Planning Your Web Site

                  Determine its Purpose

                       What do you want people to know or do after they visit
                         your site?

                            Once you identify your main reason for your Web Site, keep that goal in
                                       mind as you design your site.

                       Who do you want your audience to be?

                            Plan a Web Site that will attract your desired audience. Take note of their
                                      background, age, and interests.

                       What information do you want to share with your Web Site
                         visitors?

If you're not sure, it's beneficial to browse similar sites for ideas                    and to determine what type of information you're comfortable                    sharing.

                       What kind of information, if any, do you want to gather from
                         your visitors?

                                    Some of the data   you can obtain is personal information to determine
                                        your audience, contact  information for future discussions, comments
                                        and suggestions concerning your site, or student  evaluations of your
                                        course.
                                        Consult these forms for examples.
                               

                   Organizing Your Web Site

                       How many pages will your Web Site need?

                            Deciding what information each Web page should contain will give you
                                       a good idea of how many pages your site should consist of.

                  How do you want to hyperlink them to each other?

                            All Web sites have a starting page, or home page, that welcomes
                                       visitors and serves as a starting point which links to the rest of the site.
                                       If you wish to minimize the number of pages in your site, you can use
                                       the bookmark option which locates specific information within the same
                                       page.
                                        (The Recap links at the bottom of this page are bookmarks.)

                  How would you prefer your visitors to explore your Web Site?
                        Do you want the user to be able to get to any page from the
                        home page, or do you want to guide the user through a specific
                        set of pages?

                            In a small Web site, it's fine to have every page accessible from the home
                                       page, but in more complicated Web sites, the home page can become
                                       cluttered with hyperlinks.

                  Create a flowchart to help visualize your Web Site:

                Recap

            Determine the purpose of your Web Site:
                            goals ~ audience ~ information

                   Plan the structure and organization of your Web Site:
                            pages ~ hyperlinks ~ flowchart

                        * all notes taken from Lesson 1 of Microsoft FrontPage 98 Step by Step, Microsoft Press 1997.