If I had eight hours to chop down a tree,
I’d spend six sharpening my ax.
– Abraham Lincoln
I often have business owners tell me that they need a website without having thought about why they want it. Over the past 21 years of creating and optimizing websites, I have found that there is an important prerequisite to building a successful website.
Before beginning to develop or overhaul your website (or any other marketing platform, for that matter) it’s critical to define your website’s purpose:
- What do you want your website to do?
- How is it going to help your business reach its objectives?
- How does the website fit into your overall business plan and marketing plan?
- What is the key message you must communicate on the site?
Once visitors are on your site, what do you want them to do? You will want to identify a primary purpose (and possibly a secondary and tertiary purpose).
Do you want them to:
- Buy products from your site?
- Call or email you about your services?
- Subscribe to your list?
- Download certain information?
- Read and respond to your blog?
Write down clear answers to these questions. Then, and only then, you are ready to proceed to writing and designing your website.
To your success!
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