Time is money and a lot of time and money is wasted when business owners don’t take time to plan what they want from their website design. After working with several U.S. based and Australian website designers, I’ve found that it’s not uncommon for businesses to expect a quick delivery of a new or reworked website. Progress can really get bogged down if you don’t work through a preliminary step.

If you are working with website designers in Australia, India, the U.S or anywhere, you risk having project delays when you haven’t properly thought through one critical area. Also, if your web design consultant doesn’t spend time learning more about your business before implementing a website, there’s a good chance you’ll be disappointed with the final product. Here are some areas to work through before you sit down with your Australian website designers.

Who is Your Target Audience?

It’s proven over and over again, successful websites cater to a very specific audience. This is often difficult for business owners to grasp as there is a tendency for them to want a generic company website. By targeting a specific audience, the content on your website is also more specific. Having a brand strategy really helps in this area. Understanding the overall focus for your brand helps the web design team select appropriate keywords, plan navigation and content. This strategy captures people searching for that specific keyword and those people on the perimeter are drawn in to your website, too.

For example, you have a tightly defined website developed to appeal to "athletes with foot problems." Your web pages are optimized for that topic they begin to rank well in search engine results. In fact, athletes with foot problems find your web pages. However, analysis of traffic shows people searching for "seniors with foot problems" and "children with foot problems" are likely to come across your pages, too.

Here is another great example where a business focused their website on their core product, in this case, coffee. Look at Australia’s Muzz Buzz dot com website. Their frontline product is premium coffee. They also offer fruit specials, cold drinks, bagel sandwiches and donuts. When you look at their website you are greeted by a design clearly branded around coffee. They targeted people looking for drive-thru premium coffee shops. Their Australian website designers understood the concept of using a highly targeted approach to capture a wider audience.