Business Without Website: A 2022 Update on Digital Acceleration
Published on: 29 Sep 2022 | Author: Jorge Uceda
Among the most affected by the pandemic were small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), whose marketing budgets are still reeling from the effects of Covid-19 and put a halt to their digital acceleration.
During the pandemic we analysed the then-current state of digital acceleration. It’s only fair that, now that businesses are resuming their normal operations, we take a look at how things have changed since then.
Almost half of businesses surveyed (44%) said they have a website.
France and Spain are the two leading markets in terms of SMBs with websites, a stark contrast to our previous survey which had the Netherlands and Germany top the list.
Almost half of the respondents said their websites are mobile-friendly,
Mobile apps are still a debated topic among businesses, who mostly said an app was under way, although that number is closely followed by the decision not to develop one.
The most surprising discovery that our 2022 survey put forward is that lack of budget was no longer in the top three reasons why some SMBs don’t have a website.
As a matter of fact, only 14% of surveyed SMBs singled that answer out.
It seems there has been renewed faith in this kind of digital acceleration, since almost 40% of companies that did invest in website creation after the pandemic said they were less expensive than expected.
Despite budgets no longer being the main concern for SMBs with regard to website creation, most of the companies surveyed are keeping tight pockets in 2022.
The highest budget considered for website development is anywhere between 1,000 and 5,000 euros across markets, mimicking the same pattern as that of our previous survey.
In terms of overall marketing budgets, not even a global pandemic nor an all-out war stood a chance against digital acceleration, except perhaps for Spanish businesses, who reported that the pandemic decreased their budget.
In-house staff came out as the most used resource (29.02%) for web design for small businesses, closely followed by specialised agencies—the direct inverse of what we saw in 2020.
In general, the opportunities a website brings (sales/leads/branding/traffic) was the main reason businesses decided to invest in website creation.
Our study reveals that website creation could be seen as a catalyst for further investments in marketing and digital acceleration.
There’s no other way to put it: in 2022 content takes the cake of businesses’ website priorities, with almost a quarter of companies willing to focus on top-quality website content creation for their sites.
In 2020, it came out in second place, behind having a mobile-friendly website.
Curiously enough, only 11.06% will most focus on improving their website security.
According to SEMRush’s State of Content Marketing 2022 Global Report, only 3 out of 100 companies don’t see content marketing as part of their digital strategy.
After two years of tests and trials, the digital world seems ready to get back on track once again. In particular, SMBs appear to be optimistic about implementing or expanding their digital presence.
As more and more businesses without websites get started on their digital journey, we’ll be there to keep an eye out for trends and insights within the digital marketing world. After all, with some companies even questioning the impact of a website in their specific industry, it won’t be long before we uncover what the next step of digital commerce will look like.
The study was conducted between April 4th and April 8th, 2022, among 1,000 companies across Belgium, Germany, Spain, France, and the Netherlands. In the study, we surveyed business owners about the current state of the websites of their SMBs, as well as their plans regarding website creation. The responses are anonymous.
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