|
MORE 101 page 2
Register
Now that you have registered your domain names it is time to take some time to gather information and plan the plan. It's probably a good idea to go ahead and register your domain names as they are being registered at a fairly fast rate. Your names may not be available later and as low as registration fees are now you
can always choose not renew if you later choose a different one.
Plan
Plan the Plan. W W W W W - Who, Why What, Where and When, gather the information like any good reporter would do to write a good story with all the information. Who should be involved? Why do you want a web site? What is the site about? Where should the site be hosted? When should the site be ready?
Design
"You only have one chance to make a first impression." You will hear this several times just to make sure you remember it.
If this is a serious site for your business you probably know by now that you shouldn't expect to hand this project to your IT department and ask them to throw something together.
If you want a professional looking business site you now have to decide on designing the site yourself or contracting a professional web design firm. This is probably an easy choice. HTML is not all that difficult but it takes time and there is a learning curve. Learn more about HTML at "NCSA
(at UIUC) Beginner's Guide to HTML." (http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/General/Internet/WWW/HTMLPrimer.html) if you think that you want to tackle the task yourself. You are encouraged to learn all you can about the process however consider what your time is worth and what the cost of a professional would be, and the likely outcome. There are also web site creation tools such as "Macromedia
Dreamweaver 4" and "Microsoft Front Page 2000" which makes the task fairly easy. You will probably want an illustrator for some graphics such as "Adobe Illustrator 9.0", "Fireworks 4 Studio" or "Photo Draw 2000". We are not endorsing these products, these are only some of the more popular choices.
Choosing
the players
There are two parts to a web site, the design and the content. The same person or firm need not develop the two parts.
Choosing the players, design, copy writing, hosting. Ask for references, browse the sites, email the webmasters and ask them for their comments and what they think about the service and if they have had any problems. Take some time and browse other sites such as your competitors sites. Take some notes as you are browsing and make note of the things that you like and highlight
things that annoy you. See Sure ways to IRRITATE YOUR VISITORS and drive them away
Now that you have your site design theme (this is your web image) here it is again. "You only have one chance to make a first impression." Make a good one and visitors will return. You have your content and technical issues all worked out you are ready to publish. STOP! Not so fast, let's get it right. Test, test and re-test, links, forms, etc. There are
always little problems that emerge after you publish but most can be found prior if you take the time. It is better to do it now than after your customer who you bragged to about your new great site tells you about it. Make sure that you are satisfied with the look and feel of the site before you publish it. It's not a good idea to remake the site every other month, you will do this on an annual basses as
technology warrants. Check your site in all the different browsers, old and new. Check for load time. The old load time of 15 seconds is now down to 7 seconds, the amount of time a visitor will wait before clicking. Here are the max load times, 28k modem 30 seconds, 56k modem 15 seconds. You noticed that that was MAX. Make your home/index page fast loading. If they have to wait for you to unlock the door…
their gone. Lots of large pictures and animations can take to long to load, most visitors will not wait. Loud music with no control is a sure way to drive away visitors.
Frames
Frames? There are advantages and disadvantages. It is probably a good idea to avoid frames in less your site needs require them. Some older browsers can not deal with them, they are tricky to bookmark, and search engines have a problem with frames. If you use frames you will need to have a separate site for those with older browsers.
Promote
You've got your site, you've got your host, you are on line. Promote, Promote, Promote. Major search engines and directories first, then follow with the minor search engines and directories. Lots of links, quality links, the more the better. A quality link is a link that has content that is relevant to your site. This will increase the popularity ranking that
some search engines use to rank your site. Optimize or prepare your web page for submission (this may affect how you are ranked or even accepted in major search engines). It is your sole responsibility to see if your web page is ready or not...if you need help in this area, we highly recommend Search Engine Watch as a free
and effective service. We recommend you learn these techniques; however, if you would like help click here.
Follow up
Make sure that you delegate someone to visit your site daily and click through the links. Check the stats and analyze the results daily. If you forgot to add stats get them and keep a record of the health of you site. Keep the site information current. Answer all email in a timely period. Don't get caught up in all the new features/enhancements that come
along. If you don't need it, don't add it, in less it was intended to be added from the beginning. Sometimes you want to get your feet wet before you jump in, if it was planed go ahead.
Visit the sponsors for more answers to domain registration, domain appraisals and web site promotion. Search our directories for web hosting and web design help.
101 page 3 - Ways to irritate your visitors and drive them away.
| 
