by Julia Hyde, 7/6/2005

There's no quick or easy way to write copy for your website. In fact, you should do several things before you even begin to put pen to paper-or fingers to keyboard. And most of it involves a lot of legwork.

First, you need a master plan that takes into account what you what to achieve, who your potential customers are, why they'll want to buy your product or service, and what information they'll need to make a purchasing decision. You can't just make this stuff up on a whim. You've got to get stuck into some serious research. To help you out, here's a brief laundry list of things to do before you get started.

Know your objectives.

This may seem obvious but many people who want to sell online have no idea what they want to achieve. In fact, it's surprising how many people put up a website just because they think they need one. What's the purpose of your site? Do you want to sell products or services? Generate leads? Promote your brand? Build a datebase? Place your product catalog online to complement or do away with your print version?

What information will your visitors need? Put yourself in their shoes. If you're selling a product, what will your customers need to know about it in order to make a purchase? What kind of things influence their purchases? Is it a major purchase they'll need time to think about? Or is it a small, low or medium cost item they won't need to put a lot of thought into before they buy? You really need to know all this before you begin to think about writing anything. Because if you don't, you'll end up writing the wrong words, in the wrong style, for the wrong people.