Building Your Own Web Site? Here are Two Critical Points to Consider

Written by Gary Abada


First let's look at site planning.

Your web site does not have to be grandiose and packed with text. Organizingrepparttar flow of your site content is more important, wasting your time agonizing over what picture or size of logo to place onrepparttar 134790 top header will not help you sell products and services. Professional web design companies can advise you on that. Provide to your designer, your basic concept andrepparttar 134791 purpose of your site. Your designer will create something for you. What you can do is decide onrepparttar 134792 sections you want included as this will help you organize your content. Think about whatrepparttar 134793 sections of your site will be titled and how they will link together. This step will help you integraterepparttar 134794 graphics aroundrepparttar 134795 content so it blends in, giving you a more compact and well planned design.

Choose a site structure, 2-column or 3-column will be based onrepparttar 134796 size of your data and how you want it arranged. If you have paragraphs and paragraphs of information you want your client to read then a 2-column layout would fit your requirements. Here is an example of how to get a clean layout from a two column design - http://www.successnavigator.com Here is an example of a 2-column site with no proper planning - http://www.quitsmokingchat.com/. Three column layouts are generally used on web sites that have a lot of links with short descriptions to them - http://www.mlmprofit.com, here is an example of a 3-column site with a lot of links but EXCESSIVE use of graphics overwhelmingrepparttar 134797 look ofrepparttar 134798 site - http://www.dabs.com... something you should avoid in planning your layout.

What's really going on with your web site?

Written by Ralph Hilliard


With any good business plan,repparttar defining of a primary goal and primary audience goes hand in hand with deciding what product or service you will market. However, withrepparttar 134789 flood of entrepreneurs torepparttar 134790 Internet, I have watched an interesting reverse trend occur.

That trend goes something like this. Pick a product or service, get a domain name, build a web site and then figure out who will buy it.

I loverepparttar 134791 Internet andrepparttar 134792 ability it affords to evenrepparttar 134793 playing field betweenrepparttar 134794 big corporation andrepparttar 134795 home entrepreneur, butrepparttar 134796 fact remains that sound business practices such as definingrepparttar 134797 primary goal and audience worksrepparttar 134798 same onrepparttar 134799 Internet as they do off-line.

For this reason, it is a necessity to do your research before one line of code is written, a domain name is chosen or a single graphic is created. It's what I call "Defining before designing."

Why do I emphasize this in a series of articles about web design?

Simply because every aspect of designing your web site will flow out ofrepparttar 134800 definition of your primary goal and primary audience. If you have not done your homework in this area, you can be sure your online venture will be like a ship with no engine or sails, merely tossed about byrepparttar 134801 whims ofrepparttar 134802 ocean.

Now ontorepparttar 134803 business of defining. Right up front I'll tell you that "making money" is a lousy primary goal. Making money is a result of setting and sticking to a good primary goal and properly defining a primary audience.

Here are three elements to consider in your definitions.

1. A PRIMARY GOAL IS SINGULAR - It is just that, a primary goal, not goals. I'm not saying that you can't have secondary goals, butrepparttar 134804 key is picking a singular primary goal because that's your beacon, your cornerstone inrepparttar 134805 design, without it,repparttar 134806 site crumbles.

Many new entrepreneurs approachrepparttar 134807 web with a "one-stop" approach. I'm going to sell everything I've ever been interested in to all people everywhere.

It's understandable how this happens. In offline marketing, you are limited to space, be it a 15 second television spot or a two sided brochure. The bottom line is that you have limited space to sell yourself and by necessity, this narrowsrepparttar 134808 focus.

The Internet bringsrepparttar 134809 new element of limitless space to advertise. You really have more space than you will ever need, sorepparttar 134810 tendency is to say something like, "In addition to this marketing pamphlett, I think I'll sell memberships to this timeshare vacation program, an affiliate hosting program and maybe even this VCR since I just got a DVD player. Keep in mind that your web site is not a garage sale.

It feels good to dream you can sell everything to everyone, butrepparttar 134811 truth is you'll be more succesful selling one thing very well to a specific group of people.

2. A PRIMARY GOAL IS SPECIFIC - I could define my primary goal as "Selling books onrepparttar 134812 Internet" but does that really help me make and decisions about what should be on my web site?

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