Developing a Plan for Your Website

Website Planning

Web sites are developed to meet the wants and/or needs of visitors and the visitors are people. People are the key to successful Web site development. For a site to be successful it must meet the wants and/or needs of your visitors and be easy to use. Time spent planning will be time well-spent.

Setting Goals

The fewer the focused, high-level goals for any individual site, the better. A short statement that identifies one, two, or three goals should be the foundation of your website's design. Write them down so you remember them as you work through the design process. Goals help you focus and target your website to the wants and/or needs of your target audience.

Define Your Target Audience

Before you begin designing your site, it is important that you clearly identify your target audience and what they will be looking for when they visit your site. By getting to know your audience you will be better equipped to give them what they want or need in a manner that will be user-friendly.

Review the Competition or Similar Web Sites

Identify and research the successful web site models of others. Look for what they've done well and areas for improvement. In what ways can you build a better site? What best practices have others employed that will fit your design model?

Design Your Web Site's Framework

This is one of the single most important steps in planning and building a successful website. The time spent here is invaluable. If you begin with a strong, well thought-out and assembled framework for your site, your site will be useful and easy to maintain. Organizing and constructing your site carefully from the beginning can save you countless hours of time and frustration down the road.

One of the best ways to begin designing your website's framework is to map out the hierarchy on a piece of paper. Your highest level should be your index or homepage file. Then you should ask yourself, "Where will my visitors want to go from here?" What will they be looking for? And from there, where will they want to go? Keep your higher, broader levels nearer the top of the hierarchy and work your way down through the branches. When you have finished, you will have the basic layout of your web site and your navigational structure. Post that piece of paper near your work station and refer to it frequently, making changes as necessary, and improvements when possible.

Putting a Face on the Frame

Here again, it is important to ask yourself who your target audience is. What will they want to see when they visit your web site? Remember, unless this is just a homepage for your own personal use, this site is for them—your visitors—the people. This is not about you nor your tastes or preferences.

This is again a great time to revisit the popular, similar sites to get a feel for their designs (look, colors, graphics, layout, etc.). And afterward to ask, "What can be done to improve upon their work?"

It is important that your site's appearance be attractive (meaning: "to attract") — not necessarily beautiful nor pretty — but attractive. You want the site to attract visitors, not win awards from those who would seldom, if ever, visit — for its appearance.

In short, plan and design the appearance of your website based on the anticipated preferences of your target audience.

Maintain consistency of design across your site. Changing appearances, layouts, and navigational structures midstream will only confuse your visitors and possibly cause them to leave.

Navigation - Designing an Information Flow

If you followed the simple directions in Design Your Web Site's Framework you will probably have this part mostly done. If not, go back and reread that section. You will need to give some serious thought as to how your visitors will want to, and be able to, move through your web site. This is not an area that should be taken lightly or rushed. Take your time. Plan the navigational portions of your site well, first for your visitors, secondly for the search engines, and lastly for whomever will be maintaining your site. Again, keep your navigational system consistent and easily identifiable.

Keep the following points in mind as you design your navigational system:

Content - Asset Planning, Gathering, and Inventory

Content Rules. Remember that principle and use it as your guide and measure in every aspect of your web site development. It will serve you well.

In spite of all else you do, without quality content your website will never be truly successful. Period.

Adequate time should be allotted for planning the content of your site. And if you are like most website owners, this task will never end. You will always find more content to add and existing content that needs improvement. Get used to it.

Content can be obtained from a variety of sources: you can create it yourself, have it created by someone else, or use existing copyright free or copyleft works. This is really a personal choice based on your wishes and circumstances. All three are viable options, but only you know your personal situation.

Build an inventory of information if you can. You will always be ahead of the game if you have material ready to use. The best case scenario is one in which, you have material waiting to be posted on your site. Please do not misunderstand; you want to post everything you have as quickly as possible, but far better to have more to post than time to post.

Maintain your content inventory in logically labeled folders. Do not skimp on label names. Call it what it is and be specific. You'll be glad you did when, a year later, you are trying to remember where you put that file and what you named it.

If you have enough storage space, keep copies on your computer's hard drive and on your web server in a file named "Assets," or "Content - Waiting," or whatever you like and will remember.

Test for Usability

Test, test, and retest! You cannot overdo this! Test during and after the planning stage and continue to test until you website is up and running. Then spot test periodically on a regular basis. This is a very wise investment of your time and you will never be sorry you did it.

Usability testing is cheap, quick, informal, and easy. In the planning stage you just show a five to ten people who fit your target user profile your site's navigational plan or proposed site map and ask them:

That all you need to do to start planning, designing, and building your web site, but remember—keep testing!

After all, what good is information if nobody gets it?