E-Restaurant - The 21st Century Successful Online Business Story
Author: Richard Jackson
Date Created: Mar 26, 2007 - 11:29:57 AM
How
business can boom through internet – Restaurant, an illustration
The internet has made a quantum leap since the early days
in the mid 90s. These days, an average user spends about 4 hrs browsing the
internet as compared to zero a decade ago. Whether the business is big or
small, the meaning of the internet in promoting the business can not be
downplayed. Despite this, it is really appalling to know that many businesses
are still not using this medium at all. Those who do use it are not using it to
its full ability. The internet has brought about a phenomenal change in public
awareness and has become the most sought-after medium of support by modern
businesses.
Prudent businessmen will always think ahead and try to
keep up with the times in order to take full advantage of this growing medium.
There are some key points that a well informed businessmen should know about in
order to feel at ease with this technology;
Having a website is very
inexpensive affair:
The cost of owning a website has become very affordable
and costs any where from $300 and this includes domain name, emails etc. The
monthly hosting can cost anywhere from $10 and upwards depending on the type of
services. This indeed, is very minor expense as compared to putting an
advertisement in the yellow pages.
Let’s say you are visiting a town and you are looking for
a local Chinese restaurant. You have internet access in your hotel room and you
do the natural thing and go to Google and type ‘Chinese restaurants in
Minneapolis’. If your site
is not listed on that page, you potentially lose a client and if you don’t have
a website, you stand no chance. This is just a simple example.
If you have a website but it’s
not working:
Remember - having a website is
not enough. If it is not properly designed, it is just as good as non-existent.
Don’t try to save money by putting up poorly-designed website by some novice
web-developers. It might save you some money for now, but it will cost you
dearly in the long-term. Consider the following points while putting up your
website:
·
The
site should be easy to navigate and it should contain all the essential
information you want to convey to your visitors.
·
The
content of the site should be search-engine-friendly so that major search
engines like Google, Yahoo, and MSN can pick up you website when visitors
search for the products and services offered by you. In a nutshell, the content
should contain all the necessary keywords that visitors usually type in the
search box.
·
Apart
from putting up a good website, its promotion should also be taken care of. You
can add links to directory services and other websites to drive traffic to your
website. Besides, you can submit articles related to other websites and send
out regular newsletter. Just make sure that these articles are relevant to your
products and services. This is called link campaigning and it plays a vital
role in attracting visitors to your website. It also builds and increases loyalty
among people which only helps your business grow faster.
Don’t be complacent:
There are many businessmen who are making money at the
present moment, and do not feel that the internet medium will offer them any
additional benefit. Do not make this mistake, if you don’t stay ahead of your
competitors then they would not only come up with better products and services
but also leverage the internet to put them in an enviable position to beat.
Hence, every practical businessman should understand the importance of internet
marketing.
Although the above points are extremely crucial to the
growth of your businesses, but the key is to find a vendor who is knowledgeable
with ample designing experience and very knowledgeable about Google, Yahoo and
other major search engines. Make sure that the vendor is also able to meet your
future needs such as customization of the website and help with online
marketing as well as adding additional rich-features helpful to your site.
Ferdouse
Khaleque is an IT Director & Marketing Specialist for Semibase Inc. His
company develops small individual websites to fully custom developed database
driven websites. Some of Semibase services and products include the following;
1.
Semibase.com
– Full array of services – Web design, web hosting, custom design, online
marketing, ecommerce, online business development.
2.
MenuStation.com
– Online directory of local restaurant menus with full online ordering
capability.
3.
Communalmarket.com
– Portal website for communities.
4.
Datingstage.com
– Fully featured dating web-service with over 200K members.
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