Art of Jen Web Design and Development Blog - Summerville, South Carolina / Charleston, South Carolina

This post is part 7 of the “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” post.

Thing #7:    Web Design Considerations Web design means more than just how your website will look.  In fact, web design incorporates many aspects of a website including how users will interact with your site – how they will navigate through the pages, how and where they will find the information contained in your site, how they will use any web application on your site such as an e-commerce shopping cart, and any number of other functions visitors could perform on your site.  Because the web design involves almost every part of your visitor’s experience on your website, it is vital that it is well planned before you choose a web designer or developer and before the programming of the site takes place.

Having said that, I will concentrate on the most obvious part of web design in this post: the look.  If your company has an established brand or company identity, your website should match that identity.  Usually this means going beyond simply adding your logo to the site.  By incorporating the brand colors, marketing copy (optimized for search engines, of course), and personality of the brand you will not only borrow from the brand reputation you already have, but you will also reassure your website visitors that they are on the right website.  This is especially important if you are doing any e-commerce on your site, as visitors would be much less likely to input their credit card number into a website that they are not absolutely sure of.

Of course, I do realize that not every business has an established brand identity.  In that case, your website design options are a bit more flexible.  You still want a design that is going to adequately represent your company and create a good first impression.  After all, if your website is a person’s first impression of your business, it IS your business to that person.  In order to accomplish a  professional design, you could choose either a custom-designed site or choose a template from a site such as templatemonster.com.  A template can be a cheaper and very effective option for some businesses, although you should be prepared that there may be quite a few other websites that will look just like yours.

This post is part 6 of the “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” post.

Thing #6:    What do you hope to accomplish with your website? There are many types of websites come in all shapes and sizes including e-commerce, marketing/advertising, web applications, and social networking websites. In the sea of web designers/developers, there are many levels of experience in each of these types of websites.  Once you know what you hope to accomplish through your website, you can begin your search for a web designer/programmer with experience creating your desired website type.

The website that is right for you depends on three things: what your company or organization needs, what your customers/clients need, and what your stakeholders need.  Before beginning any website project, it is important to pinpoint exactly what you are hoping to accomplish to meet the needs of these groups.

For example, let’s say that you are an organization who coordinates various events for the local state fairground.  Your website will have many audiences, all of which you need to keep in mind before creating your website: your company, your prospective spectators, your vendors, your current and prospective sponsors, and your community.  In order to meet the needs of your company, the first item on your list of requirements for your website is e-commerce, or the ability to sell tickets to your events on your website.  In order to do this effectively though, you will want to consider the needs of your prospective spectators.  In this case, they will most likely want to know the location of the event, what they should or should not bring with them, what other events you will be offering, your refund policy and the contact information for your company, to name a few items.

Vendors have their own list of needs that can be meet through your website.  Tops on their list would probably be your location, contact information, company history and reputation, and time and date of the event(s).

Sponsors would probably love to have their company listed on your website in exchange for their sponsorship dollars.  In addition, prospective sponsors could learn more about your company through your “About Us” page.

Stakeholders would like to know about the success of your current events, your future event plans, your leadership team, and your current stock price.

And finally, there is your community.  Every business affects their community in one way or another.  In this case, the community as a whole will probably want information about your events, any job openings you may have, your current stock price, and your plans for expansion.

This post is part 5 of the “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” post.

Thing #5:    Your domain name (a.k.a. URL, a.k.a. web address) Your business’ domain name can be very important in generating traffic to your website.  First of all, an easy to remember domain name can stick in your audience’s mind long after they have heard your radio spot, seen your print advertising, or heard their friends talking about your site.  Secondly - yet still just as important – the domain name you choose can be important in your site’s search engine optimization.

Your domain name not only determines your web address, but in most cases, it also determines your email address.  (If your web address is www.abc.com, your email address is usually me@abc.com).  As with web hosting, you can choose have your web designer/developer register and manage your domain name for you, but just as mentioned above under “Website copyright,” there is one precaution that you must take if you do this:  you need to ensure that your domain is registered under your company’s name, and not the name of your web designer/developer.  It is also a good idea to have your domain name information – such as the name of the registrar and the login information for their website – sent to you by the designer or developer when the domain name is purchased.  If your company does not own your domain name and is unable to contact the developer, it can be very difficult to point your domain name to a new web hosting service, where you may have a new website located, cheaper hosting rates, better service, or more functionality.  In a worst-case scenario, you could need to start over with a new domain name, which would mean that your visitors, who usually came to your website from your old address, would need to find your site again, you would need to start over with your search engine optimization, and all of your company’s email addresses would suddenly need to change.

This post is part 4 of the “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” post.

Thing #4: Web Hosting Web hosting is the service that houses your website on a web server to make it available for the public to see.  The type of web hosting service that your website will need depends on a number of factors that basically have to do with what your website does, what functionality it has, and how many people visit it each day, hour, and second.  If you have a basic website (informational only which delivers text and pictures), your hosting costs should be minimal (around $10 a month) and you have many choices of hosting companies.  E-commerce websites or websites with web applications will usually pay more for web hosting.  It is important to research the hosting company you are considering prior to signing up with them to ensure that their current customers are happy with the service they provide.  A website that provides web hosting company reviews based on their customer feedback is www.webhostingreviews.com.

A more convenient way of taking care of your web hosting needs is to have your chosen web designer/developer sign you up with their hosting company, but please read the caution under the “Website copyright” post if you choose to do this.

This post is part 3 of the “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” post.

Thing #3:  Website copyright When choosing a web development company, it is important to determine the copyright (a.k.a. ownership) to the website files that make up the website itself.  Allow me to explain:  Some web development companies provide website packages that include the website itself (the files that make up the website), the domain name (explained more in my next post), and the web hosting (also explained in further posts) in one package.  While this allows for greater convenience and is a service that I offer myself, you need to ensure that your company owns the copyright to the website files once completed.  The reason why this is important is that if you outgrow your web development company or if your relationship were to sour with them, you want to make sure that you can take your website files to a different hosting company.  This will allow you to continue to have your website the way that you planned, worked-toward, and paid for and not lose the investment that you have put into your website.  While this seems like a simple request, there are some (quite popular) services out there that will charge you to create your website, but once you do not want their company to host that site for whatever reason, you do not have the option of taking your files with you.

This post is part 2 of the “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” post.

Thing #2: Do you (or your staff) need to update your website often? One of the best ways to keep visitors coming back to your site is to keep your content (the text, pictures and/or downloadable files you offer on your site) fresh. While the majority of websites require a web programmer - or someone with at least basic knowledge of web programming - to update, you may want your website to have a content management system, which will allow you or your staff to update the content on your website without any programming knowledge.  This is not only convenient for your company, but it also means that you do not have to pay your web designer/programmer every time that you need to update your website.  Content management systems have become so popular that I have recently began offering them as a standard part of every website I create.

Content management systems come in all shapes and sizes, but in their most basic form they allow a user (a.k.a. you or a staff member that you designate) to sign in to a web page and make changes to your site by filling out a simple web form.  If you can use the Internet, you can update your website!

Welcome to my first ever blog post!  I know, I know, some of you are saying “What took you so long?”  After all, I do tell all of my clients about the wonders of blogging and how most every business should do it.  Well, in my defense I must say that much like every other business, business always comes first.  But, in order to make it up to you, I am going to kick things off with a 10 day spree of blog posts entitled “10 Things Every Business Should Know Before Starting a Website” with one “Thing” every day for the next 10 days.  So those of you reading this on May 11, 2009 - come back tomorrow for post #2!

Thing #1:  Search Engine Optimization Oh no – here we go already with the big words.  For all of my non-technical friends, search engine optimization (SEO) is just a big word for techniques that a web developer uses to ensure that your website is read-able by search engines such as Google and Yahoo!.  Unfortunately, not every web designer or programmer is knowledgeable in search engine optimization.  In fact, many either only employ some SEO techniques, sacrifice SEO in favor of a cool design or animation they want to use, or simply ignore SEO altogether!  Of course business professionals know that you could have the coolest website in the world, but it would not do your company any good at all if no one can find it! Before you start your company’s website, make sure that your web designer/developer knows search engine optimization techniques.