For 20+ years, this guide has enabled us to 'peer under the hood' for your desires, your business's needs, and your users success.
This process allows us to develop a custom design, structure, and functionality for your website, along with SEO (Search Engine Optimization) work if relevant. It also includes guidelines on how to create content and claim your business listings for enhanced SEO, i.e. free traffic.
1) Musings:
- How do you want your website to look & feel?
- What do or don't you want your website to do?
- What works best for your clients?
- What works best for the InterTubes?
- How can you gain more business?
2) Design "Homework":
- find 5 websites in your trade* and record the URL plus notes about what you like and don't like for each
- do the same for 5 websites not in your trade (but not large businesses that can spend $$$)
- if you have them: notes, ideas, outlines, etc. about content & intent
- if you have them: source files for logo, color palette, business card, letterhead etc.
- any further requirements for functionality; newsletters, forums, galleries, ecommerce, blogs, etc.
- if we are adding SEO, make 2 lists:
- 5 competitor pages that specifically address your exact business
- a list of trade specific keywords or short phrases
* the trade specific websites shouldn't all be local, or similar. Maybe a couple of local sites to suss out your competitors, but also check Denver, Texas, New York, whatever. Try a using private/incognito browser window (un-cookie’d and non-localized) search on Google for high ranking pages, while ignoring any AI or paid ad results.
These steps are key for us to understand what you want and merge that with what works.
3) Content:
Here are some ideas to help generate relevant content.
- who/what/where/when/why/how
- title or main header
- Purpose/Mission statement
- Call to action(s); what do you want users to do?
- check competitors or similar organizations to trigger ideas about content/structure/functionality
- what is most important for your users to view, what's next, then next...?
- create a Word doc or equivalent of text with relevant names for each page; alternatively, one doc with named sections for each page
- graphics and photos should be named for their subject matter and usage; ie brown-sweater-xl.jpg, not img1954.jpg
- graphics and photos should be full size so we can scale and crop as needed
- One peculiar and common photo requirement is page headers. Those should be full size and have a croppable area ~3-4 times wider than high.
- Here’s a helpful guide for creating content.
4) SEO:
- every website will have a first simple pass of discovering and using appropriate keywords in your titles and text
- additional SEO can be added - mostly in one large pass - to find and implement more and deeper keywords; it can be added to the initial design, or added later
- traffic analysis will help further refine or expand keyword use
5) Domains, Directories & Social Media:
- Consider a domain name. It’s no longer overly important to use SEO relevant keywords or have short domain names. It’s more important to have one that reflects your business name.
- It's also no longer relevant to register multiple domain names, other than for brand protection.
- Register your domain name. I recommend NameCheap.com and strongly recommend against GoDaddy, Network Solutions or Web[dot]com, or getting locked in to a web designer platform like Wix or Squarespace. Ignore all upsell offers for security, hosting, etc. Also there are far more domain extensions available beyond the traditional .com/.org/.net - consider .biz, .info, .site, .us, or many others.
- Claim your social media and business directory pages: Google My Business, Bing Places, Facebook for text, Instagram for photos, YouTube for videos, Linkedin for personnel, etc.
- Add at least your business name, address if physical, phone number, and website.
- Here’s a list of the primary directories and services.
All of these thoughts and actions allows us to create a website that is personalized, attractive, and fits both you and your clients needs.
