Planning Your Website

Taking your business ideas and transforming them into a successful enterprise requires research and planning. The same is true of a web site. In planning your own web site, start by visiting web sites of similar businesses. What do you like about these web sites? What holds your interest? Is it the design? The information?

Purpose

You want your web site to reflect the thinking behind it. Below are several reasons why businesses want to have a site. Which of these are important to you and in which order? Are there other reasons as well?

	Increase your income by selling products and services
	Make information readily available to
	-   New prospects -   Current customers -   Employees -   Vendors -   General public
	Improve customer service
	Display your products
	Inform customers of specials

The clarity of reasoning helps make decisions on how your web site will look and function.

Audience

Who will visit your site? It is important to establish characteristics of potential visitors. Will your viewer:

•  have up-to-date equipment and use the latest technology?
•  want to see lots of graphics or prefer just to read the facts?
•  have a slow connection to the internet or a broadband connection?
•  live in your own geographical area, nationwide, or worldwide?

All of this information needs to be considered when planning your web site.

Hosting

A host is important to the functioning and accessibility of your site. We prefer that our sites reside on Unix servers which host most of the Web today. We are affiliated with QCI Internet, a hosting company, which can host your site at competitive prices and offer you the reliability you need.

Domain

If you already have a domain name, we can assist you in transferring your domain to the server of your choice. If you do not have a domain name, we can assist you in choosing a name. Domain names can be purchased for $15.00 per year.

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