Creating a Website: Planning Document
Website Goals: What is your objective? What do you hope to achieve with this website
Strategy: How are you going to achieve these goals?
Primary and Secondary Objectives
1. ____________________________________________________
2. ____________________________________________________
Keyword List. Make a list of every word, phrase, synonym and word cluster that could be
used to describe your product/service. You should have no fewer than 16 words/phrases.
1. ______________________________
9. ______________________________
2. ______________________________
10. _____________________________
3. ______________________________
11. _____________________________
4. ______________________________
12. _____________________________
5. ______________________________
13. _____________________________
6. ______________________________
14. _____________________________
7. ______________________________
15. _____________________________
8. ______________________________
16. _____________________________
Research Competitors
Competitive Analysis: Using keywords, search to see who (and how many) are trying to offer the
same product/service as you. Is their goal easy to understand? Do they know their buyers? Are
they missing something you can provide?
Company
Rating
Quality, Price
USP
Demographic: Who do you want to attract?
Age
Gender (if
(range) important)
Familiar
Culture
Who are your buyers? Profile them:
Attitude (hurry,
What problem can Special
busy, calm)
you solve?
Needs
Who is your audience? Can you create a “profile” of the average visitor you want to attract?
What problem will they be looking to solve when they arrive at your site? A good profile will guide
your focus: as each aspect of your site is planned ask yourself “Would my profile audience
respond favorably?”.
IMAGES, PHOTOGRAPHS, LOGOS, GRAPHICS (see technical notes for sizing)
(make sure you have all rights to use the images for marketing)
Choose no more than 2 main colors, 1 secondary for your website Design
What do you want your visitors to do? Create a plan to “lead” them to your goal from their
“landing” to the final.
This illustrates an example
Plan how you will “sell the click” to motivate your website visitor to stay
HOME PAGE
interested and keep moving to your goal
Introductor
paragraph repeats
search term and
offers a solution.
Content
Content for websites are rarely static. They change weekly,
monthly and a good site will keep customers coming back by
offering interesting information or tips to save.
PAGE 2
About us, contact
us, reassuring
information to new
customer
PAGE 3
New solution for
new visitor
add-ons, upgrades
for returning
customer
PAGE 4
List of prices,
terms, details for
all items
PAGE 5:
GOAL
Customer
Purchases
Special offer to
purchase now
For Search Engine Purposes, each page needs to have approximately 225-300 words on each
page to be indexed properly. That doesn’t mean you need to write a novel, If more than ¾ of the
files on your site have enough content, you will be ok. Use those keywords within page titles, in
headlines, scattered in the text to make your site more relevant.
Images
All images used for websites must be in gif, jpg or png format. You must own the copyright or have
permission from the photographer or illustrator. Photos need to be resized to fit your website. DO
NOT enlarge a photo, the image will be pixellated.
Images are used in a wide range of sizes, depending on their purpose:
For navigation sidebars: 150 pixels wide, For a story illustration: 300-400 pixels wide
For use as a single-page demo/illustration: 600 pixels wide
Creating a Rough Layout:
Using large post-it notes, write a brief description of each page and lay them on a wall. You’ll have
to move them about to get a sense of flow. After you’ve got a rough idea, create the site map in
word or excel.