wix

Ready to start or grow your business? Wix can help.

By Rieva Lesonsky

In the first few months of a new year, many aspiring entrepreneurs resolve that this is the year they’re actually going to start their own small business. If you’re one of these people—or if you made this vow last year (or the year before)—and didn’t quite get started, then let’s make 2019 the year you get serious about business ownership. “Getting serious” also applies to those of you who have started a business but haven’t built a website. Here’s one of my “rules”: If you want to start and grow a business (whether part- or full-time), you need to have a website. No exceptions.

Luckily, accomplishing this task is easier than ever, thanks to Ascend by Wix. Ascend was launched last month. If you don’t already know, Wix is a highly-acclaimed, award-winning website builder (with over 141 million users globally) that takes the pain out of creating and maintaining a website. Ascend is an all-in-one business solution, consisting of a suite of 20 products/tools to help you “connect with your customers, automate your work and grow your business.”

Think of Ascend as a hub where you first “connect and manage” your business. Features include:

  • Connect with customers in real time and respond to their questions. One Ascend user I met says she often answers questions in the middle of the night from bed, since she gets queries from all over the world 24/7.
  • You can create custom forms, surveys and quizzes and gather client/customer testimonials
  • Price quotes. Allows you to send quotes to your potential customers and lets them accept online.
  • Enables you to create, send, manage and track invoices and allows your clients to pay in one click
  • Automation tools. You can create “triggered” actions, so your business is working, even when you’re not.
  • Your own inbox. Enables you to manage all your communications in one place where you can respond to messages and track bookings and orders.

Ascend then helps you “promote and grow” your company. Features include:

  • SEO Wiz. You can create a personalized SEO plan, connect to Google in a click and get indexed in seconds.
  • Email marketing. Email marketing is still the most effective way to reach most customers. This tool helps you create and share professional email marketing campaigns.
  • Social media. Social media posts with visuals get more engagement. Using templates, you can create and share eye-catching social posts.
  • Video Maker. Everyone is buzzing about video marketing these days. You can not only create your own video promos here but share them instantly on Facebook and YouTube.
  • Customers are often triggered to buy by promotions. This tool allows you to send customized discount coupons to your customers and clients.

All this is important because Wix research shows that among their most successful website clients:

  • Chat users have 235% more site appointments and 278% more repeat visitors
  • Automations users get 151% more site traffic
  • Those who use email marketing attract 783% more site traffic
  • Forms users have 114% more submissions

Security is top of mind for Wix, too. Nitzan Achsaf, the VP & GM, Consumer Experience at Wix.com, told me the company makes it a priority to “find any vulnerabilities” on the site, and pays hackers to try to hack into the system to identify any weaknesses.

Ascend will be billed as an additional subscription for Wix customers with tiered pricing to fit the growth of small businesses.

Launching Ascend is an evolutionary step for Wix. Company CEO and cofounder Avishai Abrahami says, “We are expanding our market by offering management tools, marketing and promotion capabilities. Ascend is the next iteration in a long line of products, informed by our data and designed with our users, and their success, as our inspiration.”

Want to know more? Check out these Wix resources for more information:

  • Wix blog
  • User journey
  • The Wix Appis available for free on Google Play and in the App Store.

Achsaf says Wix and Ascend are designed to be “out of the box” easy to use and scalable. So, there are no more excuses. The time is now to start or grow your business. And you can’t do either without a website.

Man working on web design stock photo from Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock

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