What shall I base my web site on ?
This is quite a crucial question. Ideally you would be an expert in a market where competition is non-existent and demand is very high. Not very likely though. You need to define an area in which you have an interest, like a hobby, or for which you are willing to do some research and become quite quickly informed about. I would recommend not choosing a highly popular topic as doing a quick web search on it may throw up tens of thousands of pages.. essentially these are your business competitors! Acquire knowledge on a niche topic, or approach a popular subject from a unique angle. If you can narrow down the number of people searching for this topic then you actually stand a better chance of getting visitors to your site. For example, would you want to rank 100,000th on a golf web site engine search (maybe get half a dozen visitors a month if you are lucky) or rank 100th on a base jumping engine search (and get tens of thousands of visitors a month). Remember that it won't just be the die hard topic enthusiasts that will be heading to your site, it will me a myriad of other interested visitors, each with a slightly different agenda.

I have the web site theme (topic), but what do I write about?
This will of course depend on the nature of your site. However there are a few tips that you should adhere to. As a brief introduction to this emerging science, try and follow the following tips. Do not write about things you know nothing about - keep well within your area of knowledge. Do include suitable links that are relevant to your target market. If at all possible, provide something original or useful in the content of your site; ideally some form of reference material will encourage repeat sales/returning customers. Try to allow some form of communication between other users, i.e. a web forum or even a mailing list for your loyal visitors. Starting to get the picture? You need to give the visitors what they want in a form they will find easy to understand and quick to gain access to. Keep fancy graphics to a minimum as they can really slow down page loading time and hence scare off a potential customer/visitor. Lastly, look to other mainstream sites to gain an appreciation of their layout, style and ability to present information clearly. If you follow the subtleties of these sites you will be able to apply the principles to your own web site design and hopefully attract a loyal following.

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