Why would anyone visit this site a second time? Or a third, fourth or fifth time? Does the site have content that people are willing to crawl through sewers to obtain?

Repeat customers are generally the only way an organization survives. Unscrupulous miscreants may trick people into visiting their sites. The problem with deceiving people is simple: they'll visit — once — and never return.

Updating content often is extremely important. Assuming a site is worth visiting, it's the best method for encouraging people to return.

Frequently Updated Information: Update sites as often as possible with meaningful content. Avoid submitting placeholder pages and leaving them unattended.

Contests and Sweepstakes: Contests are a premium method for generating interest in a site. However, contests and sweepstakes involve serious legal issues and are more complicated to conduct than one might imagine. Consult a lawyer about relevant issues.

Tours: Consider providing a tour of the plant on the site if the firm manufactures a product.

Demonstrations: A demonstration should provide the visitor with information they wouldn't find elsewhere. For instance, an herb shop might demonstrate how to create herbal wreaths.

Recipes: Recipes can add spice to sites one might not otherwise consider: ski mountaineering services (backcountry cooking often leaves something to be desired), fireplace shops (food to eat while sitting by the fire) and so on.

Questions And Answers: A Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page generally is a good idea. When a product or service is sold on the 'Net, people will have questions that must be answered.

History: If done well, a history of the organization can be enlightening. However, there's a much greater chance the history will bore the living daylights out of the reader, so the designer must know what to use and what not.

Free Offers: If there's one thing people who use the 'Net love more than life itself, it's free stuff. Legal free offers will attract visitors to the site.

Unique Information: This is the name of the game. What sort of unique information is appropriate for the site to entice people to visit?

Links: Link to sites that might be useful to the business, but aren't competitors. The problem with foreign links is that they invite people to leave the site without returning.

Coupons: If a business has a local presence, coupons are a simple method for adding content to a site. Many people like to use coupons, and offering coupons on a site is an excellent technique for tracking how effectively the site is working. Bear in mind, however, that coupons work best for local businesses.

Tie-Ins: Tie-ins are similar to links except that the site owner is paid for including links to outside pages. In addition to monetary benefits, the site becomes more valuable because content is added to the pages.

Content That Is Bought Or Licensed

Sometimes it's easiest to buy another's content or license its use on a Web site. If it's possible to license this material to include in the site, the designer will appear to be the genius who came up with the idea.

Search the 'Net to determine whether there are interesting sites that would be willing to license content. It could be substantially less expensive — and certainly much easier — than creating it oneself.