It’s not uncommon to hear that the reason a company built a website is “to have a website.” While we all love a bit of circular logic before breakfast, if you’re going to put a lot of time and money into promoting your website, it’s important to have a good idea of what it’s doing for you.
Most websites are built out of a combination of basic building blocks. Whether your site is an online store seeking sales; a personal blog seeking community connections; a political or religious outlet seeking to persuade, uplift, or inspire; a corporate brochure displaying branding identity and company information; or just about any other type of website you can imagine, it will likely include some or all of the following features or elements:
| Corporate history, news, and press releases | Fun, games, or entertainment |
| Executive biographies | A strong brand identity |
| Product and service information | Art or craft portfolio |
| Online purchasing/donation | Educational materials |
| Support for existing customers, clients, and students | Information specifically for geographically local visitors |
| News and current events | Software or documents available for download |
| Articles, white papers | Media (pictures, audio, video) available for viewing/downloading |
| Religious, philosophical, or political content | Site map |
| Online lead generation forms | Site search function |
| Login for restricted information | Live help/live contact function |
| Instructions for making contact offline or via email | Ways for members of the community to connect with each other on the site (forums, bulletin boards, etc.) |
| Directions, hours of operation, etc., for brick-and-mortar location | Blog postings and reader comments |
| Links to other resources | Methods for your users to help promote your site (share on Facebook, Digg, etc.) |
| Customer testimonials or reviews | Table Cell |
Now, spend some time clicking around your website. you should be able to tell which of the features in the preceding list are included. How well is each component doing its job? For now, think in terms of presentation and functionality. (Is your product information up-to-date? Is your online store full of technical glitches? Are your forms asking the right questions?) Give each feature that you fnd a ranking of Excellent, Good, Fair, or Poor. Obviously, this isn’t going to be a scientifc processjust make your best estimate.
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