This may seem like a dumb questions...but can you answer it? A website will serve you better if it has a specific purpose. Do you want people to order products online, call you, visit your shop, etc! Give your website a purpose so it can better serve you.

Think about the service(s) or product(s) you offer, why do they need a website? Let’s say your business provides a service such has delivering meals to individuals with certain disabilities such as auditory, speech or cognitive; what purpose will your website service? Do you want clients to order online, see menu choices, contact you and if yes, is the site accessible? Or maybe your business is lawn-maintenance; do you want people to schedule maintenance online, see your amazing work, or call you? A website will better serve if it has a purpose(s).

Although logo, colors, style guides and a slogan are an important part of your Brand, there’s a little more (a lot more) to it. Your brand is a promise, a commitment to current and future customers. It builds credibility, differentiate you from your competitors, build loyalty and clearly expresses who you are to customers. This can be overwhelming and time consuming but fortunately, there are some great organizations to help with the challenge of building a brand and marketing strategies. This is worth the time and effort, just look at your competitors and ask, what is their brand and why should a customer choose me over my competitor? Again, this is a very brief summary and I encourage you to learn more about Brand and why it's so important to your business.

What is your brand? Do you have a style guide in place or will these items be created for the first time while building a website? Take just a moment to think about some of these items if you haven't already and discuss them prior to building a website.

Logo:

You WILL need a logo, non-negotiable...! Do Not...do not build a website without a logo! Your logo and tagline are needed to help customers separate you from competitors. If you have a logo, please provide a png file, minimum size of 400px. If you don’t have a logo, now is a great time to build one. Logo(s) are a separate product from your website and an additional charge. A great logo can easily transfer to grey-scale or black and white, it can shrink down to small sizes and still be readable and helps customers immediately identify your website. For more information on logos and why they matter:

Content:

Content is the writing, the descriptions, summaries, photography, icons and any information needed to build the website. Many business owners do not have content readily available when looking to build a website.  To save time and money, have all copy typed, spell checked and organized by page and section, for example:

Homepage/hours of operation:

• Monday 9am to 11 pm
• Tuesday Closed
• Wednesday 7am to 10 pm

All copy should be typed, labeled and ready to add to the site. If you don't have content, create a plan of action or be prepared to pay more for content creation. If you do have content, gather, organize, digitize and if possible, optimize photographs. If you as a business owner, don't care what's on your site, why should potential customers?

Photographs:

What do those photographs look like, what's the quality and are those photos worthy of representing your work, products or services? Before answering yes, read more about photographs

I'm always caught off guard by comments from angry customers because they received an annual bill for hosting and domain name; so this section will give you a clear understanding of what to expect once the site is live.

Domain:

If you want a dedicated name such as www.yourname.com, a not, www.someoneelsename.yourname.com, a domain name must be registered. Domain is not the website, it is a completely separate service from web hosting.

I'm going to keep things simple and compare domain vs hosting to land vs house. Think of the domain as the land;  that land has an address, 123 Property St, Atlanta, GA 30000. The domain name is the land and the address is: www.yourdomain.com and just like land is not a house, a domain is not a website, these are 2 separate services and expenses.

You pay builders to build a house on the land/property, the same principle applies to the domain. Once the domain is registered, now the builders (web designer or developer) can build a website on that domain.

If yes, you need a site with eCommerce: https://www.business.gov.au/news/thinking-of-setting-up-an-ecommerce-business

Although eCommernce isn’t my specialty, hopefully this blog will get you started to find a web solution just right for the way you do business.

https://www.websitebuilderexpert.com/ecommerce-solutions/