Home topics small-business-resources hot-tips Digital Hot Tips Digital How a good website opens doors Thomas Mahon September 20, 2012 What are the processes that small businesses need to adopt to take their websites to the next level? Been there done that We (Local Direct Network) have had a website for some years now but early in 2011 we decided we needed a better one. We launched our first carefully thought-through website, www.ldn.net.au , in April of 2011 and since then our traffic has gone from a few hundred visits per month to almost 10,000 highly qualified readers. We’ve discovered many buyers interested in our services that we never knew existed and we’ve grown our sales significantly as a result. In fact, we now operate a small 1800 Customer Service Centre simply to deal with the increase in incoming business enquiries. A website is not just about looking good; it’s about engaging an audience, extending a brand promise and offering existing and potential customers something more than just your contact details and a few lines about what you do. If you don’t have a website and you’re not at least beginning to explore the opportunities the internet offers your business – get on board now. OK, so where do I start? There are a two basic areas that will determine the success of your website. The first is your website’s ability to attract and engage the right people; the second is causing that audience to take a desired action . In