I’ve been thinking about the connection between creating a website and creating a business plan. To me, doing the former is essentially producing the latter.

What I mean is that creating a website isn’t just a design or development exercise—or at least it shouldn’t be. Because crafting one—by which I mean figuring out the information architecture, writing the copy, shaping the story you’re trying to tell and who you’re trying to tell it to—is really an act of interrogation that’s incredibly analogous to writing a business plan.  

Back when we actually wrote business plans, it was, more than anything, a process of distillation, a systematized way of thinking through a business, of looking at each component individually, of surfacing the challenges and opportunities you were seeing. It was a way to take everything that was in your head and map it to an actual document, with actual sections for each area of your business, where you could see it all laid out before you.

When you create a website, if you’re doing it the right way, you’re doing something very similar. You’re asking a lot of the same questions.

• Who is our audience?

• How do we compare to competitors?

• What makes us different?

• How do we want to sound when we communicate?

• Where do we sit in the market?

• What is our brand and market positioning?

• What messaging will resonate?

• What do we believe in?

Thinking about it like this reframes what’s at stake in a website project. Too often, leaders think of a website as a deliverable: a set of pages, some visuals, and a working CMS. But the real value lies upstream, in the strategic work required to make those pieces cohere.

Just as a business plan compels you to segment your market, analyze your competition, and articulate your value proposition, creating a website compels you to tell that story publicly, in a way that your customers immediately understand. It’s a declaration that your organization matters, and that you can help the people and businesses you’re endeavoring to serve.

A business plan is where your strategy becomes visible. A website is where your strategy becomes visible to the world. It’s the artifact that makes your abstract thinking tangible. It’s the place where you surface your best thinking.

And when it’s done right, it’s more than a marketing channel—it’s the clearest, most accessible version of the business itself.