HOW TO GET YOUR SMALL BUSINESS ON THE INTERNET IN KENYA

Internet is a creative way of getting SMES to compete with the large company in attaining visibility in the market.
Having an online presence via a website is affordable but the following tips will help them on how to go about it.
Body:
1. Register a domain name – the name chosen says something about the organization e.g. your business name. Com is a company that aspires global presence. Your business name.coke domain indicates the company is based in Kenya, while your business name.org is usually for non-profit making organization.
 Best domain names are those that contain the company name or brand. They may also be named after your products or its benefits.
 Its important to register a domain name immediately even before designing a website to secure the name and prevent anyone else using it.
2. Create the content (website design )
 The site should reflect the company’s brand in terms of colours, logos, images and phrases so that customers perceive the website to be part of the company’s whole branded package.
 Find out the key words that are the most relevant to your industry and have these appear on the site as many times as possible.
 Ensure the website is easy to navigate so that from any page a reader can go to any other section on the website.
3. Attract visitors to the website – you can attract more visitors to your website by:
i) Providing useful information to potential customers and having an easy to use website.
ii) Have links to your site of other useful site that your customers may be interested in.
iii) Include your web address or all promotional materials including business cards, brochures and company vehicles.
iv) Get visitors involved in the site. You can do this by having an opinion poll, a feed back form and encourage visitors to register for updates or online news latter.
Finally good websites are actively maintained to give them freshness. Websites that do not change for long period of time classified as ‘dead’ by visitors and search engines.