Lecture Synopsis Four: Web site planning, audience and strategy

Web site planning may be easier than planning for printed publications, in one way: if you make a mistake, you don't have to do a costly reprint. On the other hand, people expect more of a web site; fast-changing content, new designs. In the world of the web, it's often said, a year is three months long.

Not that you have to re-do your entire site every three months. Planning carefully should give your users a site that's fresh for, well, longer, anyway. Planning means to avoid setting up a web site like the "Winchester Mystery House"--that is, building room after room without a blueprint. Many webmasters proceed as follows:

1. Define a strategy. Why a web site, what the competition is doing.

2. Organize and design. Develop content, create a site map, design look and navigatin.

3. Build and implement. Set up a "rough draft" ("alpha") to test on pilot groups.

4. Launch. Set up the "beta" for a larger group. You may not want to set up the site for the public until you get feedback on the beta.

To define a strategy, you need to know why you want a web site. Common reasons:

• Inform.
• Sell.
• Promote.
• Distribute.
• Survey.
• Get people together.
• Coordinate work groups.
• Have fun!

Audience identification often requires marketing research. To begin, consultants Tauber Kienan Associates recommend you consider:

• What is the product?
• Who is the audience, specifically?
• Do you already have a group that knows about your product? Or
• Do you want to attract a new audience?
• How does your audience identify with you, the idea of "branding?"

It's helpful to position your product in the marketplace by studying the competition. What's different about your brand that will bring people to your web site?

A web site analysis checklist:

1. Product offered.
2. Likely audience (age group?).
3. Positioning of the product in the marketplace thorugh the web site: how do they make it look different from competiton?
4. Your critique of the web site: effectiveness at reflecting the goals of the company to sell the product or service.

Web sites to analyze:

Winchester mystery house:

http://www.winchestermysteryhouse.com

Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris:

http://www.discoverfrance.net/France/Cathedrals/Paris/Notre-Dame.shtml

Mozilla:

http://www.mozilla.com/firefox

Home Depot:

http://www.homedepot.com

Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com

One web site, your choice.

Copyright 2004 by Ross F. Collins <www.ndsu.edu/communication/collins>