BUSINESS IN THE DIGITAL AGE

New and established business owners of small, medium and large businesses alike know that no matter what kind of product or service they have to offer, they need to have a strong internet presence. Even if a product or service has nothing to do with the internet or technology, the internet is now the more likely way that potential customers will find them.

Short History of Advertising

If you look at the evolution of how we advertise products and services in the United States, it has changed dramatically since the 1700s when the colonists were just getting their start here. Back then, people found out about local goods and services primarily by word of mouth or because of signs in windows and in front of buildings in their settlements. Improvements in transportation technology such as, the development of railroads in the 1800s and commercial airlines in the 1900s, changed how people in this country got goods and services, how they communicated with people near and far, and the geography of communities.

Internet Presence

Nowadays, even if your product or service has nothing to do with the internet, it is still important to have a strong presence on it. No matter how good your product or service is, if potential customers and clients can’t find it, they will likely purchase it or something similar from someplace else. And unfortunately, no matter how popular or excellent your product or service is, if Google does not recognize your website as being of high quality and value, you likely will not come up on the first, or even second, third or tenth page of a potential customer’s search results.

If you think about the last time you looked for anything on the internet, how many times did you go to the second or third page before going to the first page? How often do you go past the first page of your search results before finding what you wanted, or starting a new search with different keywords because you didn’t find it? If you are like many Americans, you did not make it far past the first page unless you had exhausted different search ideas without the results you were looking for.

Search Engine Rankings

Contrary to popular belief, Google does not base their search result rankings on a particular business’s popularity or reviews. What leads Google and other search engines to “decide” that one website is better than the other, is based on complicated algorithms that are constantly changing. Some businesses are devoted to trying to crack Google’s code. There are many ways that people do this and new ideas are constantly being tested. Examples of some of these businesses are ones that focus on improving their clients’ websites, or ones that create and develop tools and apps to help businesses learn how to improve their websites themselves.

User Friendly and Looking Good

Along with being recognized and ranked on Google, your website should look good and be user friendly. You won’t get much business if your website is not easy to view and navigate. As well, you want to make sure that the mechanics of the website itself work well and are updated as new platforms and operating systems come out. When a potential customer wants to know more about your product or decides to make a purchase, a broken site is a likely reason for them to look elsewhere.

Changes in the way to do business in the digital age seem to be happening faster than ever before. Getting and maintaining a strong internet presence is proving to be highly important in this particular era of business.