It is an old technique but still effective, get a pen or pencil and a peice of paper and write down your plan. Since we are talking about putting your ideas on the paper, have you ever heard about mind mapping? Though mind mapping is not the topic of discussion here but since I found out how useful it is, I can not stop myself from advising others to give it a try. Back to our discussion, so when you are writing down your plan for the website make sure that It has the following:

1. What you want to do.
2. Do you know how to do it.
3. Your budget.
4. Your long term goal.

You can think about other aspects and ask yourself other questions too. I am not asking you to answer these questions. You can answer them if you want to but just writing them down is also enough to help you understand your position and it will help you achieve your goals more effectively.

What I want to do with my website?

Lets say if you have a small pet shop. You would probably want to do the following with your website.

1. Advertise your shop to new customers.
2. Make an online customer base.
3. Sell your expertise.

You might have different ideas and products to sell. You should be clear about what you want to do with your website and there is no better way than to write down.

How I am Going to do this?

After that you should ask yourself how you are going to do this. By this we mean that do you have the expertise to do that, is your idea technically feasible, are there online resources available to help you achieve your goal which we described in last paragraph. Don’t worry if you don’t have the expertise yet, or if you think your idea is technically difficult to achieve. Web is a great place to learn, you will find free expert advise on almost every topic. But we are writing it down so that we know where we stand.

How much money I can spend on my website?

Now that you know what you want to do and have thought about how to do it. lets think about the costs. The cost of creating a website depends on how you are going to use it. If your plan requires you to host lots and lots of audio and video files then you will need to spend more money on web hosting and bandwidth. If you want to purchase things rather than using the free tools available then your costs would be even higher. A couple of hundered dollars are ok to get you started with a business website. This estimate includes web hosting charges and domain registration and you will be using free tools to achieve your goal.

What are my long term goals?

In the end write down how you want to see your website growing up. Where you want to see it after an year or so. Write down your long term goals in sales or daily visitors to your website. Write about how you want to become from just an ordinary pet shop owner to a web celeberity. Be creative and feel free to write about your idea of success. It is going to keep you motivated and will also help you stay focused during your journey.

Now make a copy of this paper and save the original one in somewhere hidden from your view. We will look into this document after an year and see how much you have achieved. The working copy would keep you motivated and on the track.

This post is part of a series. To read more posts from this series go to “Creating a Small Business Website“.

What is Mind Mapping?
There is a wonderful article on Mind Mapping on Wikipedia. But I liked this definition:

“A knowledge organization tool used to elicit ideas from one or more users by placing a topic in the center of a black space and branching out with related ideas.”

Who can use Mind Mapping?
Any one can use mind mapping technique for their own purposes. For example I am using this technique to come up with post ideas for my blogs and for my other writings. Teachers, students, businesses, professionals, software developers, writers, soccer moms and even grand mothers can benefit from mind mapping techniques.

How to do Mind Mapping?
It is very simple. Take a peice of paper write down something in the center like the goal and purpose of the mind map. Now start branching out new points from the central location. Mind mapping is a tool to use both parts of your brain during the thinking process. Mind map allows you to let your mind do the thinking instead of you forcing yourself to think. With a mind map you draw a diagram of ideas coming to your mind and building on these ideas you add new ones. Click on the mind map below to see a mind map drawn by Danny Stevens illustrating the idea of mind maps:

Danny Stevens' Mind Mapping Guidelines

Many people use many different techniques to do create mind maps. I personally feel that it is totally up to the person to decide how he wants to draw his mind map. Some people use software to create mind maps, some people prefer a plain sheet of paper and pencil. Some use colors and pictures, some use curved branches and some use straight lines. Since the idea is to think freely so it is totally understandable that why there are no strictly define approaches to draw a mind map.

Sample Mind Maps:

The web is full of example mind maps. A good place to look for sample mind maps is “NovaMind’s mind mapping examples“. Below is a sample mind map I draw for a story I am working on:

The Mind Map I created for my story

Mind Mapping Software:
I would strongly suggest that first you try mind mapping on a peice of paper with pencil, pen whatever is available and handy. Once you realised the potential you might feel the need of using a software to draw your mind maps and organize your ideas in more effecient ways. Wikipedia has a list of list of mind mapping software, there are some great free mind mapping software available such as Freemind and VUE. I have used Freemind and I liked it a lot.

There are also lots of proprietory software available. Tony Buzan’s iMindmap is probably the most well known commercial tool for mind mapping. It claims to be officially endoresed and approved by Tony Buzan who claims to have invented the mind mapping technique.

Some people who have used Mind Mapping:
Ava Vampira, a medical student who uses mind maps to take notes.
Raj Dash a freelancer who uses Mind Mapping tells why freelancers should use mind mapping.

Books:

• The Mind Map Book by Tony Buzan and Barry Buzan.
• Mapping the Mind by Rita Carter.
• Idea Mapping: How to Access Your Hidden Brain Power, Learn Faster, Remember More, and Achieve Success in Business by Jamie Nas.
• Visual Thinking: Tools for Mapping Your Ideas by Nancy Margulies; Christine Valenza.