Once you have determined the purpose of your web site, you need to try and determine who your target audience will be, what kind of computers they may be using, maybe even the operating system and browser that they use. Are 3rd party plug-ins necessary to view your site? If so, are your potential visitors likely to have the plug-in already?, if not, will they be prepared to download it?

The purpose of your web site will determine how much time that you need to put into researching your intended target audience.

For example, a popular use for a personal home page, is so that relatives and close friends can be kept informed of the latest happenings. Stories of your latest holiday, or photos of your children, home improvements, your new car etc. can be posted to the site and shared with everybody at the same time.

If this is the type of web site that you are creating then your task is very easy. You know all of your visitors on a first name basis, you can safely assume that they will be prepared to wait, for your images to download and if they have a problem viewing parts of your site, then they will let you know and you can fix the problem or maybe advise them that they need to download a particular plug-in.

Another type of site that is very easy to target is a company Intranet. This site is only available to users of the company network. In most cases the computers, operating system and browser will be identical on every computer.

If a plug-in is required, it can be automatically distributed to every machine on the network. You can also be sure that any problems will be reported to the help desk.

Where it starts to get more difficult is when you are creating a site that virtually anybody with an Internet connection can access, from anywhere in the world.

So let's have a look at some of the specifics that you may need to consider.