Illusion Technologies: Web Site Developers

Web Site Marketing Strategy Made Simple
By Vann Baker

Developing a web site without a Web Site Strategy is like
trying to run a business without a business plan. Having a web
site strategy and evaluating the results of your strategy will
make sure you are meeting or exceeding your goals and help
insure your web site's success.

A quick search with Google, Yahoo! or any of the search engines
will reveal millions of web sites, the majority of which were
created with a focus on publishing content about a business or
product, with little thought of how practical the web site
really is or what the site is supposed to do.

Wants vs. Needs
It's important to distinguish between wants and needs and to
focus on functionality necessary to reach specific business
goals with your web site. Developing a marketing strategy is not
just limited to your web site goals, but your overall marketing
plan and what advertising, marketing and customer service goals
are best suited for your web site.

More often than not, a web site is treated as an afterthought
without a specific purpose beyond offering basic company
information and an e- mail form. We view a web site as an
interactive extension of a company, with few limitations.

Setting Web Site Goals
The first step is to list all the specific tasks you want your
web site to accomplish. Besides offering a potential customer
information about your company, what should your web site "do?"
Should your web site help you to accomplish E-commerce? Serve as
a lead source? Distribute information to your customers? Offer
customer service? Should your web site be used as a recruitment
tool? A customer survey tool? Or for advertising and promotion?

Creating a list of priorities
As you list what you want your site to do, prioritize the list
into three categories: 1) Primary, "must do" goals, 2)
Secondary, "it would be nice if . . ." and 3) Back Burner, "if
we have to postpone this, it wouldn't hurt us."

When grouping your web site goals, keep in mind the one
overwhelming reason for having a web site in the first place and
compare it to each of the goals as you prioritize them.

After establishing clearly what a client's stated web site
goals should be, we compare these goals with a client's
expectations regarding their web site, current Internet
technology and their marketing and advertising plan.

Separating wants and needs. The final step in creating an
E-Strategy is to separate wants from needs. It's easy to want
capabilities you have seen elsewhere on the Internet, but hard
sometimes to determine if certain functionality will really help
your business.

Do you really need a chat room or a message board on your site?
Perhaps it would be more important to know who is using your web
site and how often they are coming back.

Ordering Web Site Priorities
Having your priorities outlined and your goals detailed will
help you to determine what you really need. Go through your
priority list and measure it against your web site goals. If a
web site feature you want will help you to accomplish a specific
task then include it as long as it utilizes Internet technology
or browser technology that is widely supported by today's
browsers.

If you have items on your list that don't match your web site
goals well, it's probably a good idea to hold off implementing
them. Finally, having a priority list will make it easier to
decide what to include or exclude in your web site when working
within a limited web site budget.

10 Tips for a Great Web Site
1) Making great first impressions is important and your web
site may be the first exposure to your company a potential
customer experiences. Strike a balance between content and
design.

2) Avoid focusing exclusively on graphic design rather than
making the web site useful. Give your web site visitors a reason
to visit your site often.

3) Create simple navigation. Design your site so your users can
go from one page to any other page. Avoid navigation schemes
that rely on the user having to search for a secondary
navigation menu or having to use their browser's "back" button
in order to navigate.

4) Distribute your web site information on several pages so the
user does not have to scroll often. By distributing your
photographs and graphics over several pages, your pages will
load faster.

5) Know who is coming to your site and how your site is being
used on a monthly or quarterly basis. This information will be
invaluable for updating or refocusing your site to better serve
your target market or customers.

6) Update your site frequently and create a reason for your web
site users to keep coming back. Repeat visits give you an
opportunity to repeat your marketing message.

7) Capture information with your web site. Use forms, offers,
surveys and promotions to get your web site users to tell you
who they are and what they are interested in. Not only will this
help you to design a more useful web site, collecting e-mail
addresses can allow you to notify customers and potential
customers about new products or services.

8) Avoid bells and whistles. With the web, today's fad is
tomorrow's eyesore. Invest in good graphic design and compelling
content. If you must use animations, have them stop after a few
cycles so they don't become obnoxious.

9) Review your web site goals quarterly. As the Internet
evolves and as new technology becomes mainstream, it is good to
review the purpose of your site and the usefulness of new tools
and implement these new tools when they make sense.

10) Avoid "do-it-yourself web site design." Yes, there are
programs that let you build your own web site. If you don't have
experience in graphic design or producing professional web
sites, hire a web development company with proven abilities to
help you.

About the Author: Vann Baker is the president of Design-First,
a marketing company specializing in corporate identity and
collateral development. Vann has been helping small businesses
and Fortune 500 companies to create brochures, newsletters,
catalogs, websites and more for over 20 years.
www.design-first.com

Source: http://www.isnare.com