What will your website do for you?

Very soon we'll be announcing Professional and Enterprise level Appraiser XSites, which will add built-in merchant account/credit card order processing, advanced Themes and Flash intros, a logo builder, site statistics reports, and a built-in "marketing kit" that will help you do business – online and offline – more productively.

Why? A website is a website is a website, right? We already blow away everybody else selling websites. The answer is that we understand what you need a website to do and how like anything else – formfilling software, a backup service, a laser measuring device, a cell phone – if you're given the right tools, you'll make yourself more productive.

It sounds very tech-boom 90s-ish to say everybody needs a website. But it's certainly true. Appraisers generally don't market to the public, deal with customers who aren't the most technologically savvy themselves, and haven't had five minutes of free time to breathe in two and a half years, let alone set up a website. But even so, the question in recent years hasn't tended to be whether an appraiser needs a website at all, but what kind.

A site is successful if it's memorable, functional, and "sticky" – keeping people there and bringing them back.

Appraisers need websites to do certain things: save them time and provide tools for their clients. If appraisers' website needs weren't unique, we wouldn't build Appraiser XSites (and thousands of you wouldn't have bought them so far). But more broadly, professionals and small businesses of all stripes need websites for the following five reasons. Your mileage may vary, of course, but some combination of these is applicable to almost everybody:

• Today, a website means credibility. Not having a website today is like not having a Yellow Pages ad years ago. And having a free, unprofessional looking website is like having an abbreviated, one-line business listing in the white pages instead. Why do you have business cards and a business phone number? That's the same reason that today you need a web address. All the better if you have a domain name (whatever.com) that's specific to your business. In short, when you have a website, you have credibility in today's economy. And the more professional, functional and unique your website, the more credibility you have.
• A website gives you a leg up on your local competition. If your local competition does not have a website, having one will make you more accessible and customer- or client-friendly than they are. Having a website makes information about your business or services available to anybody with Internet access when they want it, even 3 a.m. on a Sunday. Of course, if your local competitors already have websites, then they enjoy that advantage over you, and you need to play catch up.
• Websites act as a "base" for your overall marketing effort. If you use resources such as the Yellow Pages, flyers, advertisements, e-mail, direct (postal) mail, and telemarketing, you'll be able to refer people to your website over and over again. Referencing your website in print and other media also enables you to save money on those forms of marketing as you can buy fewer pages or smaller ads and simply refer potential clients or customers to your website for full information. Even if the people you reach through traditional marketing efforts don't visit the site (and most will), the mere fact of referring people to it will help make them take you seriously.
• Cross-sell to a captive audience. Having a website can be a great way to showcase the quality and range of your products or services, something customers and clients often want to know about. For example, if you offer services other than home appraisals, your website is a great way to show potential customers your other services.
• A website is a creative exercise. For many small businesses, creating a website is their first comprehensive marketing effort. If this is you, you'll find yourself really thinking through what you're doing and why people should do business with you, maybe for the first time since you started out. This effort can make you rethink and improve what you offer.

Of course, not one of you will buy (or has bought) an Appraiser XSite unless it saves you time and makes you more productive. We work very hard to make sure they do just that, too.