10 Reasons Why Small Businesses Absolutely Need a Web Site

Jenn Murray

By Jenn Murray, Web Designer

In today’s Internet-centered culture, websites have become the most powerful marketing tool a business can possess. Still, as a small business owner, you may be wondering, “Do I really need a website? What could it possibly do for me? How could I afford one?”  But before you brush aside the idea, consider the following 10 points:

1.   Customers are looking for you. In today’s internet savvy world, people are much more likely to do a Google search to find a business than open the phone book . By not having a website, you may be missing out on business.

2.    Customers want to research beforehand. People like the ability to anonymously research a business before deciding to approach them. Provide the right information via a user-friendly website, and you can “reel them in,” as it were. 



3.    It gives you credibility. A website allows you to share the number of years you’ve been in business, your experience and education, as well as photos, testimonials, etc. This establishes credibility, especially to people who have never heard of your business before.

4.    Many people won’t “buy” unless you have a website. In today’s market place, a huge part of a business’ image and credibility is based on its website. If it doesn’t have one, or if the website falls short, then the business’ credibility is diminished – even before the person contacts the business. You may be losing customers without even realizing it.

Should Your Business Get In The Clouds?

Joshua Dronzek

By Joshua Dronzek, Grey Signal, Inc.

A controversial question – most business owners are against the almighty “cloud.” It is said the cloud is easily hacked, data can be lost or become corrupted. But in reality, most business owners do not realize the cost and dangers of having software locally on their network until it becomes too late. A few days ago, one of our clients at another company I work for called me and said “Josh, our building has burned to the ground. We need set back up.” I was appalled – I have never been in an instance where a client’s building has just all of a sudden burned down. Weeks beforehand, I was talking with the owner about getting their business into the clouds, and bringing all of their clients, documents, and workflow onto the cloud platform. This robust, automated and highly intelligent system would have been the right choice for this company. They didn’t want it –said it wasn’t needed. A few weeks later, the building was burned to the ground. One of my employees asked “Was everything backed up?” The CEO said “Yeah, but it was in the building.”

Worksite Wellness

By Kathy Fillip



Kathy Fillip

Wellness programs in organizations are increasing in number, but attendance in these wellness programs are often low and results can be difficult to track.  The definition of worksite wellness programs will vary from company to company and is truly based on the individual goals of each company.  The majority of employers will offer a one time a year worksite wellness program for employees to attend during company time. 

Frequently these events are often held during the fall giving the employee the opportunity to get vaccinated with the flu shot.  Some of the vendors at these health fairs will consist of a local chiropractor doing some type of health screening or massage, IRA, mutual funds and banking agencies that could offer better rates, the employer human resources department that can answer any employees benefit questions, the employer health care provider such as UPMC, Highmark and any other groups the employer would feel that could benefit the worksite wellness event.

Many times the employer will offer incentives for participating in each activity going on during the health fair.  Wellness program incentives can take many forms including time off, gift cards, or cash.  This can help encourage employees to take part in the event and visit each vendor table.                                                                       

How to Hire the Right Cleaning Service or Any Contactor

Tim Maloney

By Tim Maloney, Owner of Dirt Doctors

Hiring a cleaning service or any service professional can often be a frustrating task.   We have all heard the horror stories about shoddy work or people getting ripped off, and we all want to avoid that happening to us.  Whether you are hiring someone for work in your home or office, you want to choose the right service provider to work with. 

Here are some tips for selecting the right company:

The best place to start is with a referral from family, friends or colleagues.  There may be times that you just don’t have that luxury (like for an emergency repair) but when possible, ask someone you know for a referral before going directly to the phone book or the internet.

Whether you have a referral or not, check for an online presence.  Most legitimate companies today have websites.  However, take it a step further and check for an online presence on sites such as LinkedIn, Yelp or MerchantCircle to see what others are saying about their work performance. 

What Does a Small Business Want From a Website?

By Jim Lillicotch, Website Design, Promotion and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Expert



Jim Lillicotch

There are many small businesses that, even in this day and age, don't have a website or have one that just sits there and does nothing.  What they want is a website that makes money instead of costing money.  A site that is search engine friendly will assist in accomplishing this goal.  That way the search engines will help them by sending them traffic.  When it comes to business on the Internet, traffic is everything. 

You don't have to be a fortune 500 company.  You don't have to wait years or even months.  You don't have to have a multi-million-dollar budget.  Anyone can compete, even mom and pops. You just need to know the right way to go about promoting your websites as well as optimizing them for the search engines.

One thing I've discovered is that when it comes to building web sites for businesses, there really are no shortcuts.  If you cut corners, it will always come back to haunt you.  This could lead to many, many changes or, in the worst case, a site that just doesn't work well.

What is a small business to do?

Even if you don't want to do any or all of the work yourself there are things that you should know, to make sure the job is done right.

A clean looking site that is easy to navigate is first and foremost. The best content in the world and a million visitors a day won't do you any good if your visitor can't find what they are looking for. Stick to simple menus for navigation. Flash and Java menus can be slow to load and some visitors can’t even see them. Simple HTML links can be made to look very fancy with a good style sheet. I especially like the fact that you can have just one style sheet that controls all of the pages on your site and that you can change the look of all of your pages by just changing one file. There are many tutorials and references about CSS on the web these days. Even if you don’t want to take the time to learn all of the intricacies of the subject it’s probably a good idea to learn the basics.