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Lately the number of enquiries we get for web strategy consulting have increased and I guess its a lot to do with people starting to realise that development / technology is very much secondary compared to coming up with a proper focus, identity and the marketing approach for their brand. For most of them though the realization has come little late and have already spent a lot of money into the development phase and it gets really difficult to go back rework the approach.

Certain minimum things need to be done before you head into the development phase -

1. Clearly identify your target audience - the cliche – but then this is seldom done properly ( some amount of Pshychographic analysis helps a lot in designing and conceptualizing the features )

2. Talk to your target audience – call/email/scrap a minimum of 5 people you know and get an honest feedback.( you will realize that a lot of things you have assumed about your audience is way off the mark )

3. Identify the core values of your brand- helps you in coming up with the features or rather removing unwanted features.

4. HAVE A PLAN! ( identify clearly the features for phase I, phase 2 etc , the marketing plan and put in place mechanisms to communicate with your customers – can be email news letters, launch page, blog etc )

5. Do mockups/wireframes – come up with detailed mockups of key pages in your site. ( these can be done on a piece of paper or on a ppt . This gives you a feel of your site and the workflows)

6. Get the visual design done – you may have to get a designer to do this, acts as an input to your development team.

7. Communicate clearly your vision your product/website with the development team. It helps them to identify a suitable technology framework. Most of the times the decision would be whether to develop the site ground up using a framwork or just go for a CMS.

Doing these minimum things will help you save a lot of money and time . Also this would give you that extra space for the change of mind.