How Websites Are Being Used by Organisation's to Market Themselves - Essay Example

How websites are being used by organisations to market themselves Introduction When an individual sets out to open and run a business, there are a number of challenges that he/she will face. The situation is slightly different for an established business as it has weathered many challenges along the way. However, that notwithstanding, the business still has to keep up with the competition. Like the proverbial shark in the ocean, it has to keep moving for stopping will kill it. In the current digital age, businesses have sought to market themselves on the Internet by way of websites. This article will evaluate the role that these websites play as both a communication tool and a marketing tool for a business. Positive Role of Websites in Marketing a Business A website by itself is a tremendously valuable marketing tool for any business. It has become a trend in the current setting of people to rely more on the Internet to access information than was the case a while back (M & A Web Design 2011). This means that more and more people are flocking to websites as sources of information about different products and companies. This means that the company that attempts to rely on the graces of the white or yellow pages’ directory will be in for a rude awakening. As a matter of fact, the corporate environment as it is now has little room for business that are not online. Over half of people in a given area will use the Internet search engines to access information on different businesses (M & A Web Design 2011). A business that has a website plugged into a major search engine will be able to tap this lucrative market base. This will allow it to make sales and profits since the business will put its product out there for the sake of the clients viewing them. The role of the website in marketing for a business is that of an enabler (Cesar 2008). The websites have a profound effect on the productivity of the business. It not only acts as channel for sales and marketing, but also as a medium that delivers content. This means that the website can be beneficial in the sense that the client will visit the website, see something that impresses them and then order it on the same site and even pay for it there. Websites have also played a vital role in the enhancement of the customer experience through the feature known as Customer Relationship Marketing (CRM) (Kulkarni 2008). The CRM allows the client to use the business website in a more relaxed environment. It also means that the business management can customize the website. This will allow it to attract clients and satisfy all the lingering questions that they may have. This will allow clients to visit the website, and as a marketing tool, this will allow the business to sell itself more. Kulkarni (2008) also asserts that the websites have an advantage of allowing the firms that have an eye for the future to keep a pulse on the market in a matter of minutes. This is extremely vital because the corporate environment is a cut throat environment. The business must be able to predict the flow of interest and taste of their clients. This will then enable them to tap into this trend and market themselves to their clients thus managing to stay well ahead of the rest of the competition. With this in mind, the website becomes an exceedingly valuable tool since it gives the business a competitive edge. On account of reach, the website as a tool of marketing a business guarantees the business a wide reach that goes beyond national boundaries. In the case of the business wanting to get its products out into the market, the website will allow the company to do so. The Internet has the enviable character of ease of access from any part of the world (Slideshare 2011). The trick with websites has to do with the attracting of the client’s attention (Slideshare 2011). Once this is established, the business can then progress to tell the prospective client what the business has to offer to him/her. As the paragraph above intimates, the website through the Internet has the potential to market a business on the international arena (Slideshare 2011). The lack of boundaries has a second advantage to any business. This is the reduced cost of marketing the business. This article will take a case study of a fictional software developing firm in New York that wishes to tap into the French technology market. To get to this market, the firm has two options. One of them is to buy space in the local media to market itself in the country. The second option is that of setting up a website to tell the company’s story. This website can then be accessed from anywhere in the world. The second option has several advantages to it. Not only will the company profile be available to the potential French clients, it will be available for anyone else. The first option will cost the company a lot of money to do. The second option is much cheaper. All the firm has to do is have a running a website which it can then use popular sites to advertise. PHP Web Developer India (2012) posits that the role that social media plays in the promotion of business is immaterial. Using sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and other popular social networking sites, has proven to be valuable. All the business has to do is to customize their own websites so as to accommodate these popular social networking sites. Alternatively, the company can opt to include a social networking option on their website (PHP Web Developer India 2012). This will allow the company to open a path through which employees can interact with each other. It also opens up an avenue through which the company can communicate with potential clients and gets to inform them of the services or products that it has to offer. The company cannot afford to avoid using the services of the websites. PHP Web Developer India (2012) posits that the potential of the websites is that information of a business can go viral within a remarkably short time. This is yet another valuable marketing tool. The value of this tool can come to be witnessed in the case of a company that wants to spread the message about a product that it has produced. In the case of the I Phone Company, arrival of new products is awaited in earnest. When it has come up with a new product, it will need to get the word out there fast about the new product. In this case, the role of its official website and that of many websites that deal with the same matters will be vital. The product will get the message out fast because all those who have logged on to it in anticipation will soon see the message immediately. Aside from social media, there is a category of websites that play the role of marketing other businesses. In Australia, Bloomtools plays this role. The website has services that affect the small businesses. The benefit of this is that it has experienced personalities within its ranks that have enough skills to attract the needed clients. Bloomtools (2012) has customised its web pages to ensure that it fits the interests of different clients. It claims to deliver results to the client. The websites design allows it to divert traffic from the main search engines to its clients. In other words, the website promises to link the businesses to the larger search engines like Google (Bloomtools 2012). This has a significant impact. According to Bloomtools (2012), the businesses that are not accessed through Google are not accessible. This is a serious handicap to these businesses. However, with the help of Bloomtools, this is not a problem. As a result, the businesses get ease access to its clients and other potential clients which has immense marketing benefits to the business. Websites can be prolific marketing tools when it comes to prices. In the current modern world, people are apt to first surf online to check the prices of a commodity on different company websites. Once they find a company that has the lowest price, they will flock to that company to purchase the commodity (Westwood 2011). With this in mind a business owner can then surf the Internet and research on the prices. This allows him/her to quote the most attractive and competitive prices in his/her website thus allowing clients to buy his/her goods and not from the competition. The benefit of this is that it allows the business owner to maintain a competitive edge since he/she is always alert to changes in prices instituted by the competition. As a marketing juggernaut, Bloomtools (2012) has a feature called as Data Base Marketing. This feature allows the business that uses this site to take advantage of a number of several marketing strategies. One of these is email marketing. This feature allows the business to send thousands of professional emails to clients and potential clients. This allows the message of the business to reach a lot of people within a short time of sending it. This allows the business to send messages that contain details of the business to the clients. Another feature is that of SMS Marketing. This form of marketing is similar to email marketing, but the difference is that the medium is the mobile phone. This feature like the email facility allows the company to send professional text messages to people over a wide area allowing a company to market itself. At the same time, the business uses surveys to assess the performance of a business. It can as well be used to assess the reception of a product that a company is introducing into the market. Finally as a marketing tool, the website offers what it terms as Event Management. This feature allows the business to run a seamless corporate event without having to worry about the stress that comes with the running of such an event. All the business has to do is use this facility offered by Bloomtools. This facility will allow the business to be able to track the event as it progresses. Matters covered here range from costs that it incurs to the guest list that will determine those invited and those that are not. This facility allows the business to attract potential clients since it will take advantage of the event to get it products and services out to the people to make sales. Negative Role of Websites in Marketing a Business The websites and the Internet by extension have been an immense boost to businesses. However, there are negative implications on the business. The websites of different companies have in more ways than one proven to be the Achilles heel of the business. This second portion of this article will address the adverse implications of websites for businesses. The success of the website largely depends on the amount of time that the business owner puts in the website (Bukacek 2012). Deciding to post random information without placing an option for feedback will cost the business greatly. According to Bukacek (2012), there is a need by the business owner to be proactive in their websites. This will give them the chance to interact with their clients and get to find out more about the opinions of their clients. Another implication is that of time (Bukacek 2012). This negative implication is twofold. On the one hand, there is the dedication that this site needs from the business owner. The owner must take up a lot of his/her time that would be occupied in building their business. The other implication is on the cost. While most sites are free to set up, manage or even apply to use, these sites consume resources in other ways. Among others, it will cost the company money to hire people who will run these sites effectively. At the same time, the business may lose money when the owner ignores it to pay attention to the websites. Knowledge is yet another limitation to the effective running of the websites. According to Bukacek (2012), the lack of the full knowledge of the capacity of the sites may work to destroy the business rather than building it. This means that the website can either build or destroy a business. Giving wrong facts taking too long to update the site are some of the problems. Also, ignoring the requests made by clients to the company all are causes of a website destroying the business. The business owner must strive to ensure that customer satisfaction is king when it comes to the role played by the websites. Another implication is that of the loss of the personal touch enhanced in interpersonal communication (Hanly 2013). This is a vital aspect since the client will not want to buy products or procure services from a business which has lost touch with him/her. The Internet and indeed the website in this instance does more harm than good to the business. This is because it will make the people who run the business to appear indifferent to the clientele. At the same time, the website as it is has been sounding a death knell to the small businesses (Hanly 2013). The small businesses have a hard time keeping up with the large businesses, and those whose base of operation is online. Looking at the example of a small book store, its lifespan has come down considerably because large businesses such as Amazon have taken away their clients (Hanly 2013). This is not a positive trend since instead of improving the livelihoods of people; the website indirectly brings misery with the loss of a source of income. The lack of privacy is yet another negative implication of the websites. In many instances, some businesses do not have a physical location (Johnson 2011). In the case of such businesses, the use of public restaurants allows businesses to access their information from their websites. However, there is the risk of people accessing information that is private when they eavesdrop. The lack of privacy means that the business runs the risk of valuable information falling in the wrong hands. Another negative implication is the security threats that come with running of these websites (Johnson 2011). Take an example of a business using an unsecured wireless connection at a public cafe. This individual has to share the same wireless connection with those who patronise the cafe. In this instance, the person will lose a lot since a hacker with the skills to access this information. This form of corporate espionage means that the company may find valuable information example of defects under evaluation. This will end up acting in a counterproductive manner thus negatively portraying the company. As a result of the freedom of access to the website by anyone, there are a number of significant implications. It means that even rivals can post negative information about the company (ACS 2010). This is a counterproductive activity since the rivals will post information that could be lies but which take the company a lot of valuable time to clear itself. By the time, the truth finally comes out; the company’s rivals could have made strides that the business may never manage to keep up. At the same time if a company handles a relatively popular commodity, it may experience too many people accessing its website for information. While this is a good thing, it also means that too many of these accesses would lead to the website hanging due to the information overload (ACS 2010). The negative impact of this is that it would lead to the company having to lose a lot of valuable time while its technicians attempt to set things right. When running a small business that relies heavily on internet marketing, a company cannot afford to lose the connection. However, in this case, a rival company can decide to sabotage the business. This is done by creating a large number of poor quality back links that then lead to the business website. This will lead the large search engines like Google to lower the ranking of the website thus pushing it further away from the front page. As a result, few people can access the site, and this leaves the company unable to market its products (Urban 2012). When dealing with a customer in the business premises, a business owner or one of the employees may say or do something offensive to this client. This matter may seem trivial at the moment since the client may say little or nothing. However, he/she may post a comment or video on one of the popular sites like Facebook or YouTube about the nasty experience he/she went through in a certain establishment. The danger of this action is that it will do more to demolish the reputation and goodwill of the said establishment since others may join in and make it a popular topic of discussion (Green Host It 2013). The danger of social media is the fast means through which it can spread a message. This is because a large number of people use it at any one time. It has also allowed people to have access to a lot of information. When a person sees a post that rates an establishment negatively, the person may latch on even when they have not experienced a negative treatment from the same place. This is yet another example of just how dangerous a website can be to the marketability of a business. Conclusion This article has looked at both benefits and dangers of websites to a business that is either coming up or has been around. The dangers mentioned are numerous. They include the threat that unscrupulous people will gain access to the company data and cause a marketing nightmare for the company. This could be through leaking information about a new product before the scheduled time eliminating the element of surprise. It could even be a rival company stealing vital information that gives it a competitive edge against the victim. However, that notwithstanding, there are numerous benefits that a company will derive from the use of a website as a marketing tool. Any company would be remiss to ignore these benefits since it would be a reason why the company is so invisible and unable to market itself appropriately. Bibliography: Bloomtools., 2012. Bloomtools: Growing Businesses. 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