Do you actually need a website?
Some local businesses genuinely do not need one. Here is how to tell which kind you are, from a company that builds them.
A barber asked us this last year. He had been in the same chair for eleven years, had a full book most weeks, and every new customer either walked in or came because somebody sent them.
The honest answer was no. He did not need a website. He needed his Google listing sorted out, which took an afternoon, and after that a website would not have changed his week.
We build websites for a living, and we still think this is worth saying out loud, because a website nobody needed is money spent on something that will sit there getting stale.
Where your customers actually come from
Before anything else, work out how the last twenty customers found you. Not roughly. Actually think it through.
For a lot of local businesses the answer is some mix of walk-ins, word of mouth, and people searching on their phone and tapping the first sensible looking result on Maps. If that is your answer, the thing doing the work is your Google Business Profile, not a website.
That is not an argument against websites. It is an argument for getting the order right. Sorting out your Google listing costs a fraction of a website and, for a lot of businesses, moves the needle more.
When a Google profile alone is genuinely enough
You can reasonably skip a website, at least for now, if most of this describes you.
Customers find you by searching for what you do, not who you are. Barber, takeaway, corner shop. They want the nearest good one, not a specific one.
The decision is small. A haircut, a coffee, a pizza. Nobody researches a twenty dollar decision.
You have nothing complicated to explain. No service list that needs describing, no pricing that varies, no process anybody needs to understand before calling.
You are busy enough. The strongest argument of all. If you are turning work away, adding a website will not help and might just add a channel you have to answer.
For that business, a properly filled out Google profile with real photos, correct hours, and a habit of answering reviews will do more than a five page website ever would.
When a website starts earning its place
The picture changes when any of these are true.
Somebody has to trust you before they call. A roofer quoting fifteen thousand dollars. A clinic taking on new patients. A mechanic being handed the keys to a car somebody depends on. These people check you out first, and what they find determines whether they dial.
Your services need explaining. If a customer cannot tell from your listing whether you do the specific thing they need, you are losing calls to confusion rather than competition.
Your information changes. Restaurants with menus. Anywhere with seasonal hours or offers.
You are competing on something other than being nearest. If you are trying to be chosen rather than found, you need somewhere to make the case.
You want to be reachable outside business hours. A form that catches an enquiry at eleven at night is worth something to a business that cannot answer the phone then.
The twenty second test
Here is the practical version of what a website has to do for a local business.
Somebody has found you on Google. They are mildly interested. They tap through to your site and give it about twenty seconds before deciding whether you seem legitimate.
In that time they want to establish four things. Do you do the thing I need. Are you actually near me. Are you open, or when are you. And how do I reach you right now.
That is it. Everything else on a small business website is secondary to those four. A site that answers them in the first screen, on a phone, has done its job.
Which is also why an old, slow site can be worse than no site at all. If someone taps through and gets a page that takes eight seconds to load and does not fit their screen, they have learned something about you that is not true and not helpful.
What it actually costs to keep one
Worth knowing before you commit, because the build price is not the whole number.
The domain, about twenty dollars a year, and it should be registered in your name on your card.
Hosting, which for a simple site can genuinely be free and for most others is modest.
Time or money to keep it current. This is the one people underestimate. Not because sites break constantly, but because prices change, staff change, hours change, and a site full of outdated information works against you.
If nobody at your business is realistically going to do that, budget for someone to. If somebody will, you can run a simple site for the cost of the domain.
So which are you?
If you got to the end of this and concluded you do not need one yet, we would rather you spend three hundred dollars getting your Google listing properly sorted than eight hundred on a website that will not change your month.
If you concluded you do need one, the twenty second test above is the standard to hold whoever builds it to.
Either way our free review covers both your website, if you have one, and your Google profile, and tells you which one is actually costing you work. No pressure and no sales call.
Call +1 506-801-9970 or email info@qhike.ca. We serve Fredericton, Moncton, Saint John and all of New Brunswick.