These words came from one of our current clients, during the early wireframe phase of his first website. And although we make the process as easy as possible for our clients, it remains a valid point. Your website is your company’s public face after all, so you really do want to make sure that each and every detail is just right.

The process can be overwhelming for the uninitiated. If this describes you, read on. What follows is a basic, plain-language checklist for getting your organization online.

1. Purpose

Before you do anything else, you need to create a plan… and this plan needs to be centered around the question: What purpose do you want your website to serve?

In essence, you need to develop a proper job description for your website. What do you want it to DO for you? Will it be a simple informational marketing tool and point of contact? Will it serve as an online community, gallery or forum? Do you want an online storefront with e-commerce capabilities? Do you want to position yourself as an authority in your field through the provision of news and resources? The requirements for every website are unique, so you will need to decide which functions best serve your organization’s specific needs.

2. Web Host

A web host is not the same as your Internet Service Provider (ISP). Your ISP simply provides access to the internet. If you want a website of your own, you will need to effectively “rent” the space for it on a hosting company’s server.

A hosting company owns and maintains X number of servers. On each server, X number of websites is stored. With that in mind, there are three common options for hosting:

• • Shared means that you share a server with several other websites, and is the cheapest.
• • Dedicated hosting gets you a server all to yourself, and is the most expensive.
• • Semi-dedicated reserves a server for a very small number of clients.

For most websites, shared hosting with a quality hosting company is more than adequate. If you anticipate high volumes of traffic or bandwidth, however, you will want to look into dedicated or semi-dedicated hosting options. Keep in mind that servers are just like your own computer… if it is overloaded, outdated and neglected, it will perform slowly and inconsistently at best, and crash and fail at worst. Most bargain-basement hosting companies are able to offer cheap rates simply by squeezing as many accounts as possible onto a single, often outdated server. And then there’s the human element… when your email and website are down, quality customer service suddenly becomes very important.

Bad web hosts are a dime a dozen. It is imperative that you do your research, and choose a hosting company based on reliable measures of quality rather than gimmicks, sales or ad campaigns. Widely advertised does NOT equal quality. We both use and heartily recommend the pros at Fused, but always encourage clients to do their own research before deciding on which host best suits their needs.

3. Domain Name

Now that you have a home for your website, you need a relevant, easily identifiable address. The domain name (DNS) is the address that appears in the address bar in your web browser, excluding ‘http://www’ (e.g., our domain name is ‘sagemedia.ca’). Unfortunately, nobody owns a domain name for life. You need to register it (usually through your web host) to start, then renew it every year. If you don’t, someone else can and will buy it up, and your site will be rendered both nameless and inaccessible.

Choosing a domain name is a frustrating, but important process. It is frustrating because of the simple fact that if it is a recognizable word, chances are someone has already registered it… even if they’re not using it. There exists a scourge on legitimate online businesses everywhere known as domain squatters… these people buy up thousands of domain names, and simply sit on them until someone comes along who wants a name so badly that they are willing to pay an exorbitant price to buy it from the squatter. Squatters also buy up versions of existing business names and fill the pages with pay-per-click ads (known as link farms) so they generate ad revenue for themselves by capitalizing on well known companies. Your choice of domain name is nonetheless important – it needs to be relevant to your company (containing your company’s name), easily remembered, and easy to spell. Once you’ve committed to a name, you’ll want to stick with it.

4. Target

Further to your initial plan, it is important to decide exactly who you want to communicate with online. Your target audience should already have been established in your business plan. In planning your website, you need to keep in mind what THEIR needs are. Are they looking for information; Do they need a problem solved (hint: the answer is always yes); Do they want to be entertained, educated, or simply served? Combined with your purpose (and as you’ll see, intertwined as well), a sharp focus on the target audience is central to your website strategy.

5. USP

Following from the previous items, your website will need to emphasize and reinforce your USP, or Unique Selling Point. This is the reason why people will choose to come to your site (and your company) rather than your competitors. Note you can’t get to this point without first developing an understanding of your target audience. The USP is the answer to your customer’s problems.

6. Budget

As the single most important online marketing investment your company will make, you will need to determine a realistic and appropriate budget for the design and development of your company’s website. Plan to invest well into four figures for a properly planned, well designed and expertly executed business website. Rates vary wildly between providers – the web design field is largely unregulated, so be sure that you look for qualifications, reviews and referrals, and know exactly who you’re hiring. This includes confirming precisely who will be doing the actual work, as many ‘design’ companies are simply middlemen outsourcing contracts to unqualified overseas labour farms.

7. Content

Given this article is being written by a designer, it may surprise you to see content weighing in first. The fact is, effective design relies on high quality content to provide context, depth, and relevance. If you think of your design as a restaurant, your content would be the food. Note that content is also not limited to the text within your pages; it also refers to images and brand materials (like your logo, for example). These are things that your designer should be provided with upfront, so they can move forward with context and purpose.

8. Persona

Refer back to the parameters covered in previous checklist items – namely your purpose, USP, and target audience. These items will help guide you in narrowing down a personality for your website. As part of a more thorough consultation, any reputable designer will ask you fairly early in the process to provide them with a mood-board, or a selection of exemplar sites that portray the sort of image you want for your business (in addition to industry relevant examples of what you explicitly do NOT feel represents you). Obviously, the purpose is not to find something to copy, but rather to better define the mood and theme for your online presence.

9. Website Design

This is the fun part, though it doesn’t quite start out that way. Clearly, you’ll need to research and choose a qualified, reputable designer. Find someone you feel comfortable with, review their portfolio, look for customer reviews, learn about their company and philosophies, and enter their name into a search engine. Finally, be sure to review the design company’s terms and conditions. There are many designers whose terms specify that they (not you) retain ownership of all materials in perpetuity, placing restrictions on your usage. Remember, you will be investing a significant amount of time, trust, effort and capital in creating your website, so it is most certainly worth your time to ensure you really are choosing the right professional for the job.

Following your initial consultation and scope development, your designer will generally develop a wireframe for your approval. This serves as the skeleton for your site, establishing general placement/layout and structural presentation of site elements. It’s boring, but it is important. Spending a little time here now will save a lot of time later on.

The wireframe will be followed by a visual concept presentation for your homepage. If all of the preliminary steps have been covered thoroughly and thoughtfully (by both the designer and yourself) and communication has been clear, this will generally serve as the starting point for your site. Of course, you may want to tweak some colours, graphic treatments or images to make the design perfect in your eyes. Remember though, your eyes are not the important ones… it is the eyes of your customers you really need to consider. And it is your designer’s job to communicate your message with your target audience squarely in mind.

The design phase finishes with your visual layouts contained within PSD files. If your designer is also your developer, the transition to the next step will be seamless.

10. Website Development

If your website designer and developer are the same person, they will already have been provided with the required functionality and content for your site. If you are going with a separate developer, you will need to provide them with PSD files for the site (provided by your designer) as well as a detailed outline of exactly what you want each part of the site to do, and an outline of your content. They will then turn your visual design into a fully functional, working piece of communicative art (in code).

Like designers, web developers are not created equal. Not by a long shot. Web development is a rapidly changing and ever-evolving field, with different technologies and techniques being created, updated, and rendered obsolete on a daily basis. Web standards are important to ensure that your website looks and works as it should for the maximum possible number of visitors, though even that is no guarantee. Your developer will also need to test the site for cross-browser and cross-platform compatibility (because not all browsers follow standards). The way your site is coded is incredibly important for usability, accessibility, and will have a strong impact on how your site ranks in search engines. So choose someone who really knows what they’re doing.

11. Launch

While there are certainly other considerations insofar as pre-launch marketing goes, at this point your website is technically ready to deploy. Your developer will want to migrate your site onto your server for you (the one that your domain name points to, provided by your hosting company), and then complete one final set of tests to make sure that everything continues to work the way it should in its new home. This is another reason your choice of hosting companies is important – the software installed on the server needs to be up-to-date so it can support the latest standards in development.

12. Corollaries

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO is an entire industry unto itself, with intricacies that extend far beyond the scope of this article. At minimum, if you want anyone to find your website on a search engine, your developer needs to employ best practices in organic, white-hat search engine optimization. Organic simply means that the optimization is contained within the code, content and build of the site itself. White-hat means that the methods employed are not prohibited or frowned-upon by the search engines themselves. Google et al WILL blacklist any website it finds that tries to circumvent the rules through unscrupulous SEO techniques.

There are additional SEO tactics you can (and should) employ yourself to maximize your exposure. Search engines rank sites higher if they have regular updates with new content, and a good number of quality inbound links. This does not mean link exchanges necessarily, as search engines often penalize sites that offer little in the way of actual content. Basically, the more high-ranking websites you can get to link back to your site, the better.

Social Media

These days, everyone and their mother has a profile on Facebook and Twitter. Professionals will also have a profile on LinkedIn. Setting yourself up with a presence on social media can draw visitors to your site, IF handled properly. In order for this to work, you will need to invest time into keeping your profiles up to date, and you will need to make sure your contributions are relevant, appropriate, and suitably engaging for your visitors.

Offline Marketing

The web is an incredibly important medium for marketing your business. However, you should not make the mistake of ignoring classic offline marketing techniques and resources. Be sure to update all of your promotional and corporate materials to include your website address and branded email. This includes just about everything that has your logo on it, including your business cards, stationery, signage, advertising, packaging, etc. If a customer sees an ad on the side of a bus as it rolls by, they will be significantly more likely to retain a website address than any other method of contact advertised.

Your Browser

While your website will have been tested and developed to function in older browsers, it cannot be optimized for them. Current best practices and up-to-date techniques are simply not supported by many obsolete browsers, requiring secondary options and workarounds. So, open whichever browser you prefer to use, and update it to the latest version. It’s free, it’s easy, and it has the potential to improve your online experience exponentially.

Although this article has been fairly lengthy, it really is just a primer on the most important fundamentals of launching a new website. If an effective result is to be expected, the process becomes an involved one that requires considerable investment and effort on the part of the client and the designer/developer. It also requires a high level of expertise. As always, research is important. Hopefully this checklist will have you well on your way.

Features are the properties of a product or service. The features of a car might be anti-lock brakes, leather seats, or rear-window defrost. Benefits, on the other hand, show how those features will actually be of benefit (hence the name) to the user. Anti-lock brakes keep you safe if you have to stop quickly. Leather seats are more durable and luxurious than cloth. In copywriting, benefits are much, much more important than features.
Let me show you a real-world example.

Stainless Steel Shaft or Priceless Cooking Tool?

Have you ever read a product brochure or Web page that sounded something like this?

The Braun Multiquick Hand Blender offers a 200-watt motor, stainless steel shaft, five-blade chopper attachment, and aerator head.

How do you feel when you read that description of the hand blender? It’s not very exciting, is it? The thought of a stainless steel shaft doesn’t really get your heart pumping and instill the thought that you need one of these hand blenders. That’s because the copy above focuses on the “what” of the product. Now read this version:

The Braun Multiquick Hand Blender has a powerful motor enabling you to chop, whip, puree and blend with lightning speed. Its stainless steel shaft holds up to years of use without bending or breaking. You’ll create delicious meals with ease and be out of the kitchen in record time.

The first example focuses on the “what” of the product… the features. It simply lists the nuts and bolts of what the physical product offers. However, the second copy example focuses on the “how” of the product… the benefits. These benefits show the reader how this product will make his/her life easier or better.

Focusing on the “what” and not the “how” of a product or service is a common mistake novice writers make. It is also a deadly mistake that can cost you sales. But how exactly do you create benefits out of features? Easily!

Five Easy Steps to Creating Powerful Benefits

Here’s my five-step process for turning boring features into eye-popping benefits. Let’s use the example of a marketing e-book for this practice session.

1. List the features of your product or service. (Created in PDF format, information on e-mail marketing, search engine optimisation, PPC ads, etc.)
2. List the concerns or needs of your customers. If you don’t know… ask them. (Finding affordable ways to promote their websites to bring in the most qualified traffic and increase sales.)
3. Ask yourself, “Why does this feature matter to my customer?” Write your answers on the list. (PDF format means both PC and Mac users can view the e-book. Search engine optimisation is one of the most effective, highly targeted tools there is… and it costs nothing once you learn how to do it.)
4. Take it one step further. Ask yourself, “What problem or concern can this feature address?” (Getting more qualified buyers to the reader’s website so they can buy)
5. Write down the benefit and you’re all done!

So, instead of writing copy about a marketing e-book that reads like this:

Move It or Lose It is an e-book for beginners that was created in PDF format. It covers the details of e-mail marketing, search engine optimisation, and PPC ads in order to bring you affordable marketing tools you can use.

…you can write copy like this:

Move It or Lose It was created especially for new online business owners and covers – in great detail – everything you need to know about the three most popular, economical, and effective marketing methods:

• Search engine optimisation: one of the most effective, highly targeted tools there is… and it costs absolutely nothing once you learn how to do it.
• E-mail marketing: extremely targeted… this marketing method brings in consistently high returns on investment.
• Pay-per-click (PPC) ads: not only inexpensive, but also quick and easy to set up.

Move It or Lose It is available for immediate download as a PDF file, meaning both PC and Mac users can take advantage of this powerful information.

Which one sparks your interest more?

When it’s time to write your next piece of advertising copy, take some time to develop a solid list of benefits. Focusing on the “how” instead of the “what” will practically guarantee a better response and more sales.

Guest Article written by Karon Thackston. Karon is owner of Marketing Words, and a professional advertising and search engine copywriter. Check out her online e-course at the Step-by-Step Copywriting Course.

Personally, I rank selling myself up there with paperwork and taxes. I’d rather be doing actual design work than making a sales pitch. I’d rather be doing just about anything else, for that matter. But success in business demands we master not only our own craft, but also those fields that we depend upon to stay afloat (and prosper). In my case, I’m helped along quite a bit by way of the fact that I also happen to have a university degree in psychology, so I’m able to mesh what I know about design with what I know about people.

And what I’ve learned about people is that they like being sold to, just about as much as they like selling. A lot of marketing firms like to aim for the lowest common denominator, which I find not only insulting and ineffective, but outright unnecessary. Screaming “BUY ME, DUMMY” at someone tends to have the opposite effect.

Writing good sales copy for advertising purposes is even more difficult. You need to compress your ten-page sales presentation into a few brilliant, effective and easily digested words.

Now, a lot of new businesses can’t afford a professional copywriter, though it’s not an area that should be overlooked or underestimated. IF you’re taking it upon yourself to craft your own sales copy, there are a few basic points to keep at the front of your mind.

Sales copy should be genuinely compelling.

Grab your audience’s attention with an effective, well thought out headline. What you’re saying is just as important as how you say it. Your message needs to be clear, attractive and relevant. And for heaven’s sake, don’t SHOUT.

Offer a clear incentive. This is your call to action. What do you want your audience to do? And just as importantly, Why should they? You need to be forthright and to the point, without being demanding, narcissistic or desperate.

Sweeten the deal. It sounds trite, but people love freebies. I’m not saying you should give away a free TV with every truck you sell (we actually did get a free TV with our vehicle – it’s a piece of garbage we could do without), but be sure to point out any added-value offerings that would make you stand out from your competitors.

So boiled down, we’re looking at three components:
• Entice
• Engage
• Extend

Think about the last ad that actually made you want to follow up, then deconstruct it.

Remember, your audience is you.

On the cover – don’t jump the gun.
Effective sales people don’t jump into the hard pitch on first contact – similarly, it doesn’t make sense to focus overtly or solely on your company on the brochure’s cover. Instead, focus on an idea that will endorse your company in the customer’s mind, and create a connection.

The copy should focus on your customer, not you.
The text in your brochure should make the customer feel that you understand and sympathize with their problems – after all, they’re seeking you out to fill THEIR needs, not to do you a favour. To your customer, the most important thing about your product or service is how it is of use to them. So, allow your brochure copy to answer all their questions and overcome all their objections. The copy should impart that personal touch to the customer. Brochure copy is sales stragety in writing… and in the world of ad copy, you need to build rapport before you can sell.

Hook your readers.
Bait is great, but without a good hook you’ll never bring that “fish” onto the boat. As it’s been said, every page in your brochure presents the reader with an opportunity to stop going on to the next page. Get their attention, and keep it with a combination of design and copy that is attractive, intriguing, and persuasive.

Sell the refreshment, not the drink.
You’ve put a lot of work into developing your company and products… so it will be very tempting to focus in on the details of all the fantastic features your company/product offers. And although it can be argued that brochures exist to explain features, in copy it’s best to sell those features through the benefits. And you can do this by using true to life examples, cases and applications.

Don’t lose your readers on technical points
This is one of the strongest reasons to seek out a professional copywriter. All too often, business owners find it too difficult to simplify their message for general consumption… because you’re so close to the product, it’s too easy to inadvertently drown your readers under a flood of technical jargon. Please, don’t do that to your prospects. If technical information is important to your particular product, it should only be presented in proper technical style (as a table chart or diagram) and not pushed down the throat of your reader through bewildering, incomprehensible language.

Establish credibility
Obviously, you want to make the best possible impression on your prospects. From a copywriting perspective, you can do this through tone and content, and by providing expert answers in simple English. Your grammer should be perfect, your composition well-considered, and your content relevant and genuinely compelling.

Keep it concise
Aside from those clients who come to us with no content ready whatsoever, perhaps one of the most perplexing problems we come across is those clients who provide us with a short novel of text to squeeze into six small brochure panes. If your prospects wanted to read a whitepaper on your company, they would ask for a whitepaper. The purpose of a sales brochure is to present a compelling, easy-to-digest overview of your company – it is not a medium in which to detail your overall business plan. Decide which points are the most important to present, and focus on those… if they are well written and presented in an artful way, they will compel your prospects to seek you out for more.

End with a call to action
Always, always end your copy with a call to action. You’ve built a rapport, you’ve outlined the benefits of your company to the customer – now simply and clearly tell the customer what you want them to do. In other words, if you want them to purchase, say, “Harold’s Widgets”, simply ask them for their order.

Writing good quality content for brochures is a vital requirement for any credible corporation. Remember you are not just selling brochure paper, you are selling yourself.

Sage Media is an international corporate design firm based in Ottawa, Ontario.