Six step guide

1 Who it's aimed at

Who are the main visitors to your site going to be? There are often several types, all visiting for different reasons. How do you cater for all their needs?

2 What's in it for them (and you)

What will make visitors come to your site rather than go elsewhere? What do you need to get out of their visit? Do you want to get a message across, make a sale or interact with them? You need to define your goals up front.

3 How to make it a good experience

Good websites don't test people's patience before driving them nuts. The online world is an instant one, so you can't afford to waste people's time. You need to impress them, draw them in and direct them to the goal.

4 How to attract visitors

Just because you have a website, it doesn't mean people know about it. You need to find the best way to attract visitors, whether that's through publicity, relevant blogs or pay-per-click.

5 How to build for effectiveness

Cross browser and cross platform, yes, but not cross users! You want your site to be accessible, friendly to search spiders and standards-based to help keep it future-proofed – and you'll need to consider the amount of traffic it generates and build the site to meet demand.

6 How to keep it real

Websites can live a long time and be quite a liability if they're out of date. Just because you're not actively marketing your site, it doesn't mean it won't pop up in searches and embarrass you, so you need to make sure content is current.