How strong are your Web site strategies? Do they move your business toward achieving your objectives or overall goals? Think of your strategies as a framework that clarifies approaches you will take in meeting your Web site's objectives. They are more specific than objective, but do not include exact details. After developing strategic framework, you will fill in details with tactics (I will leave tactics discussions for later, in part four of this series.).

You can increase your strategies' effectiveness by taking into consideration business environment you operate in - both online and offline. Two approaches to analyzing business environment are to complete 1) an industry analysis such as Porter's Five Forces and 2) a situation analysis such as a SWOT analysis.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Porter's Five Forces ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A formal industry analysis, such as Michael Porter's Five Forces, is more in depth than simply looking for trends and general industry information and can help you better develop successful strategies.

Michael Porter's Five Forces can provide insight into both your online and offline competitive environments. In Five Forces Model, Porter explains that in any industry there are five forces that influence what happens within industry:

1. Existing companies, 2. potential new companies, 3. substitutes for products offered, 4. suppliers, and 5. customers.

These five forces combine to make up business environment. By studying structure of and dynamics between these forces, you can discover opportunities for improving upon your strategies. Porter designed his basic model to be applied to an entire industry. The same analytical method, however, could also be used to study a narrower universe, such as online presence within an industry. When developing your Web site marketing plan, for example, you can identify "forces" as:

* Competitors: Those sites that offer same product, service, or information as your site.

* Potential new entrants: Your site-less off-line competitors as well as new companies entering industry via a Web site.

* Customers: Visitors and potential visitors to your Web site and your competitors’ sites.

* Suppliers: Those companies that supply you with products (or parts if you are a manufacturer) and/or services offered on your site. Other suppliers are Web hosting, software, and other vendors that supply Web- enabling technology.

* Substitutes: Other means and sources for same products, services, or information as your Web site provides.

Excuses are only justification for giving up. You have let yourself get whupped. You have failed. Failed to give that little extra effort that separates winners and losers. You have failed to learn from tools available to you. You have failed to ask for help. You have failed to plan. Instead, you have planned to fail. Remember, failure is a state of mind. You have created an atmosphere of tunnel vision and lost site of vision. You lost battle but failed to fight war.

Reasons are real, not excuses. Your health has failed. You have exhausted all of your available resources. You just don't have necessary conviction to be in business. You have tried change, asking and searching for help and are convinced that business just isn't for you.

It isn't for everybody. 10% of marketing people make 90% of money. Why? Read back over previous paragraphs. The most important tool you have to succeed is You! It isn't easy cause if it was, everybody would be doing it. We are all blessed with 20/20 hind site. I should have, I could have, if I had only, why didn't I. These words create negativity and that in turn creates failure.