very few are honest in business anymore.

Here is a set of questions you can ask your internet guys.

• Can you provide me with a breakdown of the “dollar-for-dollar” return on my investment with your service?
• In other words – can you show me how many potential customers you are driving toward my company’s product offerings?
• Is there a company who does what you do for less?
• Why do you charge more? (Where is the value for my money?)
• Are you hiding any information
from me?
• Do I have all the usernames and passwords that are rightfully mine?
• Am I the official (certified) owner of my company’s domain name?
• Can you show me how I can know that I am the owner?
• Is there more information you could be reporting to me than I am getting?
• Do you believe you have my business in a place where my hands are too tied to consider using a different service or company that does what you do?
• How are you driving my company to the top of the search engines?
• Am I on the first page when people search my product on Google, or
Yahoo, or other major search engines?
• Is my business presentation being maximized online?
• What are you using for geo-targeting my business so local customers can find my products?
• Are you concerned about loosing
my business?
• Why? Are you being dishonest in some way?
• Why? Am I paying you more than what I really should be paying for
what you do?
• Do you believe I am being charged
is a fair price?
• Why? (Can you show me a
breakdown of what you are doing
for me?
• Would you pay someone else as much as I am paying you for the
same service?

After this little question/answer session you will have a good feel for whether you are being treated fairly. You want the maximum dollar returned for your web promotion package. You should be able to look at a quick report (daily/weekly/monthly) from your internet promoter and determine the value (cost/benefit analysis). If you’re spending more than the return, it may be time to shop for a new internet presentation. There are a lot of extremely reasonable options available, both locally and outside the local market.

Your business is important. Running the business with the highest degree of efficiency saves your customers money and helps build the business. Your business is important to your customers, your employees, your vendors, the local community, but most of all your family. It is the bread and butter of your own household.  It is also the backbone of the American Business Culture and economy. You deserve the very best that each of your vendors have to offer.

Brent Teague is a Professional Analyst for the Small Business Professional, an E-Commerce Consultant, and Freelance Writer. He can be contacted by phone at 406.595.0127 or email: Brentteague40@yahoo.com/