Planning a successful web project...

Is the web working hard for your business?

The internet presents real opportunities for businesses in rural areas like Cumbria to reach the widest possible market. However, the web is growing up (you may have heard the term 'web 2.0' being used) and can offer much more for businesses than just glorified brochures and contact information. It's becoming more about people and less about technology, putting people who know the business best back in the driving seat. With a realistic budget, the right partners and suppliers you can build anything if you have a clear idea of why you are building it. It really is a case of going back to business basics before getting bogged down in the technicalities.

Let's kick off with the basics - have you ever made a plan?

Just as you should plan any other aspect of your business, having a long term vision and identifying emerging trends for your internet based projects will give you the lead over your competitors. It's amazing how many businesses take the move online as an exercise in keeping up with the Jones's, rather than for their own aims. A beautifully designed online brochure site may do wonders for your ego, but it may not actually be the best investment to move your business forward. There are many new ways to get your information out there, which might be more appropriate and cost effective for your particular business. Sites such as BT Tradespace are free and allow you to publish information easily, all be it without much control over how it looks. Whilst tools like this may not be suitable for every business, if you know clearly what you want to achieve, it makes finding the right tool for the job much easier.

Lateral thinking and embracing the concept of niche business are key to a successful online presence. Start by identifying your company's strongest qualities and think hard about which ones make your business different to the competition. What would appeal to you as a web user? Put yourself in your customer’s shoes - do a brief Google search, both locally and globally, using these terms, and you'll soon reveal how unique you are! Remember that your potential audience is over 1.2 billion web users, so targeting even a very small niche can still provide huge returns, so refine and refine until the competition is reasonable. Once you have clear business goals to aim for, it's much easier to seek advice from suppliers and partners who can help you shape a technical plan of action and deliver on it.

How do you know if it's working?

We're not talking about the obvious checks to see if a site is actually live, we're talking about the business level information you need in order to see if your plan is working as expected. If a web project of any kind has cost you money then it should be delivering some form of return on that investment. This can be measured in black and white financial terms if you are tracking your online sales or leads, or business perception and brand profile, although these are sometimes harder to measure.

A nice simple place to start is your web statistics (or traffic stats). If you haven't ever seen your website traffic in graph form then it's an easy call to make to your hosting provider or web designer to ask for access. With details about the number of visitor 'sessions', length of visit and 'traffic source' (i.e. how each visitor found your site) you can start to make informed decisions and add measurement to your plans. Another great tool we use a lot is Google Analytics, offered as part of a suite of free tools by Google to help web managers and advertisers get the best from their sites. You may require a little input from a friendly web designer to get the best from it, (sadly it only gathers traffic data from the date it is activated) however it shows cleanly and clearly all the vital info plus some nice additional tools to help you understand how visitors use your site.

In Conclusion

So to sum up, once you have some non-technical goals of what you want to achieve, along with an idea of various ways to measure if you are achieving it, you are well on your way to start making improvements and new ideas become a reality. Next month we'll look at user submitted content and how online communities can help drive e-business.