Small Business Websites (part 1) – The planning stage

by James Agate

Every business needs a website, some of you reading this will think “pah! I don’t need a website, my business is doing just fine without any new fangled web thingy!” BUT the point is yes, your business may be successful without a website, but just imagine how much MORE successful it could be with a really great website, imagine all the leads your missing out on, all the potential clients that pass over your business because they can’t find you on Google?!

The series that follows this post will show you in depth how to create a really superb website for your small business which presents you in a professional way AND hopefully increase your business. Including how to plan for a great website, how to choose a domain for your web presence, designing a website yourself and how to get someone else in to design your website.

First off, let’s talk PLANNING FOR A GREAT WEBSITE

I could talk at length about the importance of planning then throw in a few quotes about failing to prepare and preparing to fail but I figured we may as well just jump straight into the important bits…

The 10 point plan

Before commencing any website project you really need a strategy – or if you don’t like using that word, at the very least you need a few notes that roughly resemble a plan, scribbled down on the back of an envelope.

1. Your plan needs to have the following information – which you can use as a checklist as you go through the project:
2. The type of site you want (brochure, info, blog like etc)
3. The feel/look of your site (professional, quirky, artsy etc)
4. A colour scheme (which colours currently represent your business/brand?)
5. Some possible domains (I will talk about domain names and their importance in the next post in the series)
6. Your budget
7. Your anticipated visitor levels
8. What you want the site to achieve (sales, phonecalls, awareness etc)
9. Other websites that both you like AND you think your customers will respond well to (both in terms of design and functionality)
10. A rough sitemap (i.e. the titles of the pages home,about, services, portfolio, contact and so on)

The 5 Golden Rules of small business websites

1. Does the website ‘feel’ like your business? – If you’re an accountant, people expect a solid and dependable service. If your website is full of weird quirky features is this truly reflecting your business?
2. Use relevant language – will your clients respond well to technical copy or quirky, conversational style text on your site
3. Colour is very important – avoid using more than 5 colours, and especially avoid colours that are hard to read i.e. red on a blue background.
4. Clear layout + Easy navigation – a website isn’t a vanity project, it is a business tool so it needs to work for your customers – put information on pages where your visitors will expect to find it, don’t be quirky and title your pages in weird ways (unless of course your customers respond well to quirky!) because it will just serve to irritate and could mean losing out on a sale.
5. Leave room to grow – don’t go for a design which leaves little room for adding more content. In my experience, a website design that is fairly fluid and allows your website to grow with your business is the best one.