Website Design Planning. The old expression measure twice, cut once seems out of place when applied to the concept of web design, but it holds true. Knowing in advance what your goals and expectations for your website are can save you trouble down the road. So, with that idea in mind, here are three reasons your website should be well planned.
Planning Helps You Define Your Goals
What type of business you have will, in large part, dictate what type of website you will need; and your goals for the website. Is your company going to be selling specialized car parts for older models? If so, then you are probably going to be selling online. What kind of website do you want? Do you want to use WordPress and utilize an e-commerce plugin such as WooCommerce or would you rather use HubSpot with its around the clock support team? Is your company a non-for-profit and is taking donations?
Then you will want to have a site that compels visitors to donate to your cause. Are you starting a blog that will use advertising as its source of revenue? Then it would be wise to design a site that will want to keep visitors coming back to read your compelling content.
Knowing what your goals are before you are in the last phases of designing a website will help you to realize those goals. If you are starting a venture into e-commerce, knowing what kind of shopping cart you want and having emails automatically sent to customers who abandon their carts are the sort of details that can make or break your business. Planning your site gives you a clear roadmap to reach your goals.
Planning Your Website Will Save You Money
Making it up as you go along is great if your name is Indiana Jones, but not so good if you are designing a website. It is in the planning phase of a website when you decide what is needed for your site to reach your goals. Let’s go back to our e-commerce example. You can be the most experienced and talented web designer in the world, but you can still omit things that are vital to an e-commerce site. An example would be forgetting to assign part numbers to car parts to the site, so they are not taken out of inventory when a purchase is made.
Perhaps a checkout button should have been added to the site. Using your site to build your brand is a smart and effective way to connect with your customers, but if once the website is up and its colors, fonts, and images are all different than your brand style guide dictates. With both examples, changes will have to be made after the site goes live. Correcting the mistakes on your site will cost the labor to fix it, and the loss of potential sales or clicks that bring in revenue. Planning your website instead of making it up as you go along will save you costs in the long run.
Website Design Planning Will Save Time
Knowing what you expect from your site will save your company time. If you are unclear about what you expect from your site, there will be countless phone calls and emails back and forth between you and the web designer. Questions about colors, functionality, and a multitude of other things will delay your site going live. Also, as we previously stated, there will be time wasted as a result of having to go and rectify mistakes in the website’s design.
Be Smart
Planning ahead is a wise thing to do if you want your company’s website to be completed quickly with no mistakes. If you are unsure or don’t have time to plan out your company’s website using a qualified and experienced web design agency can help you to get the website you want.
For more information on how Incend Media can help you contact us today.