The importance of website planning

Website planning and Information Architecture (IA) are the most important components of developing/designing any website, no matter how small you may think it is. Compare building a website to building a house. Would you build a house without a plan? Even it a very small house?.. No, you wouldn't because you need to know where to lay the foundation and you need to know where to lay the bricks and where to put the windows and doors, etc...

The same applies to building your website. You need to know why you are building a website and who will be visiting your website and why they are visiting your website... This is very important information, if not the most important information. So, let me start by helping you define your website's goals.

First you need to decide who will be involved in defining the site's goals. If it's just you, then get started and define those goals. What is the mission or purpose of your organization? Why build the site? What is the purpose of the site? What do you hope to achieve with the site? What are the short and long term goals of the site? Ask yourself or your client these types of questions to clarify your website's goals... I cannot emphasize enough the importance of Website Goals!!!

Think about it... question it!

I'll talk about your website audience next week...