QUESTIONS TO HELP DEFINE THE GOALS OF A WEB SITE PROJECT
 
The answers to the following questions are meant to provide a foundation for
understanding the scope of a web site project as well insight into an organizations business and culture.

• OBJECTIVES
• CORPORATE PROFILE
• BRAND ATTRIBUTES
• AUDIENCE
• CONTENT
• FUNCTIONALITY
• PROMOTION
• MAINTENANCE
• APPROVAL PROCESS

OBJECTIVES

• What is the goal for this project?
• What outcome will make this project a success?
• What are the constraints, risks, dependencies and/or time factors related to this project?

CORPORATE PROFILE

• What is your company’s legal name?
• What is your tag line?
• Briefly describe the story behind your company.
• Who are your customers?
• Who are your competitors?
• How do you distinguish yourself from competitors?
• How is your organization viewed from within the industry?
• What is your mission statement?

BRAND ATTRIBUTES

• Describe your organization’s culture?
• What values best describe your brand?
• What image does your company want to project?
• What are the pros and cons of your company’s image?
• What companies do you find appealing from a branding perspective, and why?
• What companies do you dislike from a branding perspective, and why?
• List web sites that you find appealing.

AUDIENCE

We try to gather as much information about a target audience as possible in order to have a holistic understanding of their on-line behavior.

• Who are your existing customers?
• Who is the target audience?
• Who will most often use the site?
• What will each user group want to see and do?
• What sites appeal to the same target audiences?
• What do these sites do well? What are they not doing well?
• What are the age ranges of customers? Gender breakdown? Job titles?
• Modem Speed [dial-up or high speed]?
• What media do they regularly read or watch? [e.g. magazines, newspapers, radio and television, etc.]?
• Other Relevant Information?

CONTENT

• What will the audience most want to learn and do?
• What types of content will populate the site [e.g. copy, photos, streaming video etc.]
• Will the content be uploaded manually or from a database?
• What other sites do you admire from a content point of view as well as site organization [i.e. information architecture/navigation]?

FUNCTIONALITY

• Is there a functional specification for this project?
• List any and all functional requirements and/or features
• How often will the site be revised? What sections?
• Does the site need to integrate, either functionally or creatively, with any other sites?
• Is there a long-term plan for developing the site?

PROMOTION

• How will people be driven to the site?
• What types of promotion will be generating traffic?
• How important are search engines for generating traffic? Is there a Search Engine Optimization [SEO] program in place?

MAINTENANCE

• Who will maintain the site after it is launched? Will there be a content management system needed to maintain the site?

APPROVAL PROCESS

• Who will be managing the project on the client side?
• Who is responsible for approving work? Will there be more than one group who will approve work?
• Is there a hard deadline for this project? Are there other events/initiatives that will influence the schedule [e.g. marketing campaigns, industry events, etc.]?

 
To find out more, visit: Bartlett Communications Process