When looking to set up their own website, what are people looking for?

[Winklet Web Design]

What do people want in a website for their own business or portfolio? Likes and dislikes about certain types of sites or designs? budget limitations?

[just "JR"]

You said "business"...
Most business people do not have a clue what the web is, or have listen to family members (who know nothing either) and tell you HOW to build the site...
A business website has two purposes:
- SELL products,
- be a PRESENCE on the web.
A business website is NOTHING MORE than a business card or an entry in the "yellow pages".
As there are a few billions websites, your entry is one line in a list of billions, whatever SEO you do...

What do you want for a business website?
1. It must be a true representation of your business.
2. It must target your marketing coverage (what's the point of marketing your bakery outside your town, to the World? You hope to get an order from Russia if you are in the US????)
3. It must be studied and developed following your MARKETING principles (It purpose it to sell, not entertain!).
4. It must be PART of your marketing strategy, not your marketing strategy as a whole! (Remember: it is only a business card!)

What type of design?
Well, anything, really, as long as it is attractive and has the "feel" that your CLIENTS expect! If you sell wax candles to churches, no real point of having a psychedlic type of graphics with hard rock music!

Budget?
This is the biggest catch! 99.99999% of people set a budget for their website, but they don't set aside a budget for the ADVERTISING of their website.
In general (and by experience), the advertising of a website requires a 20 to 30 folds of development costs expense in advertising, and that is JUST FOR THE LAUNCH!
You can spend 5k on the site, and no advertising, your site WILL NOT SELL.
You can spend $200 on the site development, but 5k on advertising, and IT WILL SELL!
I keep saying that every day, but it seems that no-one listen... (well, probably 0.00001% of people)

[Ted]

As Just JR has mentioned marketing your website is very important BUT , why to spend on adverising when we have free social platforms like FB, Twitter etc...

People are looking for Social Media Integration, E-commerce, Better display(showcase), easy to update, better security, ample space, SEO optimised for free traffic.

I think this is enough.