If you take into consideration just how much the internet and technology have developed over the last 15 years, and how they’ve changed the way we do business, you’d think that most business owners would have a website, at the very least…
Being online allows you to reach more customers, it gives you a sense of credibility, it lets you market your business, it allows you to be there for your customers 24 hours a day (we could go on).
…Apparently not.
According to website builder Just Add Content, a surprising 50% of small businesses do not have a website; 41% of those surveyed reasoned that their business ‘doesn’t need one’. And why don’t they need one you may wonder?
- ‘They don’t understand how it could help their business’
- ‘They’re too expensive, complicated, and time consuming’
- ‘They’re doing just fine without one’
With 76% of small business owners over 45, it’s not too much of a stretch to say that they might not be as tech-savvy as the Millennials or Generation Y coming through the ranks; they may have fallen out of touch with technology or have just been accustomed to going about business a certain way.
The concerning part about this choice is that with the slow death of newspapers and print marketing, for example, the world is online, so unless the vast majority of a business’ customers are repeat customers or referrals, they should be too.
Amongst accountancy firms, almost a fifth (19%) do not have websites. Now this is quite worrying when you start to think about the latest online software available – cloud accounting being one. In fact, some 22% of people in a recent survey by PwC predict that most or all of the accountancy profession will be automated within five years!
So if you’re near graduation and are looking into which accountancy firms you’d like to work for, we recommend checking their online presence before you apply for a role. Businesses who don’t keep up or who don’t see change until it’s too late, suffer the consequences (they die).
If you would like to know more about AAT courses in accountancy, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us via our contact us page.
