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March 06, 2005
My business iExists!
The current age of the Internet seems to love webpages that are constantly updated -- they provide the newest information, and new information is being changed and added frequently. But what if a business or organization does not want to take the time or effort to maintain a website? What if the organization is too small or too removed from the IT world? Do they forego having an online representation of themselves altogether?
Frequently i turn toward the Web to find things i could easily find in The Yellow Pages. I don't even go to the Yellow Pages.com - i go to Google and type in my query. While this is fine for finding the thousands of businesses online, it doesn't work for the thousands more who feel that only submitting their name in the yellow pages is enough. So, what if a business simply wanted to make their presence known to the Internet masses, without committing their time and effort to building an entire website?
I think it would be amazing if all businesses and organizations had at least some web presence, even one webpage. Especially with the new focus on local searching, including all the rest of the organizations, such as pizza shops, barbers, and local nonprofits, would greatly increase the breadth of search results.
I wonder what it would take to convince businesses to do this? I wonder if there would be any significant return to their bottom line?
Posted by MaTT at March 6, 2005 05:53 PM
Comments
You are so insightful...your new blog puts my blog to shame. I just ramble about junk and you talk about relevant tech stuff. But it is quite interesting and makes me think :-)
Posted by: Cari at March 7, 2005 02:25 PM
My Dad wanted to get a site for his business, so I set up a super-basic information page for him and e-mail addresses with their domain name...and he's more or less forgotten about it. They still use their personal e-mail addresses, even though they're paying for the domain and webhosting. It's just not a priority in his work.
Posted by: J at March 7, 2005 07:31 PM
Thanks Cari - i'm glad it makes sense to more than just me ;)
And J, do you know if the page has made your dad any more money or generated any more customers? That's my big question...
Posted by: MaTT at March 9, 2005 10:02 PM
His page hasn't done anything for him because no one knows it exists! Neither him nor any of the other two or three people that work there have been willing to use a new e-mail address, they keep using personal e-mail and ignoring the business domain and e-mail.
In his defense, it wouldn't be that useful anyway since he runs a commercial contracting business. It's not the kind of place that needs to lure it customers or publicize itself all that much.
Posted by: J at March 10, 2005 07:36 PM
So, is this the website? [ site removed upon request. ] We found it after some concise keyword Google searching, but it still was only listed in directories, never on its own. No one needs to know it exists to find it, altho it currently would be difficult without a deliberate decision to search at least in [ the town that it is in ]. Good example tho -- while inconclusive, this adds to my findings. My colleague, Miss R, and I, feel that more information, besides what is normally found in a directory listing, would increase the chances of discovery and enhance the discoverer's browsing experience.
Posted by: MaTT at March 11, 2005 12:20 AM
Wow, yeah, that's it. Well, unfortunately he offered a grad student no money to devote time to his web development. This means no time to spend on it and no motivation! Further lack of motivation has been derived from my Dad's continued disinterest in web development (e.g., never thinking about what he actually wants on the page, providing me with no pictures or informational content, etc.). His original intent was to have consistent (and not personal) e-mail addresses that were domain specific, and a basic informational site that he could put on business cards and such. It doesn't cost much to host the page, so I think the idea has just been sort of lost.
Posted by: J at March 12, 2005 11:51 AM
Whoops! Some corrections and clarifications to my comments to better illustrate the situation.
First: *Of course* my Dad offered to pay me for my work! I'd just forgotten about his offer. I never really wanted any money for it, my motivation was that they wanted the site and I was in a position to help them. As time progressed and there wasn't a pressing need for them to use the site and their domain-specific e-mail, I wasn't motivated to make them worry about all of it.
Also, there are actually dozens of employees, the "two or three" I was referring to was only the number of people who were going to regularly use the business e-mail.
The general point I tried and failed to make with my comments was that the web site is simply not central to his business. They have a specific niche of customers, so the site is really more informational. However, my Dad originally was hoping to enhance access to some of the basic information about his business, and for various reasons the site has never really gotten off the ground. They're too busy to devote much time to it, so they asked an outside person (me) to do it, and as a grad student I've simply never been able to give them a fair amount of my time. Anyway, graduation is coming soon so maybe we'll have some time to polish it up some!
Posted by: J at March 22, 2005 11:50 PM
I'm not sure I agree with your premise. Quite a few times, I've gone looking for a business or for a type of business in a geographic area and upon examining the search results and the ensuing company-specific websites, I'm either annoyed that the website is poorly organized and I can't find the information I'm looking for or the poor quality of the website expresses how little effort and money was expended on it. Granted I've also come across good, useful, helpful sites too, but if a company doesn't *need* the website and refuses to expend reasonable efforts in making their unneeded website look and work half-decent, I'd rather they just had a yellow pages listing.
The quality of the website is often indicative of how important it is to the owner and/or how much use is made of it. If the website is unneeded, unwanted and undesired, and the efforts expended on it reflective of this, the negative impression left by the website is worse than having no site at all.
Or maybe I just start getting picky about websites. Ones that are poorly organized or of poor quality really do annoy the hell out of me. And that is far worse than not finding the site at all.
"I have come to hate your book and, by extension, you. I have hired a deaf, blind, mute to tear it up as I do not wish to risk contamination. Please never contact me again. Good day." (Heavy paraphrasing of a Bloom County comic strip.)
Posted by: Alan at March 23, 2005 05:04 PM