It is my honest belief that unless a business requires a website - they don't need one.

There are some exceptions but in general they can more easily use existing services that has existing users. (Ex. a directory listing or some type of SaaS platform)

There's a few things as dissappointing as spending thousands of rand/euros/dollars on a website and it ends up being an expense with no tangible benefits.

I'd tell a business, lets get real. A real website requires maintenance and regular updates which means time and money. Can a small business really afford to waste money AND time on something that doesn't increase your profits?

If a website doesn't fit into your core business domain, then you probably don't need one.

Here are a couple of questions that need to be asked:

Will clients leave you if you don't have a website?

Are there any dependencies that require you to have a website?

Who will be responsible for maintenance and updating of a website?

Are the 'experts' available to help create a website? (Ex. they want to be able to do stock control but have no idea how to do it - they expect the software to make up for their lack of skill/laziness. This is a major cause of failures in software development.)

Are they willing to pay upfront what it costs to create what they want? (I call this the free ride principle)

I'd say, consider the above questions. It might be better for such a small service to not to have a website and rather spend that money on physical advertising campaigns instead.

If you can take away anything from what I said, take this: Bad news is always free. Good news has to be searched for or created - in other words you should bring them good news and they will listen to you. Ask them those questions as a consultant, if they need a website - propose to them what you would do to improve their existing website in regards to their core business domain. If they don't need a website - tell them.