The world we currently live in is changing at a rapid pace. Everything we see, touch, hear, feel, do is exponentially shifting to a new norm, which within a very short period, quickly becomes another new norm. With this ever-changing environment, customers have changed, but a reality is that a lot of businesses have not. Many of these businesses have become totally internally focused, forging ahead, unconditionally believing ‘of course we know what our customers need – we’ve been in business for a long time.’

There is much said about doing business on the internet or “putting your business online”. To many, it may just sound too complicated or too risky. But there are many good reasons to begin selling (and running your business) online.

Whether you are a service provider who has to be in a certain location or have the ability to turn your bricks and mortar business into an online e-commerce website; the internet is a powerful tool to reach more prospects and turn them into qualified leads and customers; with many of the processes being completely automated.

DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IS NO LONGER JUST AN OPTION

These are some of the most powerful reasons you should take your offline business online. With all the benefits of having an online business many people are selling their traditional businesses and launching online businesses for the time, location, and financial freedom it offers.

Improving Your Company Image

This alone should be enough reason to start a new website and begin selling online. It's an extremely important factor considering that without a website, blog, or online presence prospective clients could begin to wonder how serious you are about business. Today, companies of all sizes and industries are establishing a successful online presence.

24/7 365 Hour Availability

While some fast food restaurants, grocery stores, and gas stations manage 24-hour service, it is impossible for most businesses. That is, without the internet. A key benefit to having an e-commerce website is that your clients and prospects can read about your products and place orders at any time — day or night. Imagine what being open 3-4 times longer could do for your business. Many people will want to do their research at the end of the day when your office or business is closed, but your website can operate as your 24/7 sales person to answer questions and generate leads (or sales).

Better Customer Support

The internet allows you to answer questions, give sales webinars, and solve customer problems—all without taking any of your time. Create a video, a product spec sheet or a FAQ (frequently asked question) section once, and you can direct clients to that information for years. Not only does it save you time, but you’ll be providing better service. With an online shop, you can give them just the information that they are looking for, and just when they are looking for it. This means fewer phone calls with technical questions and more sales. Very Low Start-up Costs

Starting out online means very low start-up costs. You have no buildings to construct, no vehicles to buy and few (if any) staff to hire. Let us build your site and you can start selling. If you are already selling offline, then the transition can be exceptionally smooth. You continue selling the same products that you know and have a good supply of. Putting your company online simply gives you a new source of customers. The basic expenses include web hosting, domain name, a website, a content manageable system (CMS) to load products and content and an email marketing autoresponder service.

Once it’s all set up it can run on virtual autopilot. You can make regular updates yourself as needed.

The Internet Was Made for Business

The beauty of the internet is that your prospective client(s) can literally be just one click away from your online store. Through the internet, you can now educate, instruct and solve clients’ problems. You can accept orders and payments and receive them directly to your inbox. While in the past many people were hesitant to do business over the internet, today it is as common as swiping a credit card at a physical location.

Live / Work from Anywhere

Are the long cold winters starting to get you down? Are you tired of the constant heat and humidity where you live? Taking your business online gives you the ability to have location freedom so you can live and work from anywhere you want; you're not stuck to a physical location. As long as you have a solid internet connection you can live virtually anywhere while you conduct your online business.

Live where you want to, and let your business adapt to your lifestyle instead of the other way around.

Reduce Operation Costs

Just one single task can make a significant difference in cost savings. For example, receiving orders online reduces the need for customer service staff. With comprehensive sales and product information online, you’ll simply receive purchase orders and payments via email or into your database. Staff numbers can be reduced, thus office space and related office expenses.

A really good sales video, sales letter, or online webinar presentation can replace a full-time salesperson. Making use of various online service providers you can now take all aspects of your business online, such as purchasing, billing, order fulfillment, and shipping.

Target the Global Market

With your brick and mortar business, you are limited to the number of individuals who can visit you at any given time, let alone find you. With a good website, you can literally have thousands, even tens of thousands of people visiting your online store at once. Imagine the potential for your company, if you could expose your products and services to a potentially unlimited number of interested people. Being able to have thousands of visitors and actually having them are two different things. The success of an online business depends on the same thing as any off-line business: marketing.

Yellow Lizard can assist you with content marketing, which is a great way to increase traffic to your site / online store. Social media can be a powerful and inexpensive way to drive qualified prospects to your site.

Increase Company Responsiveness

The internet allows you to deliver your purchase order and order confirmation quickly—in many cases instantly—to your clients. An online store will process orders and confirm them to the client. With a competent online store application, you can automatically track inventory, sales numbers, outstanding orders - everything. Faster response time means happier clients and less administrative work for you.

Say yes to Digital Transformation

Ready to take the next step toward growing your eCommerce business?

Explore how Yellow Lizard can help you launch quickly and start selling your products to the world.