Why do you need a website development plan?
If you have just decided to build a business website, why not consider developing a website plan in order to maximise your return on investment?
Often people just throw up a website like throwing mud up at a wall hoping that it all sticks, stays and works. These days the need to develop a website plan is even more important than ever due to the increased market place online where anybody in business has a website.
The problem is that most websites do not reflect the actual questions and the answers that consumers are searching for before they decide to buy.
However, while this situation is the norm, there is opportunity to get it right before you start by analysing your market place, your competitors and the questions that your target market need answering. The rest is just ensuring that your website has quality, unique, relevant information that your target market would be interested in reading before contacting you. If the content published is relevant, the Google Search index will help you.
Define Your Website Development Plan Objectives and Expectations
The first step is to brainstorm your real objectives on paper as part of developing your website plan as part of your marketing plan.
1. Define and write up your target market’s characteristics profile
Who will be your website’s visitors and what information and solutions are they looking for?
What is the ideal customer demographic? Commonly known as your target market avatar and is useful to help define the scope of who are you aiming to talk to in your website sales copy.
To get an insight into what you need to define check out the tools online linked from the page Business Internet Marketing Resources, under Target Market Characteristic Profiling: How to Create a Buyer Persona.
2. Develop a website development plan by identifying the following aspects:
- Define your target market’s specific problems and aspirations
- What will be the solutions that you will offer to your target market?
- Outline the specific details of your solutions, products and/or services with an emphasis on benefits.
- What will be the “point of difference” that you will be offering from that of your competitors?
- Identify if there are market opportunities for the products or services you intend to offer
Consider writing some notes that explain your proposed offer in plain English with an emphasis on the benefits.
What will be your angle in your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)?
Consider engaging a professional business coach to get help to scope out your brainstormed notes into professional copy for use in your advertising.
3. Develop a Website Development Plan by including the following:
- Researching your website development for online search demand and what your competitors are doing, and what strategies are working for them.
- Gain a greater understanding of the keyword phrases that people are searching for online.
- Find out what topics are being searched for, and then you can make an informed decision about what content needs to be written.
- Make a list of the main advertising channels, search engines and directories that your target market would use to find services that you intend to offer.
- Set out your objectives for your website development project.
Define what the website needs to achieve for your business. - By developing a website plan on paper relative to your business objectives, you will see a clear scope of what page content you need to develop.
To view an example of a typical site plan chart, click the pdf link below that shows a layout and a flow chart.
The linked diagram below shows structural internal links to internal pages that you can use to explore your own website plan.
The main navigation and sub-navigation boxes represent your site’s main link buttons and the secondary link buttons within each topic area.
Here’s an example site map skeleton. web site map skeleton example.pdf - Plan out your strategies for presenting your business offers and what sales copy would be required for each product or service page.
- Learn about specific marketing strategies for promoting your offline business online.
Be sure to download our free web planning guides to get started or contact us today to find out more about how you can get started. - Define your marketing funnels that process your prospective customers from general enquiries to sales.
Such a marketing funnel will define where you intend to get leads from what media channel using specific advertising strategies. - Consider the function and objectives of using a website within your marketing funnel and marketing plan.
What will be the incentive for customers to visit your website, and what information will be available?
What will be the marketing message to your market?
What will be your call to action hooks on your site?
Website site map skeleton example
To get positive results online your website will need to generate new leads by working with your marketing plan and support all your other advertising campaigns within various media channels.
The solution is to develop a website that is both Google and mobile-friendly which has been pre-planned, structured and optimised for your target market’s characteristics profile.
A strategy can be evolved from researching keyword-based topics that relate to the actual search demand and trends to attract new customers online.
Your website also needs to conform to various technical standards for both desktop and mobile search networks.