Many people think starting an online business is an easy way to make money. Although it's true the internet opens a business up to a worldwide audience it's actually not any easier to convince someone from that audience they should buy from your company. In many ways it's much harder to do business on the web than it is to do business in a traditional sense.

As an online business or a business with an online presence you face many challenges you wouldn't normally face while conducting traditional business. For example people who visit your website tend to me much more skeptical than someone who would walk into your store. After all if someone walks into your store you will meet and greet them face to face. That time of activity inspires confidence in your prospect. Here are 5 things you can do with your online business that will help you have convert more of your audience into paying customers.

1. Include a phone number on the top of every page.

It sounds simple because it is. Most people will only skim a page rather than read in depth about your product, service, or company. Therefore the best way for them to get questions answered they might have about your business is through the phone. Not only does this increase the chances you'll engage with your potential customers but it will also cause there confidence to increase and therefore they'll be more likely to ultimately buy from you.

Putting your phone number on the top of every page in large numbers so it's easily readable is a great way to separate you from much of your competition as well. Since many people think their online business is going to produce them easy, hands free money they fail to put their phone number on their page. If they do - often times it's buried on the contact page or in the fine print. Use this to your advantage and try to generate as many phone calls from your website as possible. Convincing someone to buy your products or services over the phone is much easier than trying to get your prospect to make a purchase without talking to a live person.

2. Update your website regularly.

There are billions of web pages on the internet and many of them are ghost towns. We've all done searches on Google and clicked on a link of interest only to find out the company is no longer in business, the website has been abandoned, or the content is outdated. One of the easiest things you can do to stand out from the crowd is regularly update your website and include the date which it was last updated.

At WebStarts.com we do this on our hoempage by including a snippet of our daily blog along with the day it was written. This helps our site visitors see there are real people on the other end of our website who are actually working behind the scenese. You don't need to do something as complex as showing a blog snippet and writing an article each day. You can do something as simple as create a small blub of text on your homepage that says something like "This page was updated on such and such date at such and such time".

3. Let them know they came to the right place.

The average web visitor will give you about 3 or 4 seconds to prove to them you are the website they've been looking for. You can do this by writing a concise headline and putting it across the top of your homepage. This works just like a newspaper. Your headline should contain a concise statement that will communicate to the prospect the product or service you're selling or the information they can find on that page. Once a prospect has established they're on the right site they're more likely to continue reading, more likely to call, and ultimately more likely to buy from your business.

These are just 3 keys to what it takes to be successful online. There is much more you can do to increase your chances of landing customers online. The first thing any online business needs is a website. You can create a free website at WebStarts.com. WebStarts is everything you need to build and maintain your own website.