Your Website Is Your Hub

through my book called Your Amazing Itty Bitty Visibility Book: 15 Chapters to Marketing Made Easy. And today we're just doing Chapter 1. So I'm just gonna check this out and explain it so that you know exactly what I'm meaning when I wrote what I wrote. So Chapter 1 is Your Website is Your Hub. Most business owners don't think of their website as the central hub of their business. They just think it's something that you have done because everybody tells you you need a website. The challenge is considering that your website is a tool to bring you more business. There's no point in having a beautiful looking website if it's not actually functioning as a tool for your business. So number 1, your website must be integrated with your CRM or your client relationship management program, and that is where you build your contact list. So if you don't have a CRM, that's a big piece that your business is missing. You really do need a CRM, and it's where you create your list. It's where you send out newsletters. If you're not doing that, that's something that we'll cover in a future chapter. Uh, and it's where really you organize all of your client stuff. It's, it's a super important piece of any functioning profitable business. All of your social media profiles should be connected to your website. So that could just be simply you go to your Facebook profile and you make sure you have a link going to your website. It shocks me how people miss this. They just have their profiles with no links going back to their website. It's a big miss. Number 3, your Google Business Profile map must be integrated into your website. And you're thinking, do I even have a Google Business Profile? Well, if you don't, you need one, even if you're not just a local business. I build websites. I can build websites anywhere in the world if I chose. I can build them anywhere in the United States, which I do. However, I still have a really strong presence where I physically live. Which is Vancouver, Washington. I have a Google Business Profile, as should you, and I have my map embedded on my website, which is something you should do as well. And number 4, your website should allow people to schedule appointments with you. If you are an appointment-based business, This is a nice feature and it should be built into your CRM, the calendar. So if you don't have that, it's another thing to kind of add to your list. And if you're not an appointment-based business and you want people to call you, please have your phone number on your website. Gone are the days when a website functioned as a glorified business card. Today, websites, or today's websites, is often the first impression people have of your business. Let it be a sales machine 24/7. It must have some sort of interactive feature, even if it's simply a little chatbot at the bottom, a schedule an appointment button, anything like that. Uh, your website must reflect your business branding. It goes with everything else that you do online. Same branding, same colors, same font, all of that. Use it to tell your clients about your products and services. That's a no-brainer. Obviously that stuff should be on your website. Your website As a sales machine, clients need to be able to purchase your products or services right from your website. Do you have that ability? Adding packages to your website will give you unexpected gifts, as it did for me. Customers will decide which package they want before contacting you. That makes the sales process super, super easy. They've already qualified themselves, is they want what you have, and they've already narrowed down what package it is that they want before they call you. So now all you have to do is close the deal. So much easier than convincing someone they need a package. Others who want something for free, which happens or happened quite a bit for me, or they want more extensive services than what you offer, will disqualify themselves. I used to get calls from people that wanted free websites. They wanted to do it on trade for whatever service they had. Or they wanted something that was way more big and complex than what I offer in my business. It was nice when all of those people quit calling me. Super nice. Adding packages to your website will save you time. You will need, you will receive fewer calls and the calls you will receive are from people that actually want and need your services. They, they are qualified prospects. Most will be ready to purchase when you answer the phone. Oh, do you answer your phone or do you let everything ring through because of all of the spam calls out there? I still answer my phone. It still brings me business. Adding payment buttons to your website will be a revolutionary business improvement if you don't have that. They're not just for e-commerce sites. Now I have payment buttons on my website. Has anybody purchased a website without calling me? Not once. Do I want them to? No. I really don't because I wanna qualify if I even wanna do their website. So for all of you thinking, I don't wanna add a payment button simply because I may not want that payment. It has never happened in the probably 15 years that I've had them on there. Uh, I am a service. I'm not an e-commerce. However, it is so easy to add a payment button directly from your merchant processor, whoever that is. You don't necessarily need to have a shopping cart on your site. It's not like someone would need to buy a website, um, 5-page package and a website 10-page package. That doesn't make sense. It's not gonna happen. So services don't necessarily need a shopping cart, which will let people buy many things at once and then pay for everything at the end. You can just simply get like buy now buttons from your merchant processor, whoever that is. For me, it's super nice because it's, it automates adding people into my QuickBooks. It, um, if they're doing a payment plan, it automates the whole payment plan process. I don't need to set that up for everybody. So all of those things are automated just because I have buttons on my site. So if you're in a situation like that and you don't, maybe it's time to consider making your life a little bit easier and adding that in there. Uh, your customers can pay immediately with credit cards. No more waiting for check in the mail. I can't tell you how much of a relief that has been for my business. Uh, not only that, they pay upfront. No longer is it pay the first half upfront and then send me the second half when your website is done, because I quickly learned some people don't finish their site for 3 years. That stuff doesn't happen anymore. When you pay upfront, you have more incentive to get your site done. And you know what? If it does happen, I'm not losing money because I have my payment. And I've been in business long enough that people have the confidence that I'm not going to just run away with their money. Um, I have way too much, uh, reputation at stake. To do that, and it would never even cross my mind to do that. And I've got reviews from many happy customers that show that I'm not gonna do that. So if you're in a situation like that, get your payment up front, um, for any service that you're providing. Uh, so that was Chapter 1, Is Your Website a Hub? Everything you do online needs to point to your website, and that makes it the hub of your business online. Um, so if you have any questions, feel free to put them in the comments. I will answer them myself, I promise. And we will be here tomorrow for chapter number 2.