Everyone can benefit from having a personal website these days

OK, so maybe not everyone but pretty close to everyone! From your High School and College Students, Business Professionals, local crafters and artists, athletes and musicians just to name a few. I could write an entire post just listing the types of people and businesses that would benefit from having a personal website to work from.

What blows my mind is the number of small businesses and professionals today that still do not have a website or personal platform. Approximately 50% of small businesses today still do not have a website! Really…Why? Well some have legit reasons and I can understand that but the majority of them are missing the boat if you ask me.

You do not need to spend thousands of dollars for someone to build you a website that you can’t even manage or update yourself. This is something you could do yourself and be up and running in no time at all, and for very little to no money at all. There are also reasonably priced designers that will build you a professional-looking website on a platform like WordPress for example, and you can easily manage and update content yourself without having to pay expensive monthly service fees.

Some Examples of Who can Benefit from a Personal Website

High School and College Students: If you are planning on continuing your education then having a personal website or portfolio to showcase your work could be what sets you apart from the next candidate. A lot of colleges already ask for this depending on what classes you are looking to pursue. A website highlighting your work, personal achievements, goals, and aspirations gives you a chance to show who you really are and can help in getting into your college or job of choice.

Job Seekers: Let’s be honest, if you’re in the market for a job these days, it’s tough out there. I don’t care what it is you do, there seem to be fewer and fewer quality positions available and more and more qualified applicants for those positions. A personal website highlighting your strong points and personality with a digital copy of your resume might just be what lands you your next dream job. Think of how many plain-form resumes the hiring manager or interviewer looks at on a daily basis, just this alone might be enough to set you apart from everyone else.

Business Professionals: I don’t care what you do, if you’re managing people or looking to climb that corporate ladder somewhere you should have your own website and blog. Some of the most successful people I have interviewed or talked to over the years have maintained a blog or other platform to communicate with their employees and followers for years. If you’re a CEO, President, Founder, or have some other fancy title behind your name this should be a must. A lot of business struggles when deeply investigated could simply have been resolved or avoided by better and clear communication.

Artists and Musicians: I thought this one would go without exception but I was wrong, there are tons of struggling artists and musicians that still do not have a website. Artists can build their website infusing their work directly into the design and layout. Bands struggling to make a name for themselves can build a site to host samples of their work and highlight any events they have in the future and show great pictures and reviews from events of the past. They can also have forums and private groups where their fans can all communicate. This gives both the Artists and the Musicians a chance to build an audience and directly sell work and records to fans.

Authors: I can not tell you how many times I have clicked on a website link from an author’s social media site and gone directly to Amazon or some other sales site. It would be much better if it went directly to the website of the Author’s explaining the book and why you wrote it, maybe even with an active blog about the topic and from there link out to your other social sites and your sales platforms. Giving you the opportunity to establish rapport and authority with your reader, capture contact information, and possibly even be able to directly sell your book from your site.

Athletes: Young Athletes and Professionals alike can benefit from a personal website. You can show clips of key moments or even entire games or events if you choose and have permission. You also have control of the editing and can showcase your strong points and maybe leave out those parts we all don’t like to talk about. Talent scout’s jobs are hard enough, how many brilliant athletes go undiscovered every year that may have gone on to do amazing things? Don’t let yourself be one of those guys left dreaming every day of what could have been.

Business Owners: This one should no longer be a question if you ask me. Depending on the survey you read, you will find that 90 – 95 percent of consumers now do some sort of research prior to purchase, and over 90 percent of first impressions are now made online. If you do not have a website for your business you are missing out on a lot of opportunities.

Can’t I just use my Facebook page?

One thing you must always keep in mind about sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Etsy, eBay etc, is that they all control your customers not you. They control when, how and even if you can reach your customers and they can pull the plug on you at any time for any reason leaving you at ground zero.

I can not stress enough that you personally need to be the one that has control over when, where, why, and how you can contact and communicate with your customers! I am not saying not to use these other platforms, but I am saying we should use them for what they are, amazing tools to build relationships with our customers and fans.