So you're thinking about launching a Web site? Before you dive in, it's a good idea to step back, take a deep breath, and try to see the big picture.

If you ask most companies why they have a Web site, they'll tell you "because the competition does." Here's a radical thought: Forget the Web for a minute. Think about what communication needs you and your customers have now and might have in the future. Are you able to fulfill them using more traditional technology, be it phone, fax, or e-mail? If you can, you just saved yourself a lot of time, trouble, and expense because you don't need a Web site. If, however, you can identify some room for improvement, then perhaps establishing a presence on the World Wide Web is the right move.

Begin by determining what your Web site objectives are: Do you want to generate business leads? A Web site makes it easy for potential customers to find you, and find out about you. Your online storefront or office can be open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Do you want to reduce distribution costs of promotional material? For example, consider a typical corporate brochure. How much does it cost to print the brochure, stuff it in an envelope, address it, and put a stamp on it? Although your site shouldn't be simply an online brochure, what if you could deliver similar information, immediately and internationally, via the Web? (If you are sensitive to environmental issues, keep in mind that you'd also be saving trees.)

Do you want to provide the latest new product information to customers or build a database for communicating directly with them? Changing the information on a Web site makes more fiscal sense than phoning, faxing, or postal-mailing your customers every time you want to let them know about new products or services. If you give visitors to your site an incentive to give you their e-mail address, you can also send them inexpensive e-mail updates on your company (assuming you get their permission first).

Do you want to survey customers and create new business opportunities? Your corporate Web site could be a cost-effective way to qualify potential customers and get valuable feedback from existing ones. You can also use your site to experiment with ideas by showcasing a product prototype online and sampling surfers' opinions.

Do you want to increase international distribution and market penetration? Rather than set up a physical office in another country, consider breaking into that market using the international reach of the Internet. A Web site is no substitute for the real thing, but it could be a cost-effective way to establish a beachhead in a new territory.

Do you want to conduct electronic commerce? Now that secure online payment is a reality, you can complete sales transactions without having to go through (and lose a percentage to) a distributor. Is your current method of fulfillment expensive or inefficient? Maybe a Web site could help cut costs.

Do you want to reduce your customer-service costs? Dedicated Customer service phone lines are expensive for a company and often frustrating for its customers. You could save a fortune by moving customer service to the Web.

Do you want to support your existing advertising and marketing efforts? TV commercials are great, but what if they work (heaven forbid!) and the viewer wants more information about your products or services? The Web could be the perfect way to satisfy this potential customer's thirst for info.

Do you want to provide product directions to your customers? Put your instruction manuals online and update them based on customer feedback so that the manuals are always up-to-date.

Now that you've determined what your Web site objectives are, you'll also want to ensure that you don't make some of the more common Web site mistakes.

So how do you avoid making these kinds of mistakes? Begin by knowing your goal. It is amazing how many companies launch Web sites without asking themselves why. Remember that content is king. Sure, it's a hackneyed expression, but if your Web site is not going to contribute anything of value and substance to the online world, why bother?

Keep the content on your Web site fresh; you cannot allow your site to remain static. Plan to update the site a minimum of once a week or do not launch it in the first place.

Be sure to integrate the Web initiative with that of the company's. It's still not uncommon for the folks from marketing to discover, usually to their horror, that the folks from the computer department have already put their company on the Web. It's time for some of these departments to bury the hatchet.

Think about the experience you're offering. Your company's annual reports and press releases might be of interest to a portion of your visitors, but your content should go beyond this minimum effort.

For many companies, it is better to think customer service, rather than selling. Heavy-handed online sales pitches do not work. Helping your customers find what they need does--even if this means linking to the competition!

Do not ignore the power of e-mail. All this talk of the Web obscures the fact that plain old e-mail is a powerful tool. Use it to correspond with customers, create a customer-support mailing list, set up auto responders that will send prewritten information to anyone who writes in, or create a monthly e-newsletter that goes out to preferred customers.

Make it easy for people to get to your content. Web surfers are not going to wait more than 10 seconds for your home page to load. If they have to wade through endless screens to get to what they want, they will quickly give up. Remember, there is no such thing as a Web site that's too straightforward.

Take advantage of the unique characteristics of the medium. The Web is an interactive, real-time, two-way medium. Lose sight of this and you will soon have a "ghost site" on your hands.

So how much does a Web site cost? I used to cringe when people would ask me this, until I came up with the perfect reply: "How long is a piece of string?"That's because the cost of a Web site varies greatly, depending on your requirements. A basic but professionally designed corporate site could be created for as little as Rs. 75,000. But you could also pay anywhere from two to 20 times that amount. Factoring in the cost of content updating and maintenance can easily add 50 percent to 100 percent to the budget. This is why it's so important to define your objectives at the outset.

The next big decision you may face is whether to develop the Web site in-house or outsource the work to a Web development firm. Launching a Web site involves a range of elements and activities that can be daunting: content structure and production, server (host computer) hardware acquisition and configuration, server software acquisition and configuration, Internet access, and ongoing content and technology maintenance. You have to be brutally honest in evaluating your internal resources. Do you have the necessary expertise? What about content-creation skills? What about the technology?

Consider the personnel required: To develop the site in-house will require an experienced producer and/or project manager, a writer and/or editor, a graphic artist and/or designer, an HTML layout person, and a CGI/Java/ActiveX programmer. In addition, you'll need computer workstations for each of them and all the latest software. Then there's training and, well, you can see how this quickly adds up.

Then there's the issue of hosting your Web site. To host a site in-house requires you to have your own server, server software, power-supply backup system, router, firewall, high-speed Internet connection, leased line and all the available tech support, which could easily cost you Rs. 15 to 20 lakhs per year. In most cases, it makes much more sense to have your Web site hosted on a third-party server farm, which would cost only Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 45,000 per year.

You should be sure you're capable of developing a Web site completely in-house. How much money will you really save if the finished product takes forever to launch or ends up looking like the work of amateurs?

If you decide to outsource the project to a Web developer, you're going to want to make sure you choose the right one. Following is a ruthless "tip sheet" to help separate the winners from the wanna-bes:

Does their business card have an e-mail address on it? A URL? If they do not use the medium, how good can they be at creating for it?

What is their corporate Web site like? Their own site should represent their shining hour. Does it load quickly?

What are the URLs of some of the sites they have created? What are they like? What kind of impression do they give you of the type of business they represent? Would you return to these sites?

How long have they been doing this? The Web as most people know it has been around a few years. An "experienced" developer is expected to have had at least a year of Web site building experience.

How do they stay on top of new developments? What conferences and trade shows do they attend? What magazines do they read regularly? Which newsgroups do they frequent? What industry associations do they belong to?

What other types of communication projects do they work on regularly? The Web is an amalgamation of many media. Does the firm have a background in print, video, or, even better, multimedia design?

Do they truly understand communications, marketing, advertising, and video? Ask to see their complete portfolio. What kind of work have they done in the past? If it's not related to communications, you are wasting your time.

Do they fully grasp the limitations of current Internet technology? Try looking at their sites via a typical user's 28.8-Kbps modem and a 16-color monitor. A good Web developer knows how to design for the lowest common denominator.

Do they have experience with sophisticated programming languages and other technologies? They should know Unix, CGI, Java, ActiveX, and Shockwave, or at least have access to freelancers that do.

Do they do custom software development? How were the interactive features on the previous sites they built created? Did they write the programs themselves, or did they use someone else's code?

What tools do they use to streamline the development process? How do they handle image and file labeling and management? What systems do they have in place to make the development process more efficient?

Do they understand your organization's objectives and goals? They will demonstrate this by asking you lots of questions, not trying to sell you on lots of technological gimmicks.

Do they offer marketing and public relations services and support? Promoting a Web site online takes a lot more than just submitting it to a couple of search engines. An experienced Web developer will know the secrets of getting your site noticed.

Concept Development (business, creative, technical). This is the most important stage because time spent here will save a lot of money and headaches down the road. All parties should agree on the objectives, prioritize them, and turn them into a detailed design document--the architectural "blueprint" of the site that outlines the key components. Who is involved? Ideally this would be a project manager of some kind representing your company, and the Web developer.

Specifications and Planning. Here's where you iron out the technical details of who does what and when. Set delivery dates and timelines, which help form the budget. Once again, this is a collaboration between the project manager and the Web developer.

Creative Direction. A design bible needs to be created, outlining the general look and feel, as well as navigation, of your site. Out of this could come templates for the various key pages, as well as a color palette and other visual branding definitions. This stage might involve your in-house art director or designer, the project manager, and the Web developer.

Content Production. If you have existing content such as graphics and text, it will need to be converted into file formats used on the Web. Despite all the apparently "easy-to-use" tools on the market, there is a lot more to this than meets the eye. New content will need to be created as well, which is likely to involve the work of graphic artists, writers, and editors.

Content Integration. All your content needs to be formatted for Web pages. Doing this right takes considerable time, plus at least one pass by a proofreader. The Web developer and its HTML layout people will handle this.

Software Integration. Unless your site is extremely basic, various programs will need to be tweaked or written specifically to allow certain interactive features, such as online database queries. The Web developer and its programming specialists usually handle this.

Testing and Quality Control. Rigorous testing must be performed on the site, both from a technical and content perspective. Will the hardware stand up to the demands of a lot of visitors? Are there spelling errors and typos on the pages? Can Macintosh users view the pages as easily as Windows users? Everyone should be involved in this stage.

Launch and Marketing. If you build it, they still may not come. Your Web site requires continuous promotion, both via traditional media and on the Internet. The marketing folks in your company can prepare the official press release, but it's unlikely they have the expertise to promote the site online. Look to the Web developer or an online public relations and marketing firm to handle this delicate task. There are a few Public Relations companies in India, who have recently added online promotions to thier portfolio as well.

Content and Technology Maintenance. The content of your site needs to be updated frequently and checked for accuracy. Ideally, you will have someone on staff willing and able to do this, even if all they have to do is answer e-mail. Farming out new content development to the Web developer is another option, albeit a potentially expensive one. The computer hardware also requires constant attention. This means either hiring a Webmaster to monitor and maintain your in-house equipment or arranging for your Web site content to be hosted on a third-party server farm.

Tracking Usage. You are going to want to gauge the activity on your site so that you can determine what is working and what is not. For simple statistics and visitor information, look to one of the off-the-shelf software packages. If you require detailed independent auditing of usage, perhaps because you are selling advertising on your site, you will probably need to hire a Web auditing firm.

As you can see, a great deal of thought and planning should go into your Web site long before any visitors arrive. Don't let this intimidate you. What really counts in the long run is the desire and ability to learn what works and what doesn't. Get your feet wet; you'll be swimming in no time!