A web site disseminates information and invites audience feedback. From a commercial point of view, a web site can market a company and its products, and provide valuable customer services. The first task in web planning is to list what the company hopes to achieve with its site.
Who does the company want to see the web site? Who else will see it? The target audience helps define the content and design.
How will the purpose statement be achieved and the target audience served? You probably want people to visit the site, be interested enough to browse through the site, and to return to the site. A good first content aim is therefore to provide useful information that benefits the reader in some way.
Sites' benefit from being easy to navigate with readers quickly being able to find information they want. Draw a navigation overview: a family tree format often works well.
The purpose and audience may impose design constraints. Web pages will appear differently in different browsers, and different people have different connection speeds. Should, for example, images be used with restraint to minimise downloading time, or will my target readers have the latest browsers and high speed links.
Find out which pages should be written first and who is responsible for gathering information.
Once the opening pages of the web site are on-line, tell everyone about them. Here are some techniques for web marketing.
Please email if you would like me to design and market a web site for your company.
Member of HTML Writers Guild.
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14 November 1996