These questions are designed to help you as a designer or business owner to focus on what the needs of the web site project are.
Background: 1. What is the nature of your business?
2. Who is your target audience?
Message: 1. What goals does your company intend to reach with a new web site?
2. What is the primary message you wish to convey to your audience with this site?
Perception: 1. Use adjectives to describe how you want your site to be perceived by the user. (Examples: conservative, progressive, friendly, formal, casual, serious, experts, humorous, service-oriented, professional, etc)
2. How is your company currently perceived? Do you wish to carry through the same kind of message through your web site?
3. What web sites do you find compelling? What do you find the most interesting about these sites?
4. Are there other web sites you've seen that have functionality that you would like to have on your site? Due to differences in server operating systems, not all functionality you see on the web may be available on your site.
Style: 1. Do you have company colors or a color scheme you want us to use?
2. Describe any visual elements or styles that can be utilized from existing marketing materials or collateral.
3. If we are providing graphics, what style would you like them to be in: photography, illustration, cartoon, etc?
Content: 1. Will this site use existing content? If not, will you be creating content in-house or using an outside provider?
2. What is the basic structure of the content, and how is it organized?
3. Will you need to request any sensitive information on your site (social security numbers, credit card numbers)? If so, you will need to acquire a security certificate.
Commerce Sites: 1. How many products do you plan to sell on your web site? Will the products change often?
2. Do your products have any variations? If so, do they apply to all the products? Does each product have different variations? List variations.
3. What is your shipping model (flat rate, by total dollar amount, by piece)?
4. Will you be charging Sales Tax? If so, which state(s) will be charged? What percentage?
5. Are there any special pricing rules we need to know about (Ex: purchase 12 of our product and receive a 10% discount.)?
6. Which credit cards do you accept?
7. Do you need online credit card authorization (Cybercash or ATS)?
8. Do you want to accept checks or purchase orders?
9. Review the commerce options we have and see if one fits your needs best. Our sales representatives will be able to help you with this.
Marketing / Updating: 1. What are your short-term marketing goals (in the next two years)?
2. How will this web site help to meet your goals?
3. Do you have an existing or planned marketing strategy in mind to promote this site? If so, please describe.
4. What do you feel is your number one business problem? (Examples: change image, increase customers, promote company, etc.)
5. What methods of distributing the URL already exist within the company?
6. Do you intend on keeping the site updated? If so, how often? Who is responsible for updating and providing content?
7. What are your budget limitations? Can this project be broken in a phased manner to help you meet your goals?
Labels: domain name, e-commerce, marketing, web design, web hosting, web maintenance, web site design
