Web Site Strategy Every Web Designer Should Know (Part 1)

It has become almost impossible to have a successful online presence without having and implementing a good website strategy. The most successful websites of this time are ones where the web site designer understands the client’s business strategy before starting to build the web site. As business strategy may sometimes sound like a rocket science to some people, it is nothing but having answers to some fundamental questions before starting any business. However, a website does not drive the business strategy itself; it is only a piece of the puzzle of the implementation of the business strategy.

As a web site designer, a web site job shouldn’t be done for the sole purpose of making money but for the purpose of making your client achieve result from such a business investment. Therefore, you want to make sure your clients have a business strategy in place before embarking on a web site project, if there is none, it is important to have your client consider drafting a good one as this will save you a lot of headache in future. Here are some fundamental and key questions you will need to ask you clients before embarking on any web site project.

1. What is the mission or vision statement of your company/business

2. Do you have a company values?

3. What product or service are you selling?

4. What is the competitive advantage in offering that product or service?

5. Who are your competitors?

6. Who are your customers or clients?

7. How are you better than your competitors?

8. How are you marketing your business?

9.Where will your company be in 5 years?

You will notice these questions have nothing to do with the actual website design elements. They are important questions to be answered by the client as they will help a web site designer in; gaining insights into the clients business and how the web site should be built, revealing the strengths of the business, minimizing the weaknesses, learning tools to include on the web site to make it functional and engaging and to better manage your time in carrying out the overall job.

All these will better help position the web site for effective marketing purposes to potential clients or customers.

You also want to make sure you know the role of your client in their business and how the website will fit into their job priorities. It will be ineffective to design a content management web site for a business owner who’s just launching a business with no time to manage it. You will need to include a maintenance cost if there is no staff to maintain the web site.

Understanding The Web Site Target Audience

I often hear some clients say everyone needs their product or service but that is not really true. A business is supposed to cater for a particular group of people. Your service may be too expensive for someone, too far away for someone else and not needed by another person. The target audience are the potential buyers of a product or service.They are people who visit the web site or who the client wants to visit the web site in order to buy the product or service. As part of the web site strategy, the target audience should be determined as this will help you as the web site designer in planning the web site project.

The following must be considered when targeting audience for any web site;

• Geographic issue

  Some businesses are constrained by distance. For instance, let’s look at a cake business owner in a single location hoping to have a website. Will he/she be willing to ship an order from one state to another or from one country to another? These must be put into consideration as it will help to know the scope of the business.

• Technological issue

  Some areas in a country are more technically challenged than others. If a clients want a web site that will be full of how-to videos, the bandwidth or internet access of the area he hopes to service or sell to should be well considered. The videos on the web site will be good for nothing if the target audience do not have enough bandwidth to watch them. You may also want to consider the average age group of the target audience, if their average age is between 25 and 30 years it will be necessary to make the web site mobile friendly as people in this age group tend to be more mobile gadget driven. Visibility issues will also have to put into consideration as it will be important that potential clients or customers can find the website on Google.

• Demographic issue

  This issue should answers questions such as the location of the target audience, what kind of problem will make them visit the web site and require the client’s product or service, what is their source of income, what are their values. There are many of these questions that you can ask about the target audience. The more you dig in to ask such questions, the more reliably buying patterns can be predicted and the most effective marketing strategy determined.

These are some of the critical steps to take before embarking on any web site design project. As they will help a website designer work more effectively and more competently.

If you’ve found this post helpful? Your comments are always welcome and encouraged. Cheers!