smallbusiness.co.uk: Helping your business think big

With low start-up costs and the opportunity to grow a massive customer base in next to no time, it’s little wonder that online businesses are increasingly appealing to wily owner-managers.

The best online companies are the ones that aren’t too clever for their own good and address a basic need, such as online property search venture Migoa. CEO Gary Stewart says: ‘If you type “flats London” into Google, you want to see flats in London, you don’t want a list of pages where those words turn up.’

While there is some serious technical know-how behind Stewart’s company, you don’t have to be a spiky-haired techno geek to make going online work for you. For the vast majority of small businesses, an online presence ought to be seen as a useful tool for boosting sales, especially as the number of broadband users grows. 

A website shouldn’t just showcase what you do like a brochure, it should actually drive sales by guiding users towards a purchase or at least getting hold of their details for marketing purposes. Fortunately, making your website fit for business is not as hard as you might think. There are free tools that you can use, many of which have templates that the worst of technophobes can master.