Researching your Website
The first thing you need to do before anything else when creating a new website is to stop and think about what you are about to get yourself in too! Taking time up front to think about your potential website and its direction are crucial to its future success down the line when the 'live' button is clicked and real people start visiting your website.
Competitor Research
One important question to ask is 'who else is currently doing what I'm doing online?' It may be there are a few big names in your marketplace that are familiar to you and in which case it is certainly worth taking a look at their websites.
If you're not sure who you're competitors are or who else is doing something similar online, then a few searches on Google for relevant keywords and a bit of exploring should bring up a range of sites that target the same customer as you, or offer the same service.
Take the time to look at competitor sites and see what they do and what they don't do. Already this will start to give you some ideas for what you might like to do on your site, and perhaps just as importantly, various things that you might not want to do too - or at least might want to do in later stages. Make notes on paper of what you do and don't like about competitor sites, this will be useful content for later planning stages.
One of the most important points with a new website is to take things slowly, and a simple way of doing that is with a phrased approach - creating and launching your core content, and then developing further features and functionality down the line. This is the website equivalent of slow and steady wins the race.
Is it Worth it?
Once you have looked at the competitors and researched the marketplace you are about to enter, you need to ask some serious questions. Is it worth launching my own website in this arena? Can I compete with the other sites out there or is most of the market already taken by a few key players? Am I willing to put in the time, energy and money for a period of at least 18 months to get the site up there, ranking well, and performing for my company?
If the answer to the above is 'yes' then you're definitely ready to start creating your website.
It's time to move on to Website development strategy.
This guide to building a business ecommerce site is by Clarity Media Ltd
Quick Links
Researching the opportunity... Site strategy... Site structure... Interactivity... Ecommerce... Future proofing and updating... Creating content... Choosing images... Site build... Launch... Measuring success... Building traffic: free methods... Building traffic: paid methods... Onwards and upwards
Home page: building a business website guide
Quick Links
Researching the opportunity... Site strategy... Site structure... Interactivity... Ecommerce... Future proofing and updating... Creating content... Choosing images... Site build... Launch... Measuring success... Building traffic: free methods... Building traffic: paid methods... Onwards and upwards
Home page: building a business website guide
