As a web site designer I work with clients, but I also talk with online business newbies, and on a regular basis I see that people don't have a clue about what they should have as a web site. They know what they want but they don't realize the need for pre-planning the structure and content of a web site in today's market place, The Internet.

That led me to write this article. I trust it will help new online business owners preplan before they jump right into creating an online business web site that just sits there.

There are step-by-step solutions to online business web site success.

Step #1 - Target Group, finding your best prospects can be the difference between earning pennies and dollars.

Researching your ideal target group is so important that it should be step 1, 2 and 3. New online business owners don't seem to focus their attention on their target audience, instead they seem to think that if they build it people will come, and spend all their hard earned money on your site.

Well I guess it would be silly to make your target group focus as step 1-3, but when you think about it, your target group is all important in online business success and for that reason it should be part of all pre-planning steps. Without a target group you are just wasting your time and cluttering the Internet with more pages that will never be seen or read.

Okay so the first step is to know your target group. Learn all you can about them, because the more you know the more likely you will be to find more ways to sell to them. Plus you will be able to find complimentary products that your target audience would like.

Knowledge is POWER, but only if you apply the knowledge you gain to your Internet marketing and offline marketing.

Just a note about target groups. If you have a hobby that you spend lots of money on you should be setting up an online business to promote what you know best.

Step #2 - Keywords and Phrases your best prospect uses to find what you sell.

Your new online business web site will need to be keyword and content focused for best results. Spend plenty of time learning the keywords and phrases that your best prospect would type into a search engine text box to find exactly what they want.

Learn how to contact your target group and ask them some questions through surveys. The time you spend on learning your target audience will be time well spent and remember that your time is worth money. Everything comes down to your ROI - Return On Investment.

Your time is part of that investment, so make the best of it.

The more you learn the more you can earn, it is as simple as that.

Step #3 - Competition can be a online business destroyer if you are not prepared for it, but learning what they do can actually put you ahead of them in the major search engines.

If you take the time now to learn who you are competing with you will spend far less time changing your web site content later and again time is money. The more time you spend wasting your time the less income you will be earning and the more frustrated you will become. Eventually that leads to either total meltdown and quitting or it forces the Internet marketing newbie to spend the time learning and fixing web site problems.

So you see the time you spend at the beginning in pre planning your online business web site will be a much better ROI than trial and error strategies.

Find your competitor's web sites and learn all you can about their use of keywords and phrases they use to attract their target group. You will also want to view their source code to discover what keywords they use in their title, description and keyword tags.

Step #4 - Find sites that compliment your site and products.

Again your competitors can help you succeed. You can learn about web sites with products and services that would compliment your products and services and that means more income for you.

If you are selling cars you might just want links on your site that would show your prospects how they could improve the appearance or performance of their car.

Always try to make it a win-win situation. You provide the best products and services you can and in turn your target group will come back to your site and buy from you. Plus they will follow the links you have to more products and services.

So like I said from the start...

1. Know your target group

2. Learn the keywords your target group uses to find what you provide.

3. Study your competitors and do what they do for success and then go one step further.

4. Find sites that compliment yours and link with them so you provide better service to your target group.

Once you have done all your research you are ready to build.