Ten Basic Steps For Building A Web Site
That Works
By Lee Traupel
1. Assemble a web site development plan that is integrated
with your overall marketing processes; the content should be
consistent with offline materials, the graphics/images don't
have to be identical with traditional media, but should be
consistent with your overall branding, style guide, usage of
colors etc.
2. Hire a web site design firm that understands your market
position and one that won't get "geek crazy" -
meaning they are so in love with their own design capabilities,
your site gets
bogged down with graphics, plug ins, GIF garbage, etc. But,
conversely, check your ego at the door when you work with your
design firm - I've see so many good web site designs get ruined
by clients who can't or won't listen to what we tell them!
3. Pay attention to "load times," how long it
takes a web site to load on a 56 KBPS modem (this is an
industry average), if its more than 12-18 seconds you may
experience the "click of death" - the site doesn't
load quickly and the surfer is gone. Of course, if your
targeting broadband customers who are reaching your site via
ISDN or DSL then you can build a site that incorporates
multimedia-ready content that may include streaming audio or
video,
or Shockwave or Flash capabilities - go ahead and let those
digital geeks get carried away with cutting edge content!
4. Dare I say it, "keep it simple" - make your
site easy to move around in, build a menu structure that is
consistent with industry standards, local menus (for a page or
section) on the left and global menus (overall site navigation)
at the top and/or bottom of each page, keep as much information
"above the fold" (above the cutoff point at the
bottom of a monitor), don't make people use horizontal scroll
bars unless absolutely necessary.
5. Inculcate "digital speed" into your overall
site design, your client/customers should be able to get to
their desired area of your site within one or two mouse clicks;
they will quickly get frustrated if they have to click-through
multiple menus to find information they are seeking.
6. Develop content that is web-enabled, people don't read
web site content like they do offline media, keep your
paragraphs short no more than two to three sentences, build in
white space
with your content, include links in your pages - don't try to
tell your whole marketing story on your site - get people to
call you (hello the telephone still works!), e-mail or fill out
a profile form (see below).
7. Make your site permission-based marketing ready - I love
Seth Godin's "Permission Marketing" book, http://www.permission.com,
and we recommend it to all of our clients - he champions
building a long term relationship with a customer by asking
their permission to continue to market to them and
incorporating value/information in all marcom processes.
8. Ensure your site is optimized for Search Engines by
identifying 8-12 keywords that people will use to find your
site, then incorporate these keywords in your site content (to
drive relevancy with s/engine spiders/bots) and then manually
submit your site to the top ten search engines. We don't'
recommend most of the free or $19.99 specials available; yes,
all will get your registered with the s/engines, but getting
listed on page 75 of 350 pages (for example) won't really drive
qualified traffic to your site, you need page 1-3 listings on
the top ten engines to really drive qualified traffic.
9. Delve into your log server files to uncover "digital
tracks" made through your web site - your log files are
raw files that show how and from where (in most cases) people
accessed your web site, where they went on your web site, how
long they stayed, etc. Web Trends is the defacto industry
standard, http://www.webtrends.com/default.htm,
but we use and recommend a market-experienced firm in Europe,
Fantomaster, Ltd. to our clients http://www.fantomaster.com
- they have a suite of Search Engine products that can be
downloaded for free or purchased.
10. Think global in your overall site design - the greatest
Internet growth is occurring outside North America, so it is
essential to build a site that can be accessed easily by people
around the world. What issues do you need to look at? Load
times are very important (again), develop content that avoids
colloquialisms that may not be understood by others who may not
speak the same language, you may want to make your site content
available in diverse languages, there are a number of emerging
applications that will facilitate this process, ensure your
e-commerce capabilities can be utilized by all.
Lee Traupel has 20 plus years of business development and
marketing experience. He is the founder/CEO of a Northern
California based, privately held, profitable Interactive
Marketing Agency and Software Company, Inc
