I have a confession: I’m human and I’m not perfect.
I used to think you don’t need websites to grow a business and I’ve changed my mind. My new answer: websites do matter!
Why’d my answer change? Let’s flash it back to June 2017. I just got my masters with the intention of being an Executive Director for nonprofit organizations.
Here’s what I admitted to myself, “Sh*t! I just got this masters degree to please other people. I really want to start a business…”
The “business idea” that came to me was writing blogs. I grew up with Xanga, Livejournal and Tumblr. Remember those? I loved writing my personal stories and takes on life, and continuously refreshing my crush’s pages at the time to see what he was writing.
However, I hired a business coach and she told me I didn’t need a website. I listened to her cause frankly — I just paid $10k to listen to her advice. (Have you been there?)
She was right, at the time, only because I got my first paying clients through referrals. I still get high referrals and renewals but I had an intuition that my audience and clientele can expand from referrals and renewals.
Then in 2020 when the pandemic hit two things happened:
1. I started getting clients who found me because they used the terms “WOC Business Coach” and “Business Coach for WOC” online.
2. I found myself tired of social media energetically because I wanted to be more me rather than be constrained to the number of words and algorithms. I also just found a lot of people copying each other’s messaging and I wanted to express my own message outside of that crowded space.
Because I believe that the universe provides us signs, I became curious and asked myself, “What if I focused on writing blogs and my website?” So I invested time and energy more on my site starting in March 2021, and was mindful it wasn’t going to be a quick ROI.
And 4 magical things happened because I listened to my intuition (and audience):
1. My website became #1 when you Google: “WOC Business Coach” “Business Coach for WOC” and “Business Coach for Women of Color” “business coach for female entrepreneurs” (Thanks to my amazing SEO strategist, Andres, who is also a POC.)
2. September happened and Instagram was down. People were freaking out. And I was grateful I followed my intuition to be less dependent on social media. Here’s a blog I wrote about that talks about being less dependent on social media.
3. Because I followed my intuition, I had an 1,108% ROI from my website!
4. Referrals and Renewals are still my highest income generator 82% with the other 8% from my website!
What have I learned?
Websites do matter and here are 3 reasons why:
1. Website content belongs to you, and there’s no constraint or restraint on what you want to express. Social media owns your content. They can choose to block or even delete your account.
2. It grows your SEO: When you have the right keywords and content, the right, most aligned clients come to you.
3. You can be yourself: This is why I loved the Livejournal and Xanga days because we got to be more of ourselves simply through words and pictures that are not constrained in number of words and algorithm.
I have an action item for you — what is one thing you can do to update your website? Write a blog? Show a picture that resonates with your audience?
For example, in my website I have videos from past events (all pre-pandemic) because I really wanted to accentuate COMMUNITY. You can go to my website to check it out.
And just in case you are wondering, getting my Masters wasn’t a waste of time. My Masters was focused on Leadership and Management and it’s what I use in my own business.
Want to align and purposeful pivot in your business?
If you would like further support in your career, business, or leadership, my team and I would love to support you in creating a sustainable life! You can schedule a 30-minute legacy business or career review call with me to see if it’s a good fit to work together, and you’ll receive 3 action-items from me.
