Planning Your Website

Just like your business, you have a business plan and goals, so your website should also have its’ own plan and goals that support your business.

Your business-website plan should include:

• What are the services and products the business is providing?
• Who is the client or prospect the website is for?
• What do future clients want?
• How will the website support and interact with current clients?

Why Use a Website Plan?

Sometimes going on a road trip without a map can be fun, but this is not a joy ride with no direction in mind. We do have a goal and the website business plan gives us a map or a path to take.

Answering some questions will help us figure out what the website will need.

• Will the website be more than a brochure?
  1. Will it include an eCommerce store?
  2. What client services will it provide?
  3. Are there multiple offices with different contact information?
  4. Will you Introduce new products?
  5. Are there other ways your site will make money?
  6. Will clients use the site to interact with different divisions of your company?
• Who will be the key contributors to the website?
• Will there be other marketing programs funneling interested parties to the website?
• Will there be a blog? An RSS fed?
• Will there be an email newsletter?
• Will you be more concerned with sales or creating relationships?

How to set your website goals

Your website goals will set priorities and focus. And they will be measurable so simple adjustments can be made quickly.

Some standard goals will include:

• More page views.
• Increase your email subscribers.
• Better search engine positioning.

Here are some goals based on an increase in sales.

• Customer conversions.
• Current clients purchasing new products or services.
• Brand awareness by being a leader in your industry.
• More calls or one on one sales contacts.

all of these items can be easily trackable and should start before you start making any changes.

Depending on the size of your company there may be several divisions or maybe several products or services that will require their specific attention. So part of the plan will include a roadmap or a set of goals for each division.

When setting your goal expectations make sure they are achievable so your team can see their impact on the company’s growth.

Know Your Website Viewers

Are you selling to:

• Inovators want to know they are using cutting-edge technology.
• Mid or lower management doesn’t want to shake the boat but wants to be associated with products and services other larger companies are using with success.
• Family members want to bring info to the table for collaboration and agreement. Like decisions on the next vacation, many companies will put a bulk of their advertising budget around Thanksgiving because this is when families will be together and next year’s vacation will usually come up.

Content Is King

Build your content around your clients and make it easy for your viewers to turn into clients.

What you should understand about your viewers and clients and be able to show how you stand out from your competition.

• What is their problem and how you will fix it.
• Who are the initial contacts?
• Who are the decision-makers?
• Write to your demographic.

Know you can explain your products and services like you’re talking directly to the client and prospect.

Content Plan & Strategy

Will you be providing:

• A blog or adding content over time
• Documents to support products or services
• Images of products and image galleries
• Videos of services or how to use products

Planning for specific items can help when designing, navigating, and growth changes over time.

Website Assets

You may not use all of these:

• Customer testimonials
• Photography for people that directly meet with clients
• Photos of products
• Illustrations, blueprints or diagrams of products or past projects.
• Videos of products or services in action, directions, or how-to.
• Videos to introduce your company.
• Brand-specific logo, fonts, or colors.

These will help your company stand out from your competition.

Once these topics are well defined then the design, navigation, and content will fall into place. Design a client and new customer flow pattern.

Now you decide on contact forms, email sign-up forms how your site will work with social networks.

I still do not recommend using your social networks to interact with customers, but just a way to guide them to the website for more personal contact and interaction.

So now it’s time to look at design and navigation.