Principles of Web Site Success

A Web Design Checklist to Help You Plan and Succeed

Important web design considerations.

It may sound over simplified, but if you want to get a business loan from the bank, they want to see your business plan. Why would you ever want to launch a web site, potentially the most powerful marketing tool in existence, without a plan? Need help making that plan? Great, because we specialize in helping.

Below you will find a checklist that can also help get you started on a web design plan. You don't have to be a web guru to understand the principles. Leave the web design guru stuff to us, the checklist is just to help you not make the same mistakes that are common to web site owners.

• What is your reason for being on the web? What is your primary goal?
  What benefits could a web site provide for you?
• Why will someone visit your web site? What tasks should they be able to perform while they are on your site (e.g. ordering from you, getting news and/or information, downloading, etc.)?
• Quite often, web sites are thought of strictly from a marketing perspective. Consider the convenience it might provide to your customers, ways it can make your sales force more effective, use it as a reference tool for employees, etc. There are many ways you can benefit from a web site.
• Have you registered a domain name? Do you have someone to host a web site?
  Do you need explanations of these web terms?
• Who are you making a web site for? What is your target audience? Stay focused.
• How will you be promoting your web site? There is a fairly common myth that the Internet will magically make your business prosper. We can help you make a successful plan.
• Your web site needs to compliment your current advertising. We should know about other things you are doing: catalogs, flyers, print and media ads, yellow pages, etc. Your web site and your current advertising will be a valuable asset to each other.
• What web sites do you like? Why do you like these sites? Are there features or functionality that you feel could benefit your web site design?
• Do you feel it is important for search engines (like Google) to find you? If so, search engine optimization (SEO) must be planned from the very start (SEO means programming your site so people can find you by entering certain search words on an Internet search engine). Trying to optimize a web site after it has been developed is usually more work than building it right in the first place.
• There are so-called experts out there who will tell you that pages with lots of text will not succeed. People use the Internet to research before buying. By not providing useful content, you could be forfeiting their business to your competition.
• Keep updating in mind. Most variables are no problem, but if there are any changes coming up soon, like new products and services, acquisition of another company, or anything that alters “business as usual” that you are aware of, this information could be useful in planning an open ended web site design.

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