Build and Promote Your Web Site

When I was writing this article, I posted a message on the Online Advertising (http://www.o-a.com) mailing list asking people to tell me about how they made or saved money on the Web. One individual wrote to me saying that small businesses lose money more often than they make it on the Web because of the high cost of creating and running a Web site.
Unfortunately, there is some truth in what that individual had to say. Many small businesses have spent more money on the Web than they will ever make or save.
But the good news is that doesn’t have to happen. You can profit from the Web if you plan carefully and use your ingenuity.
Decide What the Purpose of Your Web Site Will BeIf you go to business meetings or look in the local papers, you will find numerous service providers who offer Web site design, hosting, and marketing services. Among them are advertising agencies and marketing firms, desktop publishers, office support services, commercial artists, computer programmers, computer consulting firms, and companies that also sell Web site hosting and Internet connectivity services.
Some of them will have experience setting up huge corporate sites, some will have limited experience building Web sites, and some may be people claiming to be Internet consultants or Web site developers because they have just purchased a Web page creation program and assume that owning the program gives them the expertise to design Web sites.
Many will try to convince you to buy their services now, whether or not you know anything about the Web—or about them. Don’t be pressured by their solicitations. Don’t sign any agreements to buy Web site space or to have a Web site created until you have a clear vision of what you want the Web site to accomplish.
Every decision you make about your Web site should be focused on what you want to achieve by having a Web site. Do you want to use the Web site primarily as a capabilities statement or online version of your press kit or promotional materials? Will you be selling products to consumers directly from your Web site? Or will your primary purpose be communicating with customers, employees, or suppliers?
To avoid spinning your wheels or spending money on services you don’t need, make a list of all the capabilities you need and put them in priority order.
Determine Your NeedsTo save time, money (and possibly your sanity), plan out the Web site carefully before you sign any contracts or spend any money on developing it. You can determine what capabilities you’ll need and gather the information you need to get accurate pricing estimates by answering these questions:
Who do you want to use the Web site?
How many people do you expect to use the site?
How will you let them know about the site (how will you market it)?
Who will do the marketing?
What capabilities (ordering, database, audio, video, and so on) will you need?
How often will you have to update the Web site?
Who will do the updates?
What will it cost to host the site (or for your own server and Internet connection)?
What will it cost to design the Web site?
What it will cost to market the Web site?
What will it cost to update the site?
How much will you have to spend on inventory?
What will fulfillment costs be?
Will you need warehouse space?
Will you have to hire employees?
How many sales or leads will you need to break even on costs?
What sales volume do you want to attain?
How much, if anything, do you expect to make in advertising revenues?
How soon do you need to reach your sales goals?
Use the answers to these questions to determine what it will cost you to build the site and maintain it. Then compare your costs to the results you hope to achieve and determine if the cost will justify the results.
If the results will justify the cost, set specific goals and timelines for achieving the goals and start the project. At each step along the way, compare your progress to your needs to keep it on target.
If the results won’t justify the costs, look for ways to cut expenses or increase revenues. Or don’t build the site at all. You can reap many of the benefits of the Internet without having your own domain name and Web site.
Don’t Purchase Your Own Internet ServerYou don’t have to have your own Internet server (computer dedicated to serving pages to the Internet) and Internet access lines to put your business on the Web. The most cost-effective way for most small businesses to launch and maintain a Web site is to rent server space from a Web-hosting company.
Similarly, if you don’t have the time, skill, and interest to do a good job of designing a Web site, farm out the chore to a reputable contractor or Web design company. The reason is simple: The time you would have to invest to learn to create Web pages could be put to better use selling your products and services and running your own business.
Know What to ExpectWith Web design, like other services, you don’t always get what you pay for. High price is no assurance of good design or a result suited to the intended use for your site. One organization paid more than $9,000 to have their Web site designed and hosted for a year. The Web site consisted of only a few pages of text and one graphic image. There were no databases and no order forms. The only interactive feature was a function to send mail to the owners of the site. The entire job, including creating the graphic image, shouldn’t have taken more than a day or two to create.
You could get ripped off like this, too, if you don’t know what you are buying. Launching a Web site is a process that involves several types of activities. Depending on the nature of your site, those services will include some or all of the following:
Setting up the Web site on a hosting service
Hosting the Web site on an ongoing basis (storing the Web site on a computer, connecting it to the Internet)
Registering a domain name (giving yourself a unique “address” on the Web, such as yourbusiness.com)
Designing Web pages (similar to typesetting and laying out a newsletter)
Designing artwork (creating original artwork for the Web site)
Writing the editorial content for the Web site
Programming a database to work on the Web (for mailing lists, surveys, catalogs, customer sales data, and so on)
Registering the site with Internet search engines
Marketing and promoting the site (on the Web and offline)
Advertising (on the Web and offline)
Scanning your graphics and text to make them usable on the Web
Maintaining the site on an ongoing basis
Few companies offer all these services. Many, however, offer “complete” packages that include setting up and hosting the site along with design and limited maintenance. Although using a single source to do all the work sounds convenient, it isn’t necessarily a good idea. The person who is a whiz at computer programming may have no artistic abilities and no eye for graphic design. Someone who is capable of putting text into html format may not know anything about creating the editorial content for the site or about Internet marketing. (Don’t assume they can type well or spell words correctly either!) And the company that hosts the Web site may charge a small fortune to “design” your Web site, when all they do is plug your material into a cookie-cutter template that they use to “design” every Web site they create.
Furthermore, if you are charged a flat fee, you may wind up paying for services you don’t need, or overpaying for the ones you do need.
To make sure the price you are quoted is fair, ask the provider to give you an itemized list of services they provide and to specify the fee they are charging for each service.
Get quotes from several vendors and compare them. Look at how much disk space you get, how much bandwidth you are allowed (how much data can be transferred monthly for the fee), and what extra charges you’ll incur if you go over these amounts. If you plan to sell online, see if there are extra charges for a storefront, too. Ask whether you will have access to update the files yourself if you decide to; how many e-mail accounts you will be given; and whether there are extra charges for autoresponders, mailing lists, and other services you may want.
Know the Going RatesBe wary of deals that offer you a set number of pages unless you have no plans to add anything to your site after it is set up. A page requires very little space on a computer. If you need to have only a few pages on the Internet, you shouldn’t have to pay more than $10 or $15 a month for hosting them, plus a reasonable hourly fee for taking your material and converting it into html Web pages.
In 1999, Web-hosting prices for people who could build their own Web sites ranged from as little as $15 a month to $50 a month or more depending on the amount of computer (server) space needed and whether the Web site would require database, audio or video capabilities. A site costing $15 per month in hosting fees is adequate for most small businesses whose primarily goal is to put sales literature on the Web to get sales leads. Some hosting companies included shopping cart software (software for setting up a retail site) at no extra charge with host plans costing about $25 a month. Graphic artists and programmers typically charge $75 an hour and up. Conversion of documents to simple html pages costs between $15 and $25 an hour.
Find Affordable Web HostingIf you will be creating your own Web pages or if you want to compare the prices your service provider quotes to price elsewhere, be sure to visit BudgetWeb.com http://www.budgetWeb.com/budgetWeb/index.html. This Web site contains a directory of companies that offer Web-hosting services and a primer that explains some of the terms you may encounter in setting up your Web site. There is also a list of questions you should ask a Web-hosting company.
Ask for References and Check ThemBefore you agree to have anyone design your Web site, ask for references. Get the names and URLs of Web sites they have designed for other companies. Look at those sites and see if you like them. Is the design of the pages attractive? Do they load quickly? Do they all look the same? Look around the sites for the e-mail address of the owners and send them e-mail. Ask if they were satisfied with the work that was done for them and if it was done in a timely fashion.