Why have a website?

Not merely building websites but building businesses. Websites should be an integral part of your business plan. It’s easy to want to create a website because other businesses have one. But you should ask yourself some questions.

The first question to ask is why do you want a website? Websites exist for many purposes - from simple contact information through to a complete customer information, sales and management system. Setting down a clear answer to the simple question: “Why do I want a website?” starts the whole process off with clarity. The answer may change as you see what is possible, but start with the answer that is right for now.

What do you want your website to achieve? You need to create a “shopping list” of what it is you want your website to actually say or do. What functions do you want it, or could it, fulfill to save you time and money? Do you want it to give information, collect information, sell stuff, change opinions or what?

Who is going to keep it up-to-date? Question: What could be worse than having no website? Answer: Having a website with out-of-date information. Consider how you will keep your website fresh with relevant and attractive content? How to achieve this painlessly.

What is web accessibility and why you should care? An accessible website is more than designing for people with visual or physical impairment. An accessible website is designed to web standards which means one design works everywhere - computer, mobile, PDA, webTV. An accessible and web standards compliant website gets more attention from search engines such as Google.