Top 4 Myths of Launching a New Website

So, you’re an entrepreneur with a new business. You’re just starting out so you’re trying to get all aspects of your business together. Business license. Accounting. Marketing. Product strategy. It’s enough to make anyone’s head spin.

When it comes to business (new or existing) websites, we often observe some common misconceptions about launching a website. In an effort to educate our clients (and prospective clients) here are the top 4 myths of launching a new website:

1. “If You Build It, They Will Come”

Surely, we’ve all seen Field of Dreams, right? A farmer turns his corn field into a baseball diamond and baseball players come back from the dead, including his Dad.

Sorry, spoilers.

Many business owners believe that if they build a great website that the traffic, customers, and money will immediately begin rolling in.

Unfortunately, it’s a little more complicated than that.

In reality, your website should be the hub of your marketing strategy. Your marketing efforts should all work in unison to drive traffic to your beautiful new website where your customers can learn more about your business, connect with you, and even purchase your products and services. Your marketing strategy can include things like search engine marketing, email marketing, social media, TV and radio, outdoor, and print. Without an over-arching strategy to drive it all, your website will likely end up being an empty baseball park without fans.

2. Google (and other search engines) will automatically index my new site

There’s no doubt that search engines play an incredibly important role in your website’s success.

If you have a brand new website, you’ll definitely want to notify the search engines of your new site’s existence. The sooner they index your site, the sooner your site will be discovered by your target audience.

If you have an existing website that has undergone a redesign or a major structural change, it is also important to notify the search engines of the changes that have taken place.

This act of “notifying” is done by creating a sitemap file and submitting to to the major search engines that accept them. The most important of these are Google and Bing’s respective Webmaster Tools services.

3. Nobody visits my site on a mobile device. I don’t need a mobile-optimized site.

This statement couldn’t be farther from the truth. In the past 5 years, mobile website traffic has exploded and this trend will most certainly continue for the foreseeable future. For many sites, anywhere from 20% to 50% of your website’s traffic will be coming from visitors on mobile devices. You will most definitely want that significant portion of your visitors to have a good experience on your site.

To look at it a different way: If you were running a brick and mortar store, you wouldn’t blatantly turn away 20%-50% of the business that walked in your store, would you?

And if you’re not sure how much of your traffic is coming from mobile devices, contact us and we’ll setup and install Google Analytics to give you that critical information and MUCH more.

4. Anyone can build a website. What’s the difference between what you do and what I can build myself?

Technically, I suppose this statement is true. And, with any luck you might build a website that has a chance of properly communicating your business’s branding, values, and products/services. Or, you might end up with a monstrosity that makes your customers doubt the validity of your business and gives them a good reason to give their business to one of your competitors.

Do your business (and yourself) a favor and leave the marketing to the experts (us). After all, we’ve got decades of experience and insight that help us build the very best website for your business. Plus, don’t you have other business setup activities that require your attention?