Firstly, we’d like to congratulate you on having a business. That in and of itself is a terrific feat and we wish you the very best in growing it to be strong and profitable.
The question you’re asking is one we do hear a lot and is even asked a lot on Google, “Do I need a website for my business in Ghana?”
Whilst the answer to that question would depend on a few factors like your target market and your industry, the truth of the matter is that almost every single business in Ghana can benefit from having a website.
That’s just how useful websites are.
It doesn’t even have to be an expensive website, it just has to be one that serves its purpose really well.
If you want to get the maximum benefit out of anything, you need to know why that thing exists. Once you do, you’ll then know how your website can benefit your business.
Here are the 3 reasons why you should have a website for your business in Ghana:
To make your customers happy
The very first reason why you need a website is because your business exists to serve your customer first, not you.
You have to put yourself into the shoes of both your potential and existing customers. If you do, you’ll realize that people only do business with people they trust.
And the way to build trust is through honesty and multiple interactions. A potential client will need to seek information from you to clarify any of their fears and doubts about doing business with you and your website can alleviate lots of those fears.
When a potential client visits your website and they can find the answers to the questions they have, you automatically begin to win their trust without lifting a finger. They soon want to work with you.
Your future clients will trust you more when they can:
- Find answers to frequently asked questions about your product or service.
- Read reviews by past and present clients who have used your services.
- Find your physical address if needed.
- Find your contact information in case they need to reach you via phone or email.
- See any awards you’ve won and why you’re the best company to work with.
- See any partners or brands that you’ve worked with.
- Can get educated by you personally on various problems and benefits that your products and services provide.
And a whole lot more. One of the reasons why international businesses are respected and trusted is because their websites are goldmines of information. They are open, honest and truthful, showing customers that they have nothing to hide.
Free Advertising and Exposure
Building a business is not easy work, no matter the industry. And that’s why to succeed, you need all the help you can get.
Many businesses fail because they weren’t successful at marketing. In other words, they couldn’t get their business in front of the right people willing to patronise their service.
14% of small businesses failed because of poor marketing.
One of the main sources of exposure or marketing is to pay money for advertising. Many businesses pay big bucks each month to advertise on various platforms like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, etc, to help increase the awareness of their business.
There are more than 7 million active advertisers on Facebook.
The problem with advertising though is that the day you run out of money, your advertising stops immediately. And once your advertising or marketing efforts stop, you could be on a downward spiral towards bankruptcy unless you find another way to get exposure.
But did you know that if you have a website, you can get absolutely free exposure via search engines like Google?
There are almost 8 billion searches performed every day on Google. Out of those 8 billion searches, there is a significant fraction looking for the very thing that you sell.
All you need to do is position your website in the eyes of Google as the most trustworthy website when it comes to your product or your service, and Google will be HAPPY to rank you as number one for those queries and send free traffic your way.
Is this traffic significant? Yes, it is!
A website like GhanaWeb.com sells advertising. To sell advertising, they have to display information, news and entertainment that people want. They have done this successfully and because of that, Google sends them traffic that is worth over $574,700 each and every month.
GhanaWeb.com gets to save almost this amount each year in money they don’t have to spend on advertising because they are basically getting FREE ADVERTISING from Google.
What would your business look like if you were getting $5,000, $10,000 or $20,000 a month of free advertising from Google?
You’ll never know without having a well optimized website that ranks highly in Google. You can’t achieve this with an Instagram or Facebook page.
Having a website automatically enables you rank much better in search engines like Google. That leads to free exposure for you. Many potential clients and customers simply started out by searching for what they wanted on Google. And if it’s your website that comes up and you have what they want, that’s almost a guaranteed sale for you.
Business Emails
You’ll never know how many deals you’ve lost because the email you sent came from yourbusiness@yahoo.com.
Did you know that there are various services you cannot even sign up for if you are using a generic email address like Gmail or Yahoo?
For example, a service like Hubspot, used by thousands of companies around the world, has a blacklist of 4,752 domains of free email providers, including Gmail, Yahoo, Zoho, Hotmail, Outlook, and more.
If your business uses a free email service for business, not only might your emails be labeled as spam and filtered out of inboxes, but you might even be blocked when signing up for offers and services.
For other services, signing up with a free email service automatically increases your fraud score and the possibility a transaction you are undertaking might fail.
Because free email accounts can be opened by anyone in just a few minutes at no cost, it can be difficult to guarantee you’re dealing with a serious and established business rather than just a hobbyist or worse, a fraudster.
But let’s talk about the free exposure you also get with email accounts under your business domain name.
Find Your Perfect Domain
We for example, whenever we receive emails from businesses with custom emails, we quickly go and check out their website to find more information about who they are and what they do.
Not only is it much easier to identify if the company is genuine, but it also helps us trust them more because they have invested in their business and their brand to project a professional look.
So guess what it looks like when you check out a company’s domain name and there is no website there at all, only some generic information or advertising like the below page.
If you want to send emails with confidence and gain the trust of your potential customers and clients, having email accounts under your own domain name is important, alongside a website where customers can learn more about you.
Conclusion
This is just an overview of some of the most valuable reasons why every business in Ghana should have a website and work on making sure it’s a great one.
Great websites don’t have to be expensive though. Whilst you can even have a website for free, you can also get professional websites designed for you at a great price.
