Does Your Website Really Drive Visibility? Plus, How to Find Clients That Matter

Hello and welcome to the show. Today. I'm not in an audio booth, so I expect to hear some interruptions, especially since I'm recording at home today and it's one of those late night recordings. Now today on the podcast, I want us to look at whether websites by themselves give you increased visibility. Is it automatic that if you get a website, then you're going to become more visible or you're going to become more popular online?

And I also want us to look at how to decide to reach out, when to decide to reach out to someone as a prospect if you're a service provider. Now, the reason why I want to tackle these questions today is because I received some outreach recently and the person sent me a WhatsApp message. And this is how the WhatsApp message went. Now let me read from the message. So this is what the person said. So the person said, I came across your business on Google and really liked what you offer.

I noticed you don't have a website yet. I wanted to ask have you considered having one to increase your online presence? So let me repeat. So the fellows have your WhatsApp message and this is what the message said. I came across your business on Google and really like what you offer. I noticed you don't have a website yet. I wanted to ask, have you considered, excuse me, have you considered having one to increase your online presence?

Now my response was just no because, you know, it's a big game. I engage people, you know, as per, you know, me, I'm in sales now and you know, I like to encourage people, you know, whether the outreach is cool or not, but anything is, I'm tired of engaging people. So I just responded no and left it at that. And I want to talk about my reasons why I said no more of the reasons why I said no in the future episode. And largely is because, you know, my podcasting, my content marketing strategy seems to be doing OK.

You know, putting up episodes of the podcast, sharing them on YouTube, and then also writing content pieces once in a while on LinkedIn seems to be doing OK. So that's the main thing, pretty much the main reason why I said no. And that's the main reason why I'm not considering a website now. And you guys are not going to find any website of me in the near future anyway. Now let's get back on topic. Now the main benefit that this guy seems to be selling is this.

The main benefit he seems to be selling is that the purpose of the website is that a website leads to increased visibility. Now I want us to look at that question today. Is it true that the unique value proposition of a website is that if you get a website, you're going to become much more visible? Now for those of you who are listening to the show for the first time, the UVP or the USP, that's the unique value proposition or the unique selling proposition is just the reason why people do business with you or the reason why people buy your product for your service.

So if you're one of those people who sells the service and what you're selling is websites, should you be leading with the fact that people should get websites so that they can become much more visible? Now, web websites can only give you visibility if you pay attention to SEO. And let me repeat this, websites can only make you more visible if you pay attention to SEO. In other words, if you have a website and you're not paying attention to SEO, you are not going to be visible, Shishi, as in nobody will see you.

You won't achieve gang if you don't pay attention to SEO. So SEO just means things that you do to make it easy for Google to recommend you to people who are searching on the Internet or SEO just means things that you do that makes it easier for people to find you on the Internet. Now let me repeat every single time you hear SEO, this is what it means. Now, the reason why I'm stressing this definition is because if you remember when I

was talking to the Abuja businesswoman last year, late last year on digital marketing at Avon Hub in Abuja, everyone in the room didn't know what SEO was. And for me, I was shocked. But thinking back now, I shouldn't have been shocked, you know, because like this is what I do for a living. I do sales for a living. SEO, technically speaking, is not sales per SE, but The thing is, you know, it's kind of my environment. So someone like me should know SEO is, but I shouldn't assume that everybody knows what SEO

is. SEO just means search engine optimization. But even that word, the grammar sounds big, but this is breaking it down. This is what it means. SEO just means anything that you do on the website or concerning the website that will make it easy for people to find you or anything you do on the website or relating to the website that will make it easier for Google to recommend you to other people. Because just like you have algorithms on Instagram and algorithms on TikTok and algorithms on Facebook, Google MA is also an algorithm.

So, you know, don't get it twisted. Google is also an algorithm. So just like we play the algorithm game on Facebook, we play the algorithm game on Instagram, the algorithm game or LinkedIn algorithm game on Tiktok, there is also an algorithm game to play on Google. So if you want to be visible, you have to play that SEO game. Now what are the ways that people achieve SEO? You can do it in for excuse me, there are lots of ways that you can look at it, but for me, I

like to break it down just to this simple way. There's technical SEO and then there's on page SEO. Now technical is all that fancy stuff that you do. The metadata. Metadata just means all I put it now, OK, well, data is just means information. So the website definitely will have information like the text you put up, you know, your prices, your location, you know, blah, blah, blah. Now, metadata is the data that is behind all that text, you know, the structured data that helps the the Google algorithm,

Google bots, because Google is just made-up of, you know, tiny, tiny bots that are just scraping the Internet trying to understand what this website is and things like that. So when you hook up your site maps, your metadata and all that technical, technical stuff, you know, stuff that everyday ordinary people like you and I don't bother ourselves with, all that is technical data. Technical data is just all the stuff that the website designer puts there so that when the Google bot gets to the site,

because remember that an algorithm is not a human being and a bot is not a human being. So for human beings like you and I, when we step on a website, we know straight up what this website is about. Just, you know, based on the graphics, based on the text that is there. But bots can't read, algorithms can't read. Algorithms don't understand, they don't know what's up. So the metadata is the thing that makes it easier for the bots to understand that.

OK, this picture on the website, so this picture is a picture of a man eating fried chicken, you know, something like that. So that if anybody's Googling best place to eat fried chicken near me, you now know that OK, based on the pictures that have been seen on this website, maybe this website is the correct place to be eating fried chicken in Abuja. Let me show this person the information. So that's all of our simplified way, but basically that's just how all these things work.

So yeah, so that's the technical aspect. Then there's the on page SEO. Now on page SEO is built around the content that you put up on the website and basically just means, you know, people trying to write posts, trying to write articles around keywords or around phrases that customers or potential clients are going to search for. So those are also some of the things that Google, the Google algorithm looks at to determine whether it's going to show your website or not.

So if people are searching correct place to eat chicken in Abuja near me and on your website you happen to write a lot about correct places in Abuja to eat fried chicken. Then it's one of the reasons that Google might have to serve up your own website because people are searching for correct Amala joints near me or correct chicken joints near me or five Star gardens in Abuja or something that you happen to be writing about those sorts of things.

So basically what I'm just trying to say is if you get a website and you don't pay all these technical boys or technical girls to go and be doing metadata sitemap this architecture or blah, blah, blah. Or if you yourself don't start writing content around some kind of things, you know, some keywords and some phrases and things like that, your website is going to be useless. People who search, nobody will see you. Basically what I'm trying to say is if your website is static, as in let's say you built the website January 1st 1995, since then 1995 not done anything on the website, No update, no nothing, no blog, no posts, no nothing, nothing.

Nothing. That website is of no use. That website is not going to give you any kind of visibility. Nothing 0. So your website has to be continually updated and your website also has to be a helpful resource before it's going to give you visibility. And that is where a content marketing strategy comes in. Now, content marketing just means you're putting up photos, videos, text, audio, PDF. What does anything share that people might find valuable and that people might be searching for?

Now, the whole idea behind content marketing strategy is that the more valuable content that you put out, the more people begin to hang with you, the more people begin to mess with you, the more people begin to follow you, the more people begin to relate with you. And then people begin to feel like this guy, this babe be like, say like this guy is the very guy or this babe is the very babe. So that's what the content marketing strategy is.

This podcast that you're listening to right now. This is a content marketing strategy. There's one guy who's been listening. Since when did he say he's been listening to himself? I think he says he's been listening since 2023 or so. But it's just this year, 2025 that the guy said, what's up? My, you know, you know, I've been listening. I've been reasoning like this, reasoning like this, you know, this is where my business is.

I'm so, so well, like, I think we can work together like this, you know? So how do you feel and you know myself, you know, I looked at guys business, we spoke a bit and I think I can help him out and currently that he's one of my clients. But this is somebody that's been listening since 2022-2023. I didn't say PIM, but then today we're doing business and that is how content marketing strategies work. You're trying to be helpful,

you're trying to be valuable, you're just putting out the content. People begin to follow you, they begin to message you small, they begin to Yang with you, begin to build a relationship with you. And then over time, there's a possibility that some of these things might lead to business. And so that's what content marketing strategies are all about. So if you want your website to give you visibility, it's not just a matter of creating the website and then posting it,

bam. And then you just leave it. No, you have to continue. You'll update that thing. Tell your website person, because you know, there are people like me, for instance, me, I don't know anything about code. So you guys call your tech person every once in a while. That is you go and do metadata, go and do site architecture, go and do this go and do that, all that technical, technical things so that the Google bots will be able to understand what's on the website.

Then you self, you also need to make sure that your website is a living website, a living website flowing with fresh streams of content, always putting out stuff so that today somebody will come to your podcast. Let's go back to the whole example of looking for correct Hangouts in Abuja. So the person goes to your website and they say that how today you wrote about correct places where you can eat peppered fish. Next week they come to your website.

You wrote about places where you can eat correct chicken. Then go to your website again and then you're talking about the top best 5 Hangouts in Abuja where you can go and watch UFR Sports and eat suya and then something like that. So if people have been finding your website to be a helpful resource and let's say what you are actually is you're an event planner or something, OK, is that too much of A stress? OK, maybe I should have thought of another example, but basically here my point.

So it's when somebody has been following your website, has been saying, OK, these, your website, you always have the four on one. You always know what's up. You always know what the deal is when it comes to this and this and this and that. Then people will subscribe, follow, bookmark, whatever. And then eventually one day the more to do business with you. And of course, since you're being so helpful, they will end up sharing it with other people as well.

So that is what brings visibility. It is not the website in itself that brings visibility. So now using this scope, if you want to use my own business as a case study and to help you better understand why I'm not bothered about the website, all the attention that I get is maybe 0.001% from my radio show. The remaining 99.99999 something of the attention I get is derived from this podcast that you're listening to right now.

Anyway, you know, the radio show is still new, so with time, let's give it a year or two, you know, maybe things might change. But you can see now why currently I'm not bothered about the website because given my limited skill set and expertise, I seem to be doing OK with the podcast and with the radio show. And then of course, I'm still in talks with the TV station to see how we can get the TV show on the air this quarter, first quarter of 2025.

S with those things working out, honestly, I think I probably don't need a website for now. But then again, you know, my area of specialty is sales and personal selling in particular, not necessarily marketing per SE. So of course, as I gain traction on all these things and as I hire marketing specialists, the strategy might change. But for now, this is the reason why I can't be bothered with the website. So excuse me.

So by the way, later on when I do get a website, I'm only going to use a website for lead generation, not for visibility. I'll still rely on the podcast and on the radio show and on the TV show to give me the visibility that I need. I'll use the website for lead generation. The lead is anybody who does something that shows he might be interested in your product or your ServiceNow. One of the ways that you can use your website for lead generation is to use it to capture the names and contact details of people who are willing to have a business conversation.

So when I do have a website, I want my website to be simple, nothing fancy. The website will have a link to the podcast. What else? It'll have a link to the podcast. Then there'll be a tab or a link for speaking engagements and a link for consulting engagements. You know, simple, my website is going to be the most basic website you have ever seen in your life. There's only going to be 3 options, nothing fancy. So you know, tavishyaman.com or whatever it is that I make it.

That's of course after my name becomes something because you know, for now, still building, still building, still growing. So you get to the website and The thing is, if you're interested in the podcast, go here. If you want me to speak at your events, go here. If you want me to consult for your business, go here. I've already decided that that's going to be the simple architecture of my website. So when I do get a website,

that's what mine is going to be for lead generation. And by the way, for those of you who are thinking about websites for your business, I hope you can see some of the thought and some of the strategy that goes into whether you get a website or not and what kind of website that you get. Because there's some of you who fall for this Lamba that the website will give you visibility. And then you go and pay for a website and then eight months later, 10 months later, one year later, you're wondering, I got a website, why didn't the website give me visibility?

This is why It's because your website is static. Your website is dead. You've not done any technical updates. You're not doing content marketing strategy. Therefore, your website is equal to 0. So I'm not saying don't get the website. I'm just saying don't fall for this number that if you get a website it will equal visibility. There's a whole bunch of stuff that you need to do in order for websites to equal visibility.

Summary. What I'm saying is if you want visibility, a website alone is not going to solve your problems. Now question #2 how do you decide to reach out to someone as a prospect of your service provider? The reason why I'm looking at discretion now is because the info that this guy found out about me is from my Google My Business profile. Unfortunately that Google My Business profile. If any of you go and check me up on Google Now you see that the information there is stale.

You will see that I have not updated it in the last, I will say the last five years, maybe maybe even 8 years off to be honest, because I was back when I was still pushing my photography and video business. So I used to regularly update it. But since I made a shift in what it is that I've been doing, I have not been updating it. So for my photography, for the photography side of my business, I don't do retail clients anymore.

So I don't do weddings anymore. If corporate organizations call me up, I will answer them because #1 The profit margin is sweet and then #2 with the way that I run things with my follow up game and things like that, it is easier for me to get repeat business and referrals from corporate gigs, corporate clients. The same thing with video, I don't do retail clients anymore. It was a corporate event. Like for those of you who work with MTN, if people are doing end of year party for the Abuja office, you work in MTN.

You know, please, by all means, I like your boy. I like to hook you guys up, especially if you need documentaries done because I would like I'm a joint documentaries right now. The profit margins are better and then creatively it's much more what's that word? It's more satisfying then, put it that way. The stories you get to tell, the things you get to learn. Anyway, that's a separate as a separate whatever. But bottom one I'm just trying to say is that this guy went to go and check Google My Business profile, and then he found my business profile.

He'd even check it and see that this thing has not been updated in 5 to 8 years. The guy now reached out. Is that how you're supposed to be doing things? You're looking for business. You go to the Internet, Anybody that you see on the Internet, you just start chasing them down. No, no, no, no, no, no. If you listen to this poet has for the length of time, you know that you're supposed to do some small research. I use some current common sense to try and separate the wheat from the chaff to know that OK,

this guy is premium, let me chase it. This babe is premium. Let me chase it. This one maybe. I don't know. Let me keep it just in case. Then this other one, just jump on pass. Just free it. Leave it. Nothing good can come from it. So, well, I was like kind of lost my train of thought anyway. So yeah, the reason for me scaling down my photo and video activities is because I'm paying more attention to my consulting and my speaking business right now.

And summary, what I'm trying to say is that this guy should have looked at my, the Google My Business page and he should have concluded that my business is dead and not worth reaching out to. So please, if you're looking for people online, you're trying to chase and get business from if the last time the person updated right now is 2025, if the last time the person updated was 2020. The thing is, it might be a going business, it might not be.

But in my own opinion, somebody who has not updated in five years like was why are you stressing yourself? Leave the person gonna look for the person that's been updating regularly. And to be honest, that is how average everyday ordinary people think. I know this because my wife is not in business, at least not yet. We're going to get into business together eventually when we start money management services in the future after she passes all her qualification exams and she's a fully chartered financial analyst.

But until then, I've noticed because she likes to do stuff like, OK, like now that we've moved house, for instance, she was searching Instagram, you know, for vendors. So yeah, to be honest, until I started dating my wife and, you know, since marriage, I didn't know the way that people use, like, people really, really use Instagram to learn how to shop and the things like that. So some of the new things that we're buying now that we've moved into the new house is from her checking on Instagram.

You know, if you just send me a picture, you know, what do you think about this little pillow? What do you think about this? What do you think about this shelf? What do you think about that? Or pajamas for the kids or this or this or that or that. There's lots of stuff going on on Instagram and lots of stuff going down on TikTok. But I know there's one thing. My wife can open Instagram and just close it down. I'll say, why'd you close it now?

This was good one. This didn't look nice. I said no, no, no. The person has not updated in one year. I don't think this business is moving. So you can see that everyday average people, your mum, your wife, your boyfriend, your, you know, colleagues, they look at simple things like this. You check your website and say, ah, this guy is now updated in six months. Let me not try, let me not try it. This, this, this business is dead and they move on.

So it's the same thing I should be paying attention to. So bottom line is, I'm saying that if you're a service provider now, like this guy who does websites, what should you be looking out for before you start approaching people? Don't just go and then be collecting names up and down and then start chasing everybody. Business and sales is hard enough as it is. Make your life easier. If you go around and you're collecting names and phone numbers of a bunch of businesses that are already dead, of course you'll be frustrated reaching out to people, pinging people,

calling people, emailing people, messaging people and getting bad answers. The all this guy had to do was do some some small homework. You're reaching out to me to go and get a website. Somebody who obviously has not done something on this business for the last five years, 10, you know, one decade. What are you chasing that kind of person for? Honestly speaking, how do you think that kind of person is going to close into a deal?

So what you should be looking now for when it comes to traditional sales, what we call them buying signals. A buying signal is just something that people do that shows they might be interested in a product or service. So whenever you see some of these small, small cues, those are people that you chase. So back in my event days now wedding photography day, when you, when we me and my video guy will go for bride offers.

If any babe comes to a bride off air, it looks like buying signal. It's not a guarantee because there's some people that nobody has proposed to demo boyfriends of they don't have, but they will come for the bridal show. But still attending a bridal show was a buyer signal. It's now up to you to engage in conversation with people so you can separate the wheat from the chaff now. OK, this one, she doesn't even have boyfriend, but Shah, she just wants to come and see what's up.

She heard music, she heard this, she heard that. She just enter, OK, this one is not serious. You now free her. But attending some kind of shows that could be a bang signal. Of course, now we're talking to people who sell websites. So for the guy who reached out to me, I hope you're listening to this episode. Bang signals, they're different kinds. So I made a list of a few. Let's just examine. Now let's look at website related signals.

So First off, my own opinion, my guy, you should have been looking at people who already have websites. I know some of you will say, ah, I'm selling website. Why will I be chasing somebody who already has websites? But just stay with me here. You you see where I'm going. So if you were looking at people who already have websites, but look for people whose website is the the design is outdated. Once you open the website, you see that this guy, this website was made in 2020.

This website was made in the year 2000. So this website has not been changed in in 25 years, but the business is still an ongoing business. That kind of person. Yeah, reach out to that person. You know, case in point, like Linda EKG. I don't know if Linda EKG is hot right now again, but I know that was one time shower like when her website first blew. I know that maybe like 3 or 4 years later my sister-in-law was on the website.

I checked. I'm like ha so Linda EKG like this babe, she know like she didn't refresh the website, you know nothing was still the same. So there's some people who just roll like that and then plus the person might just be lazy, you know, like me, and just never bother to update the website. But Shar, look for people who have outdated design that might be a buying signal. People who have clunky website design, that might be a buying signal.

Look for websites that lack mobile responsiveness. The idea behind mobile responsiveness is this. I don't know what the percentage is, but Shar, almost like 100% of people right now, they check out websites on their phone. So the idea behind mobile responsiveness is this. Your website, when you open it on desktop, the thing should appear correct. If you open it on the phone, the thing should appear correct. So if you check somebody's website on the desktop, the thing looks 100%.

On the phone, The thing is now looking one kind. You know, elements are getting out of order. Those are the kind of people you can approach. Then of course, there's some people who still have flash on their websites. You know, Flash is how I describe it and I'm not a tech person. So those of you who are tech people, you know, don't be angry with me. Flash is like one kind of tech that allows for animation on the website.

So I don't know the difference between Flash animation and ordinary animation. But I've noticed that those of you who design websites, you get a seat and say, ah, this is Flash. So you will know that thing. So if you see somebody and like, ah, this is Flash, you now know that that's best thing you can approach. You say, oh bro, I've seen their website still runs on Flash. Do you know that is responsible for your website opening slow and that's the reason why your business might be suffering?

You know, you can have that kind of conversation with someone which leads to the next thing, poor performance. If you're going to be looking at poor performance, then we're now going to be having problem based openers. I think I spoke about that maybe two or three episodes back. This is basically where you're having a cold conversation with someone. When I say cold conversation or cold prospecting, it just means the person doesn't know you.

You might, you don't know the person. There's no prior context, no prior personal context, no prior business context. You guys don't know yourselves at all, so that's cool. Prospecting so you can have conversations around slow loading speeds, maybe because the person is using flash, so if you open the website, the website is running slow, that kind of person. You can now send that person a WhatsApp message or if the website is down half of the time there's some websites that are like that, like for some reason glow right now for like 4 days I've been trying to load load Internet.

The thing was just an ongoing. So if you have those kind of connects, go and start talking to glue. Whoever is managing that website is not doing a good job. So websites that are slow currently crashing or having downtime or websites that are not showing up on search engine rankings, those are the people we can hit up on WhatsApp. But it was going to be a problem based opener. Like hey bro, senior website looks cool, but I noticed that your website is running on Flash.

Do you know that flash based websites load 96% slower than websites that work with so, so so and so that could be responsible for you losing business because people are bouncing off your website. Would you be interested in me having a look at your websites to try and figure out how we can optimize it and make it faster? You know so that kind of opener something like that of course, if I had time, I could sit down and think about something much more elegant.

So now what else what else do I say? OK lack of functionality, essential features like modern websites have contact forms, you know drop your phone number here then e-commerce capabilities. You know, if you want to buy, click here, add to this, add to that, you know, so you can be looking at stuff like that. Some of these things missing. These could be buying signals to show that somebody's ready for your product or your service.

So, you know, on and on and on and on. And then also just some simple stuff like maybe you're cheating on LinkedIn. You notice that somebody has just launched a new business or there's a new startup or you know, something, something, you know, you see on your Instagram that somebody has launched a new social media account. You go and check, you see that there's no website, you know, those kind of people. You cannot hit that person up.

Or I noticed you started a new business, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And this is where this kind of visibility Lamba will now work. I've noticed you've started a new business, blah, blah, blah, but you don't have corresponding website. Are you interested, You know, enhance visibility something, something, something, you know, those kind of messages. So now not all of us listening today are in the website business, but just sit and think for my own business, what are buying signals that when I see I

will now know that OK, this person is ready for me. Let me begin the portruded person. So just sit down with a pencil and the paper and then think, start freestyling. Just write stuff down. No answer is too stupid. Just write everything down that comes to your mind. By the time you sleep and you wake up, you now realize that OK, this and I wrote yesterday, OK, if you know makes sense. And then of course, you discuss with people, your business partner, your spouse, Mumsy,

Popsy, you know, whoever. And then of course there's ChatGPT, there's Google Gemini, there are these AI tools. You can actually make it a prompt to look for buying signals for your business. And this will give you cues so that you now know that, OK, when I see somebody doing this and doing this and doing this, this is when I know that, OK, now let me start the conversation. Let me start to chase the person. So summary, don't just go and get business names from a website and assume that this person is a good candidate for your product or your service.

Sit down and think, have I seen any buying signals? If you have seen buying signal, go ahead, pursue. But it doesn't mean that once you see buying signal, you pursue that deal will close, you know, But we should always be doing things to increase the odds in our favour. So that's all for tonight. Thank you very much for your time and attention. If you'd love to connect for a strategy session, a business audit or you'd love for me to answer some questions, then connect with me on WhatsApp.

The phone number is 08064662140. The country code is +234. For those of you who are not Nigerian, then also connect with me on LinkedIn, the name to look for establish aid. I also have stuff available on YouTube. As for those of you who don't like listening to podcasts. So thanks for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys in the next episode.