Giving Your Most Valuable Tool a Check Up

One of the most important tools that you can put into action for your business is a well designed, carefully written and smartly organized website. So whether you are just now planning your first website – or you’re reading this in order to evaluate what you’ve been using up to now, our goal with this report is to help you give your website a complete check up.

To begin, let’s identify the role that a website plays in your business and look into how to make certain that it is fulfilling that role to the greatest extent possible. We’ll break the different key components of a successful website down and consider how they benefit you and your business as well as how they can be optimized to laser target your preferred customer base.

There is something that has to be said up front: For many small business owners, their first website has been or is being designed from dreams and visions they’ve treasured in their hearts for a long time.

Looking at it with a fresh perspective can be difficult or even a little painful. If you can understand this up front, it will be easier for you to work through your feelings on it. What’s most important for your long term business success is that you learn to look at your website from the consumer’s point of view instead of from your own.

Here’s an example:

Mark has been planning his break from corporate life for ten years. His dream of operating his own consulting business is finally coming true. He has been telling his wife and friends for years that he sees the new business as his ticket to freedom so he’s planning to build his business logo and website around a characterized ticket figure. He has envisioned this little cartoon character on every page of his site.

This character has huge personal meaning for him – but it has nothing to do with his consulting business and really isn’t at all appropriate for his target market. So someone has to tell Mark the hard truth – he needs to drop the character and pursue a more professional look for his website.

What does a website need to do?

Your website is a virtual storefront. It represents you and it represents your products and services. It speaks for you and if it has been put together right – it sells for you.

Of course, not every website has been designed to sell something, yet every website, every web page even, has a distinct purpose and should inspire a desired action in visitors.

What is YOUR website’s purpose?

Have you ever sat down and considered just what it is that you want your website to accomplish for you?

Will it sell a product?
A website that has been designed to sell a product has a pretty clear cut purpose.

  • Present the products in the best light possible.
  • Invite visitors to stay in touch with you through a mailing list.
  • Answer all potential questions about the product itself.
  • Provide details about shipping, returns and payment options.
  • Provide a clear pathway to purchase.
  • Make the sales process as simple for the buyer as technically possible.
  • Thank the customer for their purchase.

Will it sell a service?
A website that has been designed to sell a service also has a clear purpose.

  • Present the service in the best light possible.
  • Invite visitors to stay in touch with you through a mailing list.
  • Answer all potential questions about the service itself.
  • Provide details about service delivery and payment options.
  • Provide a clear pathway to purchase.
  • Make the sales process as simple for the buyer as technically possible.
  • Thank the customer for their purchase.

Will it provide useful content as its main purpose?
A content based site takes many forms but its main role is usually the delivery of high quality information. As the person who is providing the content, you usually have a goal in mind – there is something that you desire from those who come to consume your content. Therefore you want the website to:

  • Deliver the content attractively.
  • Invite visitors to stay in touch with you through a mailing list.
  • Establish your reputation for providing good content.
  • Promote affiliate links.
  • Promote related products and services of your own.

Will it offer users a source of community?
Some websites are designed to be a hub of interaction and so it is expected to:

  • Provide an attractive atmosphere for users.
  • Provide compelling content.
  • Invite visitors to become a member.
  • Collect appropriate information.
  • Provide a way for members to interact.

Your website may be a combination of any of the above.

You may offer both products and services and deliver useful content and provide a community. The question is do your visitors understand clearly what it is that you have to offer them?

Some large websites that have many different purposes could benefit from a breaking down and separating of it’s different sections into different sites – but that’s not always the case, it all depends on how well you are delivering your message and how well your visitors are responding to it.

In the next section we will discuss what needs to be communicated to your visitors and the most effective method of doing it.