An effective website is not just an elaborate brochure that can be hung out in cyberspace and then ignored. Your website has the potential to create a dialogue with your prospective customers and persuade them to do what you want them to. Here are five ways to create a persuasive website architecture that can boost your company's profits.

1. Define your website's purpose

The first step in persuading people is to have a clear idea of what you want them to do. Before you begin to build your website, settle on the goals you want to accomplish. Your choices include generating leads, driving sales, increasing brand trust and awareness, building your mailing list, or a combination of the above.

2. Put yourself in your visitors' shoes

Next, think about what problems your customers have that your business can help them solve. Remember that your customers don't care about your features; they care about how those features can benefit them. A good tip is to scrutinise your website and continually ask the question "SO WHAT?" when faced with a statement or supposed benefit.

Another great tip is to show a bunch of people who know nothing about your business the home page of your website. Ask them each in turn to look at the home page for just ten seconds and then ask them the following questions

"What does this company do?"
"What were the key messages?"
"What is unique about them?"

The emphasis should always be on benefits over features, and the customer over the business.

3. Create user paths that guide your visitors

Now you combine the results of the first two steps to create paths that your visitors can follow through your website. These paths should start with the visitors' problems and end with them fulfilling your goals.

These paths won't be straight lines, but will have multiple points of entry and will allow your visitors to branch off to explore things that interest them. To create these paths, imagine potential customers at different stages of the buying process. What do they each need to know before they would take your desired action?

4. Make your website professional and easy to use

Now that you have defined your user paths, you need to convince your site visitors to stay around long enough to follow them. There are two important aspects to this: