Most businesses fail to plan for online success. Knowing your purpose, audience, and uniqueness are
first steps to developing a successful web site. Follow these three steps to position your web site for Internet profits. Step 1: Determine Your Purpose
The first step in planning a web site is to determine what you want to accomplish. Do you want to sell products and services, find new customers, establish credibility, or improve customer service?
The purpose of your web site will affect its content and design. Depending on your goal, you may want to write articles to establish trust, provide a compelling sales letter, a catalog, product information, a secure online order form, and a shopping cart.
Step 2: Define Your Ideal Customers, Their Needs and Concerns
Many web sites are trying to attract everybody. DonÕt make this mistake. Your web site will be more profitable when focusing on your ideal prospects who are likely to buy your products or services. Ask following questions to create a profile of your ideal customers.
- Who are your customers? Who will be visiting your web site? - Who wants or needs your products or services? - What are your customersÕ needs and concerns? - What is age range, gender, profession, industry, income level, education, and reading level of your ideal customers? - Why will they come to your site? - What problems do your products or services solve? - What information do they want? - Are most of your customers computer literate? - What computer, monitor, and screen resolution do they have? - What browsers do they use? - Do your visitors connect to Internet with a slow modem or a fast connection such as cable or DSL?
After defining your ideal customers, target your web siteÕs content, message, and design directly to them. Here are some examples of how your audience affects design of your web site. If you are targeting seniors, make your text large. If your prospects are accountants, use a conservative design. Make your design colorful for children. Avoid movies, sounds, Flash animations, and Java programming if your clients have slow computers and Internet connections.
