TIPS FOR SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS WEBSITE DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH

The key to successful business website planning is to budget not only for initial website development, but also for website maintenance and Internet marketing.

A common mistake is businesses spending their entire budget developing a website and then realizing the need for marketing once they realize their website is not receiving any visitors. No matter how great a website may be or how much money is spent on design and development, it will still be just one of millions competing for attention on the World Wide Web. The Internet contains billions of web pages, with millions of new pages added every day. Effective Internet marketing will ensure your website gets found by your target customers.

Budgeting Guidelines

When creating a budget for your website, consider more than just development costs. Basically there are 3 broad cost areas to budget for. These are:

1. The initial cost of developing the website;
2. Ongoing website maintenance and website hosting costs;
3. Ongoing Internet marketing of your website.

How much to budget will depend on your specific business requirements. Some, for example, allocate 30% of their budget to website development, 30% to maintenance/hosting and 40% to website promotion.

Why You Need to Market Your Website:

Business websites are without question a highly effective marketing medium. But to work they must be seen. They need visitors. Failing to market your website online is like having a TV commercial produced but never showing it on TV. Or having flyers printed but not distributed. To do so would be a waste of money.

What is Internet Marketing?

Internet Marketing refers to strategies and techniques applied on the Internet to support a company’s overall online marketing objectives. Goals may include driving targeted visitors to a website to create a desired result such as purchasing a product, learning more about the company or requesting information.