By Jack Rynes, President 

A few of Jaduka's core values are "Easy to find us, Easy to do business with us, Easy to use our Technology". I found it interesting that the first sentence in John Jantsch's great post read "Be easy to do business with". He continues that it should be the mantra of every small business, I say he is spot-on and technology can help.

Websites, in most cases, have something to say or goods and services to sell. Big businesses have the luxury of spending hundreds of thousands--if not millions--of dollars annually to ensure their message is clear and that you know what their goods and services are by building engaging web sites to enhance their on/offline media spend.

SMBs must make sure that they do everything in their power, with a limited budget, to accomplish the same thing. Once the SMB has managed to get the consumer to the web site, they want 1 of 2 things to take place, Communication or Sales (online shopping) and sometimes both.

Let's take the easy one first: communication. Sure you can put your phone number on your web site and I'm not suggesting that you ever remove it but why not give the visitor another option to communicate with you? If I need a phone number for a business I usually go to the web site, sometimes the number is easy to find but most times not. When I do finally find the number, it appears as though I'm watching a tennis match from the cheap seats as I squint my eyes and go back and forth between my computer screen and phone while making sure that I'm dialing the correct number.

Honestly now, how many of you have had to try again?

If a Click-and-Connect (CnC) button were there, all I would have to remember is my own number. I'm engaged with one media (computer) and do not have to engage with the another device (phone) until it rings. Online shopping - even massive businesses struggle with shopping cart abandonment and there are a variety of reasons: the check-out process is complicated, users are still wary of giving personal information over the web, etc.

A quick technology fix is adding a CnC button to the web site to aid in the reduction of shopping cart abandonment. Placed strategically within the site, a CnC button will boost online sales by giving the consumer another alternative to completing the transaction. These are sales that ultimately would have been lost or designated to another channel.

Remember... websites are things people do rather than something they read. Thanks again to John for the coverage.