UK Web Hosting Solutions
The solution is a professionally produced
and hosted site:
- Your Own Domain Name;
- E-Commerce;
- Fully Managed Secure Hosting;
- Database Hosting;
- Bespoke Hosting for custom builds,
etc.
Business Portals
At the moment, business Portals are
springing up all over the place, offering customers the chance
to search for their business in one place. Unfortunately,
whilst these web sites are superficially a good idea, they
can't do too much for you. For a start, customers see some
of your information, but they also see that of your competitors.
Indeed, many such portals are little more than a list of links
for taking business away from you. Maybe you have to be listed
there, as in Yellow Pages, but you can do better than that.
What about customers who are searching for business in your
area? How do you capture them? Whether you are listed in a
portal or not, you have to be able to make the most of those
customers that find your web site.
ISP’s
Perhaps you already have a properly
hosted web site, backed by an ISP offering industrial-strength
hosting... but at industrial strength prices. If you have
a few hundred employees, perhaps you need this kind of service,
and can afford the in-house web management team you would
need to make the most of it. But for most SMEs, such a setup
is a little over the top, and a little over what is an appropriate
budget. The service is usually good, and very reliable, but
its main weakness is that the ISP doesn't understand your
business, has no experience of your business, and therefore
can't help you with your specific requirements.
Bespoke business Package
The free service providers offer what
is known as 'flat' space, that is, space for pages that are
essentially static: they just sit there, perhaps with a bit
of flashy animation to make it look pretty. All potential
customers can do is look at your pages, and maybe send you
an e-mail (at the same time noticing your unprofessional-looking
e-mail address).
But what if your customers could search
your database for something that suits their requirements?
What if they could register their requirements with your web
site, and it would contact them automatically as
soon as something of interest was available? How many customers
do you lose because of lack of follow-through? The Web, properly
used, is ideal for chasing up leads that would otherwise be
forgotten about. A computerised web site is much better than
the average Consultant at keeping track of people, so why
not get yours working for you?
The industrial strength ISPs can build
you a better web site than the freebies, who essentially offer
you space and nothing else, but they will charge a fortune
for it, and because they know nothing about your business,
what you will get is a generic, out-of-the-box e-commerce
system.
What you need is an ISP that has actual
experience of the business business. One that can custom-build
your web site to the specific requirements of your sector.
One whose charges are tailored to your budget. You can have
Active Server Pages to build pages from your database, targeted
at each individual who looks at your site. Or perhaps you
need an ISP who has heard of iPIX, so your customers can take
advantage of full 360° panoramic views. Even better, an ISP
that can manage not only your hosting, but also your web site
itself, if that is what you require. Think about it.
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