The internet in the last few years has undergone a tremendous change in every single aspect of its operations. From the infrastructure to connectivity, to applications such as WhatsApp, services such as the Cloud, population, etc.
The changes that are taking place give companies the assurance of the possibility of growing their businesses online. But how often do companies modify and upgrade their online presence to take the full advantage of this ever growing entity called the internet???
It is estimated that e-commerce and other online activities will increase significantly in the next few years, and will continue as such in the subsequent years. Many people are being hooked onto the internet via a social media, cloud services, mobile apps and several others that help to easily interact with other people and do business on the go.
Companies need to enhance their online presence in terms of visibility, ease of interaction and service delivery, using modern tools and strategies that would help generate more leads and easily do business via the World Wide Web.
Recent trends in Websites and the Internet
- Websites have ultimately become a prospect’s first point of contact for most companies.
- Websites have become the place where existing clients and prospects go to either form an opinion or confirm an opinion about a company… before they decide whether to take the next step of doing business with the company or not.
- Websites now represent an online office where companies can sell to clients, serve clients with any information they require, speak to clients on issues – and all of these are done with less time & effort thereby increasing returns on investments (ROI).
Repositioning your online presence is not just the sole duty of your website agency, neither is it the sole duty of the marketing manager or the IT manager.
Your company’s online presence is an extension of the company and resides on the World Wide Web, more or less another branch of your company where every single activity from marketing to customer service, to payments, recruitments, etc. can be done. Therefore all these business units must make an input into creating your company’s on line presence and not just leave everything to the IT team.
In repositioning your online presence you can start with the following guidelines as listed below. It is an ideal way to easily assess your existing performance on the World Wide Web and then institute measures and strategies to improve the performance.
The guidelines are;
- Engage a Subject Matter Expert (SME) to lead the conversation
- Assess the position of the current Web presence
- Indicate the proposed repositioning
- Outline your short term goals
- Outline your long term goals
- Get a realistic budget to execute the project
- Bingo! You’re on your way to get the best from the internet.
This era of the internet and the World Wide Web compels companies and institutions to constantly include better use of information technology in their day-to-day business activities such as marketing, sales, branding, customer service, etc. and there are several benefits that await your company as it does it judiciously.
By: Alex Offei Lartey