Advance Planning Is the Key to a Successful Website


Written on March 27, 2010 – 9:46 am | by Guru

One of the most difficult, but key components of the Internet marketing process is to design your website to achieve the goals you have set for your business.  However, most business people ignore this critical step, or leave it to their web designer to take care of, which can often be even worse. 

When you take the time to strategically plan the outline of your new website or an upgrade of your current one, not only will you achieve a website that will show off your business in the best way, but one you will be able to add and edit content easily, and probably most important will help to achieve your overall business goals.  Here are a few steps to use in the planning process:

1.  Write down on a piece of paper everything you think the visitors to your web site might want to know about your product or service.  Using the website for a school, for an example, you would probably discover that visitors would be looking for information on the staff at the school, classroom size, attendance numbers, and sports programs.  Take the time to brainstorm as many areas related to your product, service or industry that someone might be interested in when visiting the website.

2.  Take on the role of your website visitor.  Surf the Internet and visit various sites offering similar services, then review them as a potential customer would.  As a visitor who is genuinely interested in your product or service, what are the good things and bad things about each site you visit?  Does the website inspire you to take further action?  Can you find what you are looking for fast? Are there a lot of pages to navigate through to get to what you are looking for?  Note all this data down with the intent of making your new website as easy for your visitors to use as possible.

3.  Do keyword research to find out what visitors will be searching for. You don’t need to invest in expensive search tools, Google has a free keyword tool that is adequate for this purpose.  Type in a general phrase such as “high school” and see what other keywords come up.  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.  Make sure to plan your website to grow.  Avoid websites that can’t be easily expanded to add more pages or products.  A good website is a constant work in process. 

5.  Finally, make sure your website is easy to control, so you don’t have to rely on your website designer to make even the smallest changes.   Old fashioned websites that only a web developer can change do not work in today’s dynamic Internet marketing environment that demands new content added regularly.  It is to your advantage to plan a website platform that will allow you to add content quickly and simply.

The investment by your business into a new website is a large part of your marketing budget.  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 over 10 years. His specialty is Internet marketing solutions for the small business owner, speakers and authors. Visit to see what HereNextYear has to offer and to learn more about their innovative new website packages fully integrated for ease with social networking and other Internet marketing strategies.

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Post a Comment