It's hard to find an exact scientific formula for what makes a good website. You can definitely find some guidelines to follow that will help you create a well-made website, but until you actually have a website up and running, you'll never know whether or not it can be classed in the good website ideas category.
I've had just as many failed websites as I have successful ones. Actually, I've probably had more failures than successes. It comes with the territory.
Coming Up With Good Website Ideas – The Good News
You don't need to come up with a master plan or a brilliant innovation in order to have a good site. Something like Amazon.com is beyond most of us.
That said, you can still create a very good website that provides value to its users. If you're providing answers and information that people are looking for, then you've probably got yourself a good website.
Don't panic that you need to be a genius. The reality is far from it!
What Is A Good Website?
A good website has to be engaging and interesting to its visitors. If people aren't interested, they will leave, and your website becomes just another abandoned piece of Internet Real Estate floating around in the ether.
It also needs to have no spam. Remember 10 years ago when you might find a website that was just filled with keywords and offered no real content or value?
Luckily, the Internet is moving away from that trend. Websites like that are certainly not good. No spam!
There's a simple formula you can follow for finding success with a website.
Problem + Solution = Success.
Let me break that down. There are people who have a problem (it could be anything), and your website provides a solution to that problem (you recommend a product for example), and that leads to success.
As long as you present the solution in an honest, truthful way, you are good to go.
A website also needs to be easy to use and visually appealing. Nobody wants to see a wall of text or read an essay. We want images, videos, aesthetic use of graphics and color, and most importantly, we want it to be easy to use your site.
Make clear menus and navigation bars. Guide us around your site. Link to relevant pages. Internet users have very short attention spans and if you don't make your site easy and engaging, they will leave very quickly.
Choosing A Topic For A Site
There's no resitrction about what kind of site could be a good idea. Any topic can lead to a successful website. Whether successful for you is defined by how many visitors you get, or by how much money the site generates is also irrelevant. Every niche can do well.
Niche?
A niche website is built around a small subcategory, focusing on a specific subject. Let's take “health” for example. You won't be able to build a successful website around such a broad subject.
If you narrowed it down to “Teenage Acne” or “Pregnancy and nutrition” for example, you'd get a lot more success.
This isn't just because your site would have less competition, but because you would appeal to everyone who visited. If I am looking for an answer to a very specific question, I want to visit a site which focuses in that area.
I'll be much more likely to trust their expertise, and I'd probably stick around and see what else appealed to me.
I'm sure you can relate to that.
A final reason to choose a niche is because you want to write about what you know and care about. It's a lot easier to become an authority on a smaller subject, and chances are every one of you reading this knows one or two niche subjects that they can help others with.
Read more: Choosing a niche.
How Do You Learn All This?
I hope I've let you appreciate that a good website idea really could be anything. The key is not to get too caught up in the idea, but to learn how to build a website users will love. The “topic” or “idea” is not the most important thing.
Let's recap:
A good website will:
- Provide value to its visitors (information, solutions, even entertainment)
- Not spam or over promote
- Be easy to use and navigate
- Specialize in a niche, not be too broad
- Value its visitors above its income
You can learn all of this with ease.
Learning how to build and operate successful websites is a very straight forward process. It takes time and some hard work, but it's not difficult to understand. If you can use email, you'll be able to use a website.
I've created a 7 day email course just for people like you want to learn. It's a free course, and I'll send you an email every day for 7 days, slowly bringing you up to speed. A week from now you'll be ready to turn your website ideas into real websites.