The Importance of A Website

The concept of having a website isn't new, but for some people its importance may not be that clear. Especially when in an economic crunch, a website may seem like the first logical thing to go. You may ask, "Why do I need a new website design?" or "Why do I need a website at all?" The answers to these questions are not easy to answer, as the answer is different for different industries and different individual companies. However, I have tried to outline some main things to consider while attempting to answer these questions.

Purpose
A website can be as simple as an electronic brochure, giving information about a company, or it could be an e-commerce site, allowing people to order services or products from the website. A website can host a podcast, or even allow for discussion rooms with potential clients and customers. It is important to figure out the purpose of the website before continuing in the process.

Once the purpose is discovered, it is important to fulfill this purpose by reaching goals. But how do you set these goals? If it is an informational website, success should be measured by how many people are actually viewing the site. If it is primarily a podcast, success should be measured by how many people are subscribing to it. If, and only if, it is an e-commerce site, should it be measured by how much revenue it is bringing in. When looking at these statistics, you may be surprised how important a website truly is. Just for kicks, put a sale or a tidbit of information that is only available online, and see how many people respond.

Still not liking the facts? Maybe you need to market your site better. To do this efficiently and in the most cost-effective way possible, miLogos can help you out.

Leading 3-click Rule
A website needs to be easily navigable, user-friendly, and visually appealing. First impressions are very important to a business, and so if the first page is an ugly puce color, unless they are buying monster doors, the viewer will turn into a "bouncer." A "bouncer" is someone who goes to your website, but their visit does not lead them any closer to buying your services or products. A website needs to lead the viewer to information pages, product pages, or order pages. This information should be no further away then 3 clicks, otherwise statistics show that the viewer will most definitely become a "bouncer." Three clicks: that means they go to the home page, click on a department page, click on a specific product information page, and then click on the order page. Not everything needs to be on the front page, in fact that is discouraged. This balance is very hard to find, however and market research may be required.

Privacy vs. Follow-Up
Another very hard balance to try to maintain is by allowing the viewer to maintain some privacy, while at the same time getting enough information from them to follow-up. It leaked out that political campaigns as well as news sites were putting cookies on viewer's browsers once they left the site, so as to see why they had left. Many people felt this was an invasion of privacy. Also, have you ever wanted to ask a question on a forum or make an order with a company, and the form is asking you everything about you except for your Social Security Number? Determining this balance, is difficult, yet essential. If you go to far on either side, you won't get any results.

Need some help with any of these processes? Want to put up a website at very little cost to you at all? miWebs is launching in April 2009, and with it comes a new web branding for miLogos, as well as more services to offer. Website design, hosting, and online marketing strategic consultations will become available for very little cost at all. Website design will start as low as $4.99/yr, website hosting for as little as $2.09/month (24.99/yr), and marketing consultations for just $30/hr. Want to begin before April rolls around? No problem! Just contact me at mbeall@milogos.com and we will see what we can do.