Realizing Again How Unique Our Business Really Is

Two years ago when I had the concept for our business, I felt it was unique. I also felt that it was badly needed, and that few others would do it unless we proved that it could be done, first.

So what is the big deal? Lots of web designers say they specialize in small business. Many offer $500 and $300 websites. But they weren’t doing it like we were – and they were struggling to make a profit on the small contracts.

We discovered that there are techniques, skills, and adaptations that completely change the equation for a small website. We learned how to offer a $500 website that contained everything that a small business owner needed, and that they’d usually have to pay more than $1500 to get. What’s more, we learned how to do it efficiently, so that we could still make a handsome profit at it. Everybody wins.

Most small business web professionals are not aggressively exploring ways to cut costs and make things more efficient. You don’t find efficiency being much of an issue until you get into the corporate world. So we are an anomaly – a small business, that works with other small businesses, but which is applying business process management to streamline operations.

That just isn’t being done by most small web designers. It doesn’t occur to most TO do it. If they struggle to keep up with the bills, they simply raise their prices, and eventually price themselves out of the microbusiness market.

I like the people we work with. I like them well enough to want to keep working with them. So I started studying the ROI and price breakpoints for them, specifically. I also analyzed the way we are doing things. When we hit a wall in the profit equation, we revisit the way we do things, we don’t raise prices first.

We also provide a range of services – not just a site design, but many types of sites, and all of them with basic copywriting, SEO, security features, and basic ADA accessibility. We help each client write a policies page, and to present themselves professionally.

I’ve tried to explain how different we are, to both other web professionals, and to customers. Customers don’t get it unless they have previous web designer experience – then they appreciate what we do. Other web professionals generally cannot even wrap their heads around it all, they cannot conceive that there could be a faster way to do what they do, which still results in quality service.

It feels pretty lonely sometimes. I have the whole thing in my head – but it is slowly getting out, and the tools we are developing are slowly making a difference to our clients, and to a few other smart people who have decided that maybe we can teach them a thing or two after all.

It is hard to shake the world when the world can’t even understand the hugeness of a concept, simply because they cannot see how big big really is.