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What do you expect to accomplish with your web site?
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Who do you expect to use it? Customers? Vendors? Employees?
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How many visitors per day, week, and month do you expect?
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How will you advertise and promote the site to get people to use it?
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Who will do the marketing?
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What capabilities (online ordering, live chat, message boards, databases, audio, video, etc.) will you need?
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Will you have an online catalog?
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How many items will you include?
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How many sizes and colors or other variations will be involved?
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Where will the photography and copy come from?
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How often will you have to update the web site?
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Who will do the updates?
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Who will design the web site?
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What will it cost to design the web site?
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What will it cost to host the site (store the files and make them available on the Internet)?
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Will your current merchant account allow you to sell on the Internet?
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Will it allow you to automate transaction entry so that you do not have to retype all the data your customer enters online?
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What it will cost to advertise and promote the web site?
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What will it cost to make changes on your web site?
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Will you have to hire employees to manage your web site?
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How many sales or leads will you need to break even on costs?
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What sale volume do you expect to achieve on the web?
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How much income, if any, do you expect to make from the sale of advertising on your site?
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Who will sell the advertising space for you?
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How soon do you need to reach your goals?
Use the answers to these questions to determine what it will cost to build the site and maintain it. Then compare your costs to the results you hope to achieve and determine if the cost will justify the results.