When deciding what type of website to build, you first need to answer two basic questions: The topic of the website and what problem you intend to solve.

Choosing the topic for your website

In order for your website to be successful, it needs to be focused on a specific topic. That topic can be as narrow or broad as you want it to be, but it should be related to something you enjoy writing about, and something you'll still be interested in 2-3 years from now.

There are two reasons that the website needs to be focused.  First, people visiting your site are there for a reason. If there is a lot of quality information related to that reason, they will click past the first page, look around, bookmark your site, return to it, and tell their friends about it. If the site is scatterbrained with many different topics, your visitors will likely not find what they're looking for, hit the back button, and never return.

The second reason has to do with the way modern search engines such as Google work. When somebody links to another page, Google looks at the topics involved on both pages to help determine what it's about.  For example, the word "ship" might be talking about a large boat, something that flies through space, or the process of moving something from one place to another. Therefore, to determine the right meaning of the page, the search engine looks at the information on that page as well as the information on pages linking into it, in other words, the rest of the pages on your website. If other pages on your site talk about product shipping methods, the search engine will assume that your page is about that rather than space ships. Search result pages are sorted by relevancy, and people visit the first couple of listings far more than the rest.

Choosing a topic that you're interested in will make it a lot more fun than writing about something you find boring. Your enthusiasm will show itself on your pages, and your readers will pick up on that and respond much more positively.

The Problem Your Website Will Solve

The old saying of "find a need and fill it" applies here. What problems exist that you're able to solve? There are millions of websites. How is yours going to be different from all the others?  Do you have in-depth knowledge on the subject that others will want to know? Do you have a product or service to sell related to that? The solution will help you determine what methods will work best when dealing with your revenue streams.

Sites that people visit for their informational value, especially when they are in a buying mood, are able to do well selling ads and making affiliate sales. Sites that provide unique features can do well selling subscriptions. Shopping cart sites are, of course, there for those wanting to directly sell products and services.

Knowing what the point of your site is, before you begin building it, is very important.  Everything on your site needs to back up this purpose. If you're selling something, then everything needs to direct somebody to the 'buy now' button. I've heard this being referred to as the banana, the carrot, or the call to action.  Once somebody gets to your site, it's your job to get as many of them to the purpose of your site as quickly and efficiently as possible. If it's a community, like ProSPOTLIGHT, then the goal is to get as many visitors registering as possible. If it's a business site, then the goal might be to get people to the contact page or to sign up for a newsletter.  If it's a branding site, then perhaps the goal is to get people to the 'email this to a friend' page.

With ad supported sites, the first priority should be to have a great site where people want to come back, and they want to tell their friends about it. Ads should come second. The reason for this is because it's better to have a 1% ad click-thru rate on 100k visitors than a 5% click-thru rate on 1k visitors. 1000 ad clicks is better than 50. By putting the visitor first, more will visit.  If you put the ad first, far less will visit and they won't return as often.

Next Step

Once you know what the topic of your website is going to be about and the solution you're going to provide your visitors, the next step is to figure out where your revenue streams are going to come from.