In August of 2013 a Yodle survey found that 52% of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) did not have a website. About six months later, a hibu study, with a much larger sample size, put the number around 45%. Today, you might expect the percentage to have dropped even more, but it hasn’t.
According to a new Clutch survey of 350 SMBs, 46% still do not have a website. The majority of respondents from the survey represent the “small” in SMB, with only 1-10 employees and less than $1 million in annual revenue. This is in-line with 2015 LSA data that found 49% of sole proprietors still do not have a website.
At the end of 2014, I considered some of the possibilities as to why such a high number of SMBs still didn’t have a website. I landed on a few simple reasons: website offerings not meeting expectations, lack of transparency, and the challenge of vendor selection given the number of players in the space.
While these reasons could very well be contributing to lacking website participation among very small businesses, these conclusions were subjectively drawn. The Clutch study asked directly as to the “why” of the issue and came back with some interesting insights.
As the chart above shows, the biggest reasons for not having a website is because SMBs think it is not relevant to their business or because it’s too expensive. The secondary reasons include using social media in place of a website, the inability to keep up with maintaining a site and a lack of technical knowledge.
It is interesting to see that 32% of the SMBs without a website think a website is irrelevant to their business. This might be explained by the fact that some businesses receive many of their leads from third-party sources (Yelp, Angie’s List, Thumbtack, Facebook, etc.). Another reason these SMBs may find a website irrelevant is because of the challenge in getting these sites to rank on search engines, while listings on these third-party sites rank well. But to say a website is therefore irrelevant seems like a bold conclusion.
A website brings credibility and additional information about a business that third-party sites can’t. After all, a website is the only 100% “owned” or controlled outlet a SMB can use to promote their business. More important still, consumers say that websites are the second most trusted form of advertising, behind “recommendations from people I know.”
With the figure hovering around 50% for the last three years, SMBs still haven’t been sold on the idea of purchasing a website. Despite a variety of DIY, DIWM and DIFM website options that vary in price, cost remains a major roadblock, suggesting SMBs might not be aware of the many options available to them.
There are many studies that highlight the importance of a website in capturing new leads and many that show how customers look to websites to help them make purchase decisions. Despite all of this, this Clutch study shows that some SMBs feel websites are simply irrelevant to their business. However, in today’s economy, a website is widely regarded as a necessary cost of doing business.
What are you finding in your conversations about websites with SMBs? What is keeping them from jumping in?
