What is ‘Prime’ Web-Space for your Business?
In the face of the COVID 19 pandemic, more and more businesses have switched gears to leave their brick and mortar stores to enter the sometimes overwhelming world wide web or what we all know as the internet. The procrastinating business owner maintaining the traditions of old but proven business operations fails to recognize the urgency of occupying prime virtual real estate.
We are all too familiar with the signs that read ‘office space for lease’ or ‘prime retail space’. Why are these considered ‘prime’ locations? Two words, visibility and accessibility! A location that has either of these traits allows traffic that helps businesses thrive and in a some cases help businesses stay afloat, however having both these traits is a guarantee to having traffic. Converting this traffic (Conversion) is a whole different topic that we will cover in a future blog post.
The long established, fool proof brick and mortar concept is now being put to test and as we combat the depressive effects of the pandemic on the economy, the internet seems to be the small, yet a clearly visible light at the end of the tunnel. How so? Online sales have been at an all time high with no effect of the pandemic. According to the US Department of Commerce, the first quarter of 2021 reported a total of $1,581.4 billion in sales and that was an increase by 7.8% from 2020. It is about time businesses go beyond just considering going online. There needs to be an urgency. As we have faced a compelling sense of urgency to purchase a ‘prime’ piece of real estate, it is important we also invest in ‘prime’ web-space.
What is prime web-space?
Unlike the traditional brick and mortar office space, the web allows you to define your business to your liking. The architecture of your web-store can be customized to every last detail. However, the most important traits of visibility and accessibility need to be secured first. First it is important to secure a domain that best describes your business , which is key to your ‘prime’ web-space. For instance, if you are an electrician servicing the city of Detroit, an ideal name would be www.detroit-electricians.com (which was available as of the time of this post), which gives you the first gold star in owning a web-space (domain) as your prime piece of web real estate. Once you own this, there cannot be another website with the same name. It is yours for as long as you choose to keep it. There can be different variations of the same for instance the domain can have a .org or .net or .tech to allow for variations. Business owners sometimes choose to purchase these different variations – typically a very nominal fee to avoid other businesses having names that are very similar. It is important to be creative in picking out your domain, however you must act fast to get a domain name that will be the best match for your business.
More and more businesses are going online everyday and with the growing virtual landscape, the time to build your website is now! While having a good domain name is key it is not the end all and the be all. Just as marketing tools exist for businesses in low traffic locations, there are several tools such as SEO, SMM, etc. that exist, and offer significant leverage to boost your online presence. However, it is imperative that businesses act fast to allow the internet and all of its resources to help optimize your online presence.
Data referenced sourced from www.census.gov :
https://www.census.gov/retail/mrts/www/data/pdf/ec_current.pdf
