Planning
The first thing to do is decide what the purpose of your website is and who will be using it. If you already have a website and are looking to upgrade, then you already know. If you are creating your first website, a good way to get started is to find a few websites that you like as examples of what you want your website to be. Then, write down what you like about those websites and what is missing that you would like to add.
Usability
The biggest problem today with websites is usability. Too many sites reflect the internal politics of the company. The structure of your website needs to reflect the perspective of your target audience. Sometimes that target audience is your internal organization, but if you’re primary target is external customers, then your website needs to be targeted to them. Most of the time, websites need to reflect both the organization and the customers, so that employees feel good about the website and customer get a good understanding of your products and services.
Keep in mind that visitors to your website are looking for information. Your website needs to focus on easy navigation to get them the information they are looking for.
Ask yourself two questions:
- What sort of information are my visitors looking for (each group of users)?
- What will my visitors want to do?
Prototyping
Most website developers like to have a complete website plan in place before building a website to avoid any rework. The problem is that most companies just don’t know what they want or what they can do with a website. Therefore, we prefer to get some initial information about what a company would like, and then create a prototype website to help flush out what they like and don’t like. We have found this process to be faster and less painful then having round-after-round of committee meetings - trying to make a 'final' decision.