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Author: OPRK Marketing

How to create a website that will work?

Today we will analyze step by step how to act to create a website that will bring success.

Creating website

When you have an idea to create a website, it means that such a need has arisen. Now you can go two ways:

  • Make a website for free, on ready-made online platforms. Most often, everything is already thought out for you there, and all you have to do is arrange the elements of the site, add your content and launch it. However, this path also has its downsides – many effective tools of such online platforms are still paid: for example, design elements, the necessary domain name, hosting, etc. Plus, you will need to deal with all the issues yourself or look for a specialist for each task in the course of work.
  • Order the development of the site from professionals. Of course, this will cost some money, but the specialists know their work and will be able to make a turnkey site, with a good structure, design, navigation and content, and quickly. With this option, the development company can even offer you services not only for creating, but also for promoting the site.

The cost of creating a website always depends on what kind of website it is and how complex it is. Business card websites and landing pages are usually simple, and they are quicker and cheaper to make than others. Expensive websites are those with a complex structure, many sections, unique layout, special design, and an advanced level of functionality. The more complex the structure of the website, the more expensive it is.

Registering a domain

As a theater begins with a coat rack, so a website begins with a domain — an address (name). Creating a website is never possible without it. This is exactly what you enter in the browser command line or what is displayed in it when you click on a link to a website. Our domain, for example, is oprk-marketing.com.

The first thing you need to do at the very beginning is to register a domain name. It should be simple and convenient for writing and reading, easy to dictate.

The domain name of the site will be successful if:

  • it is short and capacious;
  • it is not overloaded with symbols;
  • it displays the name or essence of the company.

Once the domain is selected, it needs to be placed on a remote server so that everyone can access it. This is called hosting.

There are three main types of website hosting:

  • Virtual or cloud hosting (Shared). This is a server where data from many sites of different users is collected, that is, this data is, as it were, “in one basket” with everyone.
  • Dedicated hosting (VDS). In this case, a separate part is allocated for each site on the server, intended only for it.
  • Dedicated server. This is an entire server given for hosting one site or a group of sites that belong to one user.

After these actions, the main work on the site begins – development, layout, filling with content and promotion.

Selecting the type of site

Now it’s time to determine what your site will be like. Almost all of your further actions depend on the type, and any site development begins with determining which direction to move in. There are several main types, and you can choose the one that suits your activity.

Be careful at this stage and be aware of the possible mistakes you may make at the very beginning.

Business website

Landing

Also known as a one-pager, or landing page. This is an ideal option for presenting a single, bright product offer:

  • a unique or complex product;
  • product release;
  • author’s course;
  • event;
  • a ​​service with several options.

Business Website

This option is more complex, it has several or even many page sections. Such a website is suitable for a company that carries out constant complex activities, when you need to take into account many details and make it convenient for customers to contact you.

You can make a multi-page website if your business is:

  • catering, hotels;
  • consultations, financial, legal or other support;
  • medical services;
  • beauty industry (manicure, hairdressing, beauty salon, massage);
  • tourism, recreation and leisure centers;
  • children’s club, private kindergarten or school;
  • language school;
  • and much more.


A multi-page website is the most common way for most types of business, because there are many opportunities to show your company, talk about your activities, give visitors the opportunity to place orders with you and interact with you.

Online store

This is the best solution if you are selling goods on the Internet. An online store usually has a product catalog, the ability to select products by category and filters (features, characteristics), pay for an order online and many other options to make selling easy for yourself and for customers. An online store website should be convenient, user-friendly and easy to understand.

Define the purpose of the site

This step smoothly continues the previous one – you need to know the goals for which you are creating the site. The success of your site will largely depend on how clearly you formulate these goals, because it is the goals that help you understand what structure the site and what tools you need on it.

The goal is what determines all further steps before you start developing. Appearance, design, decorative elements, button shape – all this later, first – the essence, idea, goals and objectives. This is like a foundation on which everything else will be built.

Let’s look at how others have done it

When you already know for what purposes you need a site and what functions it will perform, you can think about how it will look and work. At this stage, you have the opportunity to think through the structure, all the functions, the location of navigation elements, sections, buttons, etc.

To better understand how to do it, you can and should look at how others do it. Find several websites of companies or specialists who work in your or a related business scheme, and see how they did it. Remember, each company solves its own problems in business, some have larger ones, some are smaller. Therefore, you should not focus on the super-site of a large brand if you are an individual entrepreneur with one office or point of sale. A competitor’s site is not a model for you, but a source of ideas and inspiration, sometimes a hint on how to do it or not to do it. Remember your goals and stick to them – make the site unique and yours.

It is useful to study competitors’ sites in order to take note of:

  • a successful site structure and abandon an unsuccessful one;
  • spy on suitable design moves;
  • find out what services and add-ons can be used.

Making a website sketch

So, the general picture has taken shape, now it’s time to start developing a sketch or the first prototype – a draft of the website. All the ideas and thoughts that you had at the first stages, now need to be embodied in graphic form – make a sketch.

Website types

It would not be superfluous to first draw a sketch of the site and its pages directly by hand, with a pencil on paper. When you (or a specialist you hire) decide to make a prototype of the site in a special program, it will be easier to navigate.

You need to draw a sketch of the site so that it is convenient to perceive visually. We will give you some tips on how to do this:

  • Text is depicted on the sketch with straight lines, headings – with bold straight lines.
  • Designation of a picture or video – a rectangle crossed out from corner to corner.
  • Navigation elements, buttons – small rectangles or circles.
  • Separately, the site header is usually made with a narrow strip at the top. Logo and menu items – short thick strokes.
  • It is not necessary to make inscriptions and names at this stage, the main thing is to display the structure and structure of the site.

It may well be that such a draft will not be the only one in the work, so be patient – make several options, see how it looks on paper, make the necessary changes.

An electronic prototype is created in special programs, for example, Figma. As a rule, web development of a site (code creation) occurs according to a ready-made prototype – it is used as a sample. Here you can already apply all the design solutions that you have chosen for yourself, and see how it looks. We will talk about design and design in more detail below.

You can read about how to how to design the main page of a website in our article.

Filling the site with content

Before doing the layout and final design of the site, you need to stock up on materials that will be placed on the pages. This needs to be done right now, so as not to waste time later searching for materials and editing them.

To fill the site, you need a “foundation” of the site already created in the CMS with sections that can be edited and filled with content.

CMS — English Content Management System — is a system with which you can manage the content of the site, add or delete sections, pages, content, edit the content of each page and element of the site.

All CMS are divided by the type of placement into two main types:

  • Cloud CMS (SaaS) — hosted on a server that belongs to the developer of the site, who works in it;
  • Boxed CMS — hosted on a separate hosting and allows you to modify some modules yourself.

In the article about corporate sites, we talked about CMS in more detail.

Texts

Find all the information about your company and products and structure it by site sections. Texts must be unique – do not copy or rewrite other people’s, this will negatively affect the site’s promotion in search engines. Prepare texts for each page – competent, useful, written in accessible language, divided into paragraphs, lists, with headings.

Copywriters are professional commercial text writers. They know how to write and build a text, they can structure it and enter “keywords” – special words and phrases for search engine promotion.

It is best to write texts before the design is developed, and not during it. The volume and structure of the text affect the visual layout of the page, the size of the blocks, the location of other elements.

We tell you in detail about how to format text on a site here.

Pictures and videos

It is very important to illustrate products and services. It is best when visual elements are:

  • original (self-made photos and videos);
  • good quality, with a competent composition.

A professional photographer can help with this if you don’t have such material yet. To do this, you will need to determine what exactly to shoot, what style the photos will be in, and how many shots you will need. A professional photographer can help if you find it difficult to figure this out on your own, but it is still better to have your own idea of ​​what you would like to see in the visual content of the site.

Making the design

It’s time for the most interesting part — design work. Now you can remember all your ideas for the design of the site and implement them — colors, fonts, element sizes, visual effects.

The design stage solves the problem — to make the site visually harmoniously “fit” with what was developed at the stage of the prototype, layout and content. Remember that design is not just decoration, but above all a solution to problems:

  • make the site pleasant and easy to perceive;
  • reflect the spirit of your business, its features and concept in the appearance of the site.

To accomplish these tasks, the site design should be:

  • harmonious;
  • modern;
  • functional.

Designers know everything about composition, combinations, successful and unsuccessful moves in design. Therefore, it makes sense to entrust this work to a specialist if you yourself are not a professional designer.

Create site navigation

This step should be done almost without interruption from the previous one. The site should be understandable, logical and convenient for the user:

  • sections and categories are in visible places, you do not have to look for them;
  • transitions between sections and links are arranged directly and clearly, so that no one gets confused or lost;
  • buttons, especially those that lead to the target actions of visitors (order, buy, leave a request) should stand out and be visible;
  • important sections should always be in front of your eyes and available for navigation.

Ease of use of the site is called usability. Creating good working usability is the work of an entire team, which includes a marketer, designer, layout designer and SEO specialist. The more convenient your website is, the more benefits you will receive:

  • Visitors can easily find everything they need and submit applications faster;
  • It is easier for the website administrator to make changes when necessary;
  • Search engines perceive such a website better and increase its ranking in search results.
Which website I need?

Finishing touches

When all the steps for creating a website are completed, take a few more steps so that the website is fully prepared for active work:

  • install a traffic counter. This way you will be able to track how many people visit your website in a specific period of time and use this data for improvement;
  • register the website in search engines. In order for future clients to find your website, you need to give them this opportunity – register it in search engines and optimize it, independently or with the help of specialists;
  • add additional services and improvements. When the main part is ready, you may see that some detail is missing: for example, an online chat on the website, accepting online payments, a delivery service, etc. Now you have the opportunity to easily connect these services and make the website even more effective;
  • launch an advertising campaign. This is no longer work on the website itself, but on its promotion. To get a good effect, you can use Google Ads and other paid advertising tools. Setting up advertising has many nuances, so this is done by separate specialists in Internet marketing, targeted and contextual advertising.

Let’s go!

Now you can safely consider the site ready. How popular and effective it will be for your business depends only on you and on how each step of the site creation was thought out.

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