“I’m sorry” I said, and put down the sandwich. “But I don’t really understand what you’re trying to do here. I know you want a website that has something to do with these cars, but what is this site for?“ Link >>

AListApart checks in with an article that resonated with me.

Author Greg Storey recounts a “balloon popping” moment, whereby he deflated a sure-to-fail web project with one question - What is this site for?.

So many times people—good, honest, hardworking intelligent people - go down the path of creating a website without asking the hard but necessary questions - what’s the site for? Who is supposed to come? Why will they come, and what will they do here?

In the past I’ve been reluctant to call myself a consultant, because far too much money has been wasted on tech “consultants” who didn’t bring any value to the table. But lately I’ve been peripherally involved with some web projects where there was obviously no one providing counsel to the client—guiding them to making the right decisions for their audience and their business model.

What kind of decisions? Simple - but crucial - things like using large, high-contrast fonts, minimal animation, and static menus (vs expanding/collapsing menus) for an site that plans to have an older audience.

But in order to make those decisions you first have to set the strategy.

It’s that counsel, that strategy-building, that “what’s this site supposed to do” question-asking that I specialize in here at Boyink Interactive.