Web design is the process of planning and creating the way your website will look
and feel. It is the first part of creating your website and is the stage where you
can implement your creative ideas, branding and visual appeal.
As with any marketing strategy or project, thorough initial planning is essential.
Planning a website involves considering its role in your business plan and allocating
sufficient resources to the development and upkeep of the page. At the planning
stage, answer the following important questions.
1. What is the purpose of your website? Try to summarise your goals and
objectives in two sentences, and let this definition inform every stage of the development process.
Our website should be easy to find for people looking for gardening services
in the Cape Town area. Visitors should request a quote and contact us by email.
We want our website to rank high in search results and draw traffic to our
active Facebook Page. We also want to generate prospective leads with
our email newsletter subscription.
Our website must provide useful content for people in the book publishing
field. We want to entrench our position as the leading book publishers in our genre.
2. What do you need on your website? Make a list of all the tools and functions
that are essential for your website, and be strict with yourself not to include
unnecessary extras. This list is important because if your project goes over
budget, you will know which elements are not negotiable, and which can
safely be cut. In strictest terms, the only essential aspects of a website are
the home, about and contact pages, a navigation bar and your corporate
branding; however, this would make for a bland site. Let your website’s purpose guide you.
3. What do you want on your website? Once you have noted the essentials,
think of the other useful elements that it would be good to have on your
website. Again, be careful not to add frivolous and excessive details. Some useful additions include:
• A contact form that your customers can fill out, so that you can get their
contact details along with their permission to send them emails.
• One-click sharing on your content so that readers can instantly post your
content to their Facebook, Twitter and other profiles.
• An automated feedback form for complaints and queries.
4. How much control do you want over managing the website? Do you want to
be able to do everything yourself, or would you prefer for your developer or
IT department to manage your page and update your content? In addition,
consider how often the content will change: if you post a blog article every
day, it is easier and quicker to manage the website in-house, but if the content
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