There are just 3 basic types of web sites:

1 » Traffic Sites

2 » Content Sites

3 » Sales Sites

These types are distinguished by their underlying structure, purpose, and relation to the rest of the web. (Any specific web page or web site can have elements of more than one category.)

The key to understand any web site is the primary purpose of a page or group of pages.

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The distinguishing feature of a content site is that the visitor comes to the site for something at the site, something the visitor is given at the site itself (something to read, see, hear, or do).

Text-based information, although commonly understood as "content," is not the only type of content. There are endless other sorts of content that a web site can provide:

• photographs,
• music,
• audio,
• video,
• free downloads,
• message boards,
• online services,
• games,
• free email accounts.

Variations of Content Sites

Community Sites provide content in the form of interactive services, such as message boards, forums, and classified ads. Visitors attracted to that content, then provide even more in the form of postings, etc. Although communities can attract a lot of traffic through this uniquely self-perpetuating content, their main purpose is not to send it somewhere else.

Membership Sites restrict access to the content to members. (The main membership site may have a sales page doorway, where visitors are persuaded to become members.)

Brochure Sites are online versions of conventional printed business brochures usually providing "About Us" and similar kinds of information. (If the brochure site also makes a "pitch" to generate leads for the business or to sell goods or services, then it has a sales site component as well.)

Personal Pages are simply personal content sites.

You can identify a content page by asking:

• Do visitors come to this page for something found on this page?
• Is this a place where visitors come to 'hang out'?

If the answer is "yes" to either of these questions, then you are looking at a content site.

The distinguishing feature is "the pitch," or some form of persuasive communication.

The sales site or page seeks to convince the visitor to make a purchase, join something, make an inquiry, or do something else. The most common goals are to make sales or to attract leads for future sales.

Sales page sites can offer just about anything to the visitor, including hard goods, digital goods, online services, off-line services, subscriptions, and access to a content site.

Variations of Sales Sites

Sales Letter Sites are the most basic form of sales site, focusing on a single product or service. They can be as small as one to five pages.

Stores are sales sites that offer multiple products. In essence, they are sales pages multiplied.

Malls are a combination of traffic and sales site. The purpose of a mall is to attract traffic that it then drives to the individual sales pages or stores within the mall itself, instead of directing the traffic to external sites.

Auction Sites are similar to malls, but the traffic is driven to sales pages that are temporary rather than permanent.

You can identify a sales page by asking:

• Is the main purpose of this page to convince visitors to do something?
• Does this page ask visitors to make a decision?

If the answer is "yes," then you are looking at a sales page or site.

Each of the 3 types of web sites has a fundamentally different purpose -- and thus a different relationship with visitors:

1 » Traffic Sites send visitors somewhere else.

» Traffic pages answer the question "Where?"

2 » Content Sites give visitors something at the site.

» Content pages answer the question "What?"

3 » Sales Sites persuade visitors to make a decision to do (or not do) something.

» Sales pages answer the question "Why?"

These purposes compete with each other for visitor attention. Visitors simply can't respond to all three things at the same time -- yet many web sites are built as if they could. It is easy to undermine the most important purpose of a web page -- simply by confusing the types of pages. For example, a typical mistake is sending visitors somewhere else when the intended goal is to persuade visitors to buy. Successful business web sites are built with a clear understanding of purpose.

As you plan and build your small business web strategy, understanding the types of web sites, their purposes -- and their distinctive relationships with visitors -- will help you

1 » develop ideas for your own internet business web site

2 » understand your competitors' web sites, and

3 » understand other web sites that you will help you achieve your objectives.

Each type of web site lends itself more readily to some ways to make money, some methods of promotion, and some kinds of business investments. The important thing is to build a web site that works with the way you plan to make money on the internet, what you can invest into your internet business, and with your web site marketing plan (how you plan to interact with visitors). 

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