Advance Planning Will Make the Most of Your Website
Planning a website that will achieve the goals you have set for your business is probably the most difficult part of the entire Internet marketing process. Yet, most people completely bypass this important step or, worse, just turn the whole project over to a website designer to handle.
By strategically planning your new website or an update of your existing website, you will ensure you have a marketing piece that showcases your business to its best, allows you to be in control of ongoing content updates, and achieves the goals you have set for your business. Here are a few steps to use in the planning process:
1. Create a list of anything your website visitors will want to know about the product or service you are offering. For example, visitors to a school’s website would probably want to know the attendance levels, size of the classrooms, information on staff members and what sports they can participate in. Brainstorm every possible topic someone might want to know related to the industry, product or service your website will be offering.
2. Put yourself into the visitor’s shoes. Visit some websites and review them as if you are in the market for the services those sites have to offer. As a visitor, what do you like and dislike about each site? Are you driven to take action? How easily can you find what you are looking for? How many times do you have to click to find what you are looking for? Take notes on all this information with the purpose of making your own website as visitor friendly as possible.
3. Research to find out what keywords your visitors might search for. There are free keyword search tools through Google that are completely adequate for this type of research. Enter a general phrase related to your product or service, such as “coffee filters” and other related keywords will appear. These are the things your visitors already have questions about. Knowing this, you can plan your website content to answer their questions up front.
4. Plan your new website so that it can expand. Stay away from website formats that can’t be expanded easily to add products and new pages. A website is not static, but rather should change constantly to meet your customer needs.
5. The final thing to keep in mind is that you want to be able to control your new website, rather than be at the mercy of your web designer to make even the simplest of changes. Today’s dynamic Internet marketing environment demands new and fresh content added to your website often, and the old fashioned sites that rely on a web developer to make changes just won’t work anymore. It is to your advantage to plan a website platform that will allow you to add content quickly and simply.
Your website is most often one of the biggest marketing expenses your business will encounter. It is critical to take the time to plan a new website that is compatible with your business goals.
Marty Dickinson is the founder of HereNextYear, Inc., a full service Internet marketing company in business for 15 years. His passion is Internet marketing solutions for the entrepreneur, speakers and authors. Visit to see what HereNextYear has to offer and to find out more about their innovative new website packages fully integrated for ease with social networking and other Internet marketing strategies.
