I was checking on the status of our trademark application today and realized that there are still two more months to go before it is reviewed and finalized. Frustrated with the waiting, I decided to tackle another project that must necessarily be put on hold: the winery website. So I started writing out a design document.
It is still too early to commit to anything, but I want to keep a record of what I want based on the tech available today, and compare it to what I will be able to get a year from now for comparable cash. Some things I want (a single screen shopping cart made using AJAX, a mash up of common web techniques and script) will be more common in a year, and probably less expensive to have developed. Others shouldn’t change much at all.
There’s a long list of things that bring a person to a winery website, including looking for photos, recipes, technical details, driving directions, signing up for mailing lists or wine clubs, and even buying some wine (!). Still I’d like to have some entertaining stuff on there as well. Perhaps a video on the winery with our story, maybe some photos of my lovely wife slopping fruit into macro bins, covered head to toe in grape juice…
But I digress.
What would you like to see? Is there something that you always hope to see when you visit a winery website that is never there? I’d love any feedback.
I’d like to see your site be designed for regular updates to the home page, since many winery Web sites aren’t. Of course, I’d like to see it score 100 on our visitor-effectiveness rating!